Sword of Shadows

by Karin Rita Gastreich

  “Your sister? I did not know you had a sister.” In all the years they had played music for Mage Corey, Kahlil had never mentioned his family.

  “She died.” His eyes met hers. “She and the man she loved.”

  “I’m sorry,” Adiana said. “I’m very sorry.”

  He exhaled as if to dismiss the memory. “It happened a long time ago.”

  Still he did not return the plant. Adiana glanced at the ground beneath them, surreptitiously searching for another, though she had little hope of finding one.

  Bloodswort is a lonely herb, Eolyn had said. It hides from many eyes, including our own.

  “I have spoken with Prince Mechnes,” Kahlil brought her focus back to him. “He has given permission for you to sit with us when we rehearse. That is, if it be your will.”

  Adiana did not like the sound of her laughter. It was high pitched and broken, the laugh of a madwoman. “He said that? If it be my will?”

  “No.” The frown on Kahlil’s face deepened. There was sympathy in his eyes, and she despised him for it.

  As if he could understand. As if anyone could possibly understand.

  “No. This is what I say: If it be your will, Adiana. We would be honored to have you sit with us.”

  She turned away so he would not see her wipe the sting from her eyes. “I cannot make music anymore. This is no place for music. There is no melody left in my soul.”

  For a long while, Kahlil said nothing. Then he stepped close and said in a low voice, “All of us live at the mercy of gods and kings. But as long as we have music, we have our freedom. They cannot touch us inside our songs. You knew this once. You must remember it now.”

  Her throat constricted painfully.

  He offered her the wilted plant. “Promise me this will not kill you.”

  “Kill me?” She glanced up at him in surprise. “No, it won’t kill me. Well, it might, if I were to take enough. But I’m far too cowardly to kill myself.”

  “Cowardly?” He furrowed his brow, as if that were the last word that would have come to his mind. “You said it is mixed with other herbs. What else do you use?”

  “Angelica. Coltsfoot. Hemlock. But this is the most important.”

  “Then I will find more of these plants for you.” When she did not respond, he added, uncertainty in his voice, “Shall I send for you, then, when we rehearse?”

  Adiana shrugged and looked away. Her gaze drifted southeast, toward where Eolyn’s Aekelahr once stood, where all her instruments had perished in flames, their ashes scattered by cruel and unrepentant Gods.

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Penamor’s Rage

  Taesara’s uncle stormed in unannounced, scattering servants and ladies like a fox among chickens. “Get out! All of you.”

  The Queen’s attendants departed with startled faces and murmured protests. Only Sonia remained at her side, clasping Taesara’s hand with the clawed grip of a small bird.

  “A bolder harlot I have never seen!” Lord Penamor rumbled, his footfalls heavy on the stone floor as he paced in front of them.

  Taesara shifted her position against the pillows, but there was no escaping the persistent cramp in her lower back. She forced calm into her voice. “So it is true. Sonia heard whispers of the servants this morning. It is said the witch appeared last night and stayed with him until dawn.”

  “Those eyes of hers, like smoldering coals of midnight lust.” Penamor’s words dripped with venom, but his gaze seemed caught inside a forbidden thought. “She distracts every man in her presence, yet the King allows her to stand among us as an equal, as one of his own council, as if she knew anything of war.”

  “It has long been said that he is much taken with her.”

  “Taken.” Penamor snorted. “Bewitched, more like. That woman should have burned with the rest of the magas.”

  “She is not a maga,” Lady Sonia said beneath her breath. “She is nothing but a common witch.”

  “Witch. Maga. Sorceress. Harlot.” Penamor spat out each word. “They are all the same.”

  “A true maga would not have seduced a king,” Sonia said.

  A scowl crossed Penamor’s face. He jabbed a finger toward Sonia while addressing Taesara. “Why did this woman remain when all were told to leave?”

  “Because I bade her to remain, uncle,” Taesara said. “Sonia has studied the magas, as you well know. I thought her knowledge might be of use to both of us, under the circumstances.”

