Limits of Power

by Elizabeth Moon

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  Vérella

  Queen Arian’s arrival put the entire palace in a frenzy. Except for the few brief formal moments when Camwyn was presented to her and made his own short speech of welcome (she could not, he was sure, really be as old as King Kieri), she had the welcome effect of removing even more attention from what the boy prince was doing. No one cared where he was as long as he was out from underfoot. He attended his lessons, but outside them, he explored. No one asked awkward questions.

  Still, it took him days to discover a possible route to the skylight, a route involving a trip out onto the palace’s complicated roof. The library held a large plan of the palace, but the librarians, remote from the ceremony of a visiting monarch and with Queen Arian having already made her appearance there, were the only ones who seemed to notice him these days. They’d already raised eyebrows at his interest in secret passages the year before. He did not want them remembering his new curiosity.

  From the rooftop, it was much easier to see just how ridiculously complicated the palace was. The foundations—or some of them—might have been from the old palace from before the Girdish war. A wall here and there might go that far back. But since then, outbuildings had been constructed, added on to, and finally joined to the oldest parts, while the palace itself had grown, completely engulfing a few buildings and merging with others on the margins.

  He could see the skylight from his first point of emergence—which he’d found by following signs of roof repair, a stack of tiles on a stairway. It was just over there, north of where he stood. He headed that way, but between his part of the roof and the other was a gap down to a stone-flagged passage between the main palace and the Bells’ grange-hall. South of him was the bell tower in which the magical bells hung. For the first time, he wondered if their magic had any effect other than the bells ringing by themselves. A sweet sound came to him, faint but distinct in the bright air … not as loud as the bells but … was it the bells or elves?

  Voices rose from below, and he leaned cautiously over the low parapet. A row of knight-candidates in training, voices echoing off the stone, moved from the grange-hall toward the palace, all talking at once. A face turned up to the sky; Camwyn jerked back. If he’d been seen … he slithered backward across the roof before standing and making for his exit. He would have to find a better way, but at least he now had an idea where the gaps between buildings were.

  That night he ate alone in his own quarters, thinking about the regalia and his hand and the voices in his head. The thing about his … whatever it was; he would not call it magery … was that it wanted to be used, just as the crown and regalia wanted to be free and with Dorrin. It was like his body when he was restless and tired of sitting still in a meeting. His body wanted to move; it was natural for it to move … the moving itself wasn’t ever bad, but he—anyone—could do bad things while moving. So if this—whatever it was—was natural like sight or movement, then the desire to use it was natural too. And surely it could be governed by his will in the same way as his movement.

  But—by the Code of Gird—it was all wrong, except healing, and no one had that magery anymore.

  Unless he did. Or Dorrin did. Paladins had healing magery. Marshals also.

  The invitation to breakfast the next morning with his brother was not entirely welcome. He needed more time.

  “Camwyn,” his brother said as he wiped his mouth at the end of the meal, “what were you doing up on the roof?”

  Camwyn’s tongue clove to the roof of his mouth for a moment. He’d been seen? By whom? One of the knight-candidates, probably. What had they said? He’d been so sure— Then he was able to speak. “Exploring,” he said, which was true enough. “I wanted to see if it made any more sense from on top than on the maps.”

  “Um. But you had no guard with you, did you? What if you’d fallen?”

  “I was careful,” Camwyn said. “And I went barefoot so my shoes wouldn’t slip.” Most of the time. Even in spring, sun-heated roof tiles were hot.

  Mikeli shook his head. “Cam, that wasn’t safe. And I suspect you had no guard with you because you knew they wouldn’t let you that far out on the roof. You must not do that again.”

  “Have you ever been up there?”

  “No. I wanted to, but I was caught before I found the way out. Where is it?”

  “I can show you,” Camwyn said. He had several ways out now, but he would show Mikeli only one. “We could go now—not all the places I went, but the way out. Just in case you ever need it … if something’s chasing you.” He meant it as a distraction, but the look of longing on Mikeli’s face touched him. “It could be our secret,” he said. “Just between brothers, you know. It’s beautiful; the sky is so big, and you can see so far.” Almost like flying in the dragon’s mouth, and it lasted longer.

  “Cam, I haven’t time…” Mikeli looked at the scraps of paper on his desk, then pushed them into a rough stack. “Dammit, I’m the king. Why not? We’ll just go look—but my guards are coming, you understand, and you’re not to go out there alone.”

  “I understand,” Camwyn said.

  Preceded and trailed by palace guards, Camwyn and Mikeli made their way back to Camwyn’s initial escape route and from there to the roof. One of the guards climbed out before either of them, then Mikeli went up and then Camwyn. Mikeli laughed. “I see why you like it, Cam. I can see right down into the city.”

  “And be a target, sir king, for any long-archer … you must not stand so.” That was a guard. Camwyn was sure no one could shoot accurately that far.