  Penamor pinned the lady-in-waiting with a hard gaze. “Do you have a curse we can use to rid ourselves of this witch?”

  Sonia pursed her lips.

  “Well?” Penamor prompted.

  “I do not pretend to know their spells and potions. What I offer is some insight to their history and teachings.”

  The ambassador eyed her with contempt. “The Mage King is siring a bastard on that whore even as we speak, and you would give us a history lesson.”

  “Uncle!”

  “I say only what needs to be said, Taesara. What have you done these past years, with all your beauty, all your grace? After the many sacrifices your father made to secure this marriage, have you nothing more to show than this? A scrawny girl, a dead prince, and a whore in your husband’s bed.”

  “I will not stand for these insults!” Anger rose hot in Taesara’s veins. “Our family was mad to think I could appease the Mage King. Needlepoint you taught me, and riding. Charity and stylish dress. Songs and clever dialogue, demure dances and quiet obedience. These were the tools, you said, that would win the love of a king. But this king does not love me. He loves only that woman, who brings him the two things he most desires: magic and war.”

  “A king’s greatest desire is a son,” Penamor growled. “Give him that, and he will love you.”

  Taesara’s heart contracted painfully. “It is too late. Indeed, there was never a hope to begin with.”

  “Curse you, Taesara!” Penamor pounded his fist into the wall. “I will not listen to this nonsense. You will find a way back into the Mage King’s favor and deliver him a prince.”

  Taesara frowned and turned away. The last of her son’s blood had not yet drained from her womb, and already they demanded she conceive another.

  What a bitter duty this is.

  To suffer under the Mage King’s weight, longing for tenderness that she knew would never come, stifling cries of pain so as not to displease him. And the silence that filled her chambers after he left: dark and impenetrable like his heart, comforting only in its capacity to hide her tears.

  “My Lord Penamor,” Sonia volunteered quietly, “already my Queen has suffered the worst of losses at the hands of this woman. If you have any love for your niece, you must surely see that—”

  “Love for my niece?” Penamor strode toward them and stood over the bed much like the King had on the day of Taesara’s miscarriage, an ogre ready to strike at the slightest provocation. “My love and my duty are for my kingdom, the security of which rests on my niece’s capacity to please the Mage King and to prevent him from siring a bastard sorcerer with that shameless witch.”

  Taesara studied him a long moment, her stare unblinking. A wintry calm overtook her.

  “Get out,” she said.

  Penamor’s eyes widened. “What?”

  “Leave me. Now.” When he did not move, she added, “Or shall I call my guards to escort you?”

  Penamor set his jaw, sent Sonia a viperous glance, and returned his gaze to the queen. “I only say what you must hear.”

  “Leave!”

  He lifted both hands in a gesture of appeasement and departed.

  Sonia rose and closed the door behind him. Though not an attractive woman, Lady Sonia knew how to present herself. Today she wore a teal robe with ivory trim that offset her neatly bound dark hair. Her carriage was always impeccable, one of quiet dignity.

  “It was unwise to dismiss him so,” she said.

  Not a rebuke or impertinence, simply the reflec
tion of Taesara’s own thoughts; something for which Sonia had shown a gift ever since she came into Taesara’s service.

  Taesara rubbed her forehead, searching for a clear thought, a path through this haze of fear and desperation. “Do not call the others back yet. I would have a moment’s peace.”

  “As you wish, my Lady Queen.”

  She closed her eyes to ward off the dizziness.

  “Shall I serve you a cup of tea?”

  “Yes.”

  Sonia’s skirts rustled as she moved about the room, her slippered feet hushing the echoes of Penamor’s rage. The cup she brought warmed Taesara’s chilled hands; the aromatic brew soothed and awakened her senses.

  Sonia blended herbs in ways that always refreshed Taesara, no matter what her mood. As the Queen drank, the lady sat at her side, a frown on her pug-nosed face.

  “What are we to do, my Lady Queen?”

  Taesara drew a deep breath. “We must find a way out of here before death takes us all.”

  “Flee?”

  “And take Eliasara with us.”

  Sonia shook her head slowly. “We cannot leave Moisehén without Lord Penamor’s sanction and protection.”

  “I have a handful of guards who are loyal to me. None would stop us if we left the castle. We could find a way to depart without fanfare, then descend to the piers and travel by boat down river. We’d be in Roenfyn before anyone—”

  “Even if we secured safe passage, and escaped the pursuit of the Mage King’s men, your father would not receive us should we depart like thieves in the night.”

  Taesara set her cup aside. Her stomach revolted against the truth. Fear pricked at her neck. Sonia was right. King Lyanos would declare her a disgrace to his house and kingdom.

  “That witch took my son.” Her voice trembled as she reached forward and wrapped her hand around Sonia’s wrist. “She will kill my daughter. With the princess gone, there will be nothing left to protect me from the Mage King’s cold ambition. I, too, will die in this place, at his hands or hers. Why can my uncle not see this?”

  “Perhaps Penamor shares your concerns, but is reluctant to admit them. The future of Roenfyn weighs heavy on his heart. If we leave the Mage King alone with this mistress, they will breed more of their kind. Roenfyn will be trapped with the Galian wizards on one border, the Mage Kings of Moisehén on the other. The day they decide to contest our lands, our people will be slaughtered between them.”

  Defeat settled heavy on Taesara’s shoulders. She sank back into her pillows. “I am but one woman. I cannot stand in the way of such terrible forces.”

  “You are the Queen.”

  “A queen with no defense against a maga’s curse.”

  “She is but a sorceress,” Sonia corrected quietly, “and in the King’s eyes, she is first and foremost a woman.”

  Taesara cast her lady a sideways glance. “What do you mean by that?”

  “She has captured his heart. Someday she will break it.”

  “More likely, he will break hers.”

  “She will betray him with another man,” Sonia said. “It is simply a matter of time.”

  “Only a fool would cuckold the Mage King.”

  “Witches are fools. That much is clear in all the annals.”

  Taesara studied Sonia’s face, wary of the triumph that glinted in her hazel eyes. “You truly believe she will betray him?”

  “It is rumored she had many others before she came to the king’s bed. Why would that change now?”

  A shiver coursed through Taesara at the memory of all those stories: hapless youths overcome in moonlit fields, troubadours who worked in Mage Corey’s Circle, rebels who fought against the Mage King. Men and women alike. Some whispered that even Mage Corey had succumbed to her pleasures.

  “Rumors,” she said. “Tales spun to shorten dull winter nights. We need more than rumors to turn the Mage King against her. Even if all they say is true, it matters not how she conducted herself before now. What the King will mind is how she conducts herself from this moment forward.”

  “History breeds suspicion,” Sonia insisted. “It was Kedehen’s suspicion that condemned Briana of East Selen to the tower. If we are clever, my Lady Queen, the Mage King’s suspicion will condemn Eolyn as well.”

  “He would not listen to me, no matter how irrefutable the evidence. He would condemn me first for having questioned her at all.”

  Sonia leaned forward and gathered Taesara’s hands in hers. “Do not underestimate your power. The people of Moisehén have come to love you. The peasants see you as good, generous, and compassionate. The noble families admire your beauty and grace. Even among the class of mages you have made friends. There are very few in this kingdom who desire a return to the days of Kedehen. They do not want another witch in the King’s bed, much less on the throne. Many will support you, if we stand against her.”

  “It would not be enough. Even you have claimed none can exceed her power save the Mage King himself. However many allies I have, they cannot protect me or my daughter from that woman’s curses.”

  “The Gods will protect you, my Lady Queen,” Sonia assured her. “The Gods of Thunder always protect the true and the righteous.”

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Destiny

  In the evening, Eolyn and Akmael ascended narrow winding stairs of the southeast tower to the ramparts. The breeze was warm, the stars had just begun to ignite in a darkening sky. Torches hissed and flared in response to shifting winds. Smoke rose from their flames, carrying the aromas of burning pitch and charred wood.

  Eolyn kept close to her King, hand resting in the crook of his arm. They matched each other’s stride along the stone walkway, sentries greeting them along the way.

  Akmael’s presence invoked a sense of constancy in the midst of so much turmoil. He paused and set his gaze past the City toward the horizon, already lost in the gathering dusk. Eolyn suspected his thoughts were upon Rhiemsaven and the narrow road that wound from there toward the Pass of Aerunden, where the Syrnte awaited.

  “Apartments are being prepared for you here,” he said. “In the East Tower.”

  “Your mother’s prison?” The words escaped her lips before she could consider them, but even as he tensed into a brief silence, she felt no desire to retract them. Briana had died in that tower, and Eolyn’s mother had been captured there and sentenced to a bitter fate.

  “I am not incarcerating you,” he said. “Those apartments are spacious and well-appointed. Protected by powerful magic. It is the most secure place in this keep; indeed, in the entire kingdom. You will want for nothing, and you will be safe until I return.”

  “I see.” Eolyn withdrew and let her hands rest upon the stone parapet. “This is most generous of you, Akmael, but it would be better if I stayed in the Mage’s Quarter. Thelyn has already agreed to help me find a place there.”

  “I will not have it.”

  She bristled. “I cannot remain in the castle. Ghemena needs me. She was devastated when she learned I would not stay with her tonight, and she is furious with me for not returning at once to Moehn to search for Tasha and Catarina.”

  “Those girls are beyond your help now.”

  “I know. But Ghemena does not understand this. This is not the moment to abandon her to the company of mages and strangers. She needs something of the past to hold her steady, and a maga as her tutor, that she might direct her magic toward the future.”

  “She may stay here with you, in the East Tower.”

  “Akmael, you cannot expect—”

  “Eolyn.” He took her by the shoulders. “Tomorrow I leave this fortress to meet a formidable enemy about whom I know distressingly little. The future of this kingdom—of our people—weighs heavy on my heart. Give me at least this much peace: Let me depart knowing that you are well cared for, and safe.”

  She held his gaze a moment, then lowered her eyes and nodded. “It will be as you wish, Akmael. I will stay in the East Tower, and Ghemena wit
h me.”

  “Thank you. You will be content, I promise you.”

  He took her hands in his. “Your aura grows brighter as the shadows deepen. It is extraordinary in its colors, so richly hued.”

  Desire flushed through her. So many years she had known him, yet the passion he inspired continued to fill her with awe and uncertainty. They kissed, an ardent promise of pleasures yet to come.

  “We will descend at the next tower and return to my quarters,” he said, placing her hand in the crook of his arm. “Tzetobar expects one last audience before I depart. This night promises to be far too short.”

  Akmael paused to study her again. A frown creased his brow, sending chill down Eolyn’s spine.

  “What is it, Akmael? What do you see?”

  “Your aura. It has changed.”

  “A shadow? A place of no light?” Eolyn subdued a surge of panic. “It may a sign that the Naether Demons are coming.”

  “It is not a shadow I see.”

  “Are you certain?”

  “This thread is too beautiful to be a herald of those monsters.” Stepping close, Akmael ran his fingers just over her hair, as if sifting through currents of light. “I have never noticed it before. Of purest silver, like the sharpened edge of a newly forged sword, and shimmering, like water reflecting the sunlight. It disappears, then flickers back into brilliance.”

  The pounding of Eolyn’s heart faded into stunned silence.

  No, it cannot be. Not here. Not now.

  “This troubles you?” he asked, noting the change in her expression. “Why?”

  Long ago, Doyenne Ghemena had taught Eolyn how to recognize the transformative moments of a maga’s life. Each left a particular signature on the aura: the first kiss, the rites of Bel-Aethne, the discovery of love. The emergence of new life.

  “It is a child.” Her whisper seemed to echo off the castle walls and city roofs. “It is our child, Akmael. Yours and mine, conceived in the highlands of Moehn.”

  For what seemed an eternity he said nothing, dark eyes fixed upon hers, expression inscrutable. When he spoke, his voice was hoarse. “I had thought that magas had ways to avoid—”