  “There’s a chimney stack,” Camwyn said, pointing. “It’s just a little way, and you could put it between yourself and the city.”

  “Could you see like this from the dragon?” Mikeli asked softly.

  “Only for a moment … but that’s what gave me the idea.” A twinge of guilt—part lie, part truth. Memory of that first aerial view had given him the hope the dragon might someday return and give him another ride; something quite other had driven him to find the roof.

  Somewhat to Camwyn’s surprise, Mikeli did negotiate the slant of the roof and then lean back on the chimney stack. Only one of his guards followed; the others clustered near the way out. Mikeli looked up at the sky, the clouds moving slowly and steadily westward, their shadows patterning the roofs and land beyond, following their movement with his eyes and then taking a long look in each direction. “It’s beautiful,” he said again. “I had imagined something like this, but—it’s even better.” He gave Camwyn a long look. “I changed my mind. I won’t forbid your coming up here, Cam, but bring someone with you. Don’t do it alone. A fall, a slip, could kill you, and I don’t want to lose you.”

  “Does it have to be a guard?” Cam said. The guard still standing where Mikeli had stood looked uncomfortable, even frightened.

  “No,” Mikeli said. “If you’ve got a friend with a head for heights and some sense—both—that would do. No hanging from gutters or climbing drainpipes, though.”

  “I wouldn’t do that,” Camwyn said. “They might come loose.”

  “So they might. And if an enemy realizes you like to lark about up here, they might loosen one. Or set an ambush. Consider that, Cam. We still have enemies. Be careful. Promise me?”

  “I promise,” Camwyn said.

  “I must go back—work. And you, as well. When you find your companion in roof exploration, tell me who it is.”

  “Yes, sir king,” Camwyn said with a little bow to prove he meant it.

  All the way back down he was considering which of his friends was most apt for such adventures. Not the real adventure, of course: he would not risk any of his friends with knowledge of his candle-lighting. But which of his friends, if something should happen … if his hand should start to glow, for instance … would not panic and fall off the roof?

  The obvious candidate was—naturally—the first he saw after leaving Mikeli at a branch in the passages, Aris Marrakai.


  “You’re late for our class,” Aris said. “Marshal-Judicar sent me to find out—”

  “I was with the king,” Camwyn said.

  “Good. Then you’ll get off the scolding he wants to give you for indolence.”

  “I wasn’t sleeping later,” Camwyn said, stung. “I was up betimes, but Mikeli—the king—and I had—had something to do.”

  “Lucky for you,” Aris said, grinning. He led off at a brisk pace.

  “Slow down,” Camwyn said. “I wanted to ask you—”

  “Yes?”

  “Did you ever get up on the roof of your house—or anything else?”

  “Roof-walking? Yes. I’m not supposed to, though. My mother says even the mischief of the brood is too valuable to lose with a fall. But in Fin Panir—” He stopped abruptly as they passed two guardsmen. Then he resumed in a lower voice. “One time I got out an upper window in the schools, onto the roof, and then onto the barn roof, and from there I made it all the way to the main buildings without touching the ground. Someone saw me, and the Training Master was waiting in my room when I got back in—and fair tanned my backside—but it was fun.” He chuckled, then looked at Camwyn. “Why? Do you know a way to the roofs here?”

  “Yes,” Camwyn said. “And I have the king’s permission to go up as long as I have a companion. Want to come?”

  “Of course!” Aris’s eyes sparkled. Then he sobered “But if we aren’t both in class really fast, we’re both in trouble.”

  Camwyn’s excuse calmed the Marshal-Judicar, and he endured yet another lesson on the Code of Gird without doing anything to attract the Marshal-Judicar’s ire.

  His and Aris’s first expedition came two days later, just before dawn. Camwyn had a night’s respite from his hand’s spontaneous flares and actually woke with the first light. He was half dressed when Aris scratched at his door. He let the younger boy in. Aris, like himself, was barefoot and had put on not his palace livery but an old pair of trousers with scuffed leather patches on his knees and a gray shirt with several mended rips.

  Once on the roof, the world seemed lighter; all the stars had faded, and the sky was a peculiar shade of dull blue, brightening to the east, where a bank of clouds showed red at the upper edge. Below, the city made a dim pattern of lighter and darker blues and grays. They had not noticed the palace air as stale until they came out; here the air tasted of distant fields. Tiny currents set in the breeze like coils of wire in jewelry brought them here a wetter scent—mint, was it, or moss?—and then a momentary wisp of oak or wheat.

  Camwyn thought of the dragon, always in the air, always drinking the wind, smelling and tasting all this. “Buildings stink,” Aris said. They were sitting now, side by side, arms clasped around their knees. “Kitchens may smell good, but everything else—even the flowers they bring in and the herbs they strew—smells better outside.”

  “You like stables,” Camwyn said.

  “Horses smell better than people,” Aris said. Then he said, “Sorry … I didn’t mean you.”

  “I don’t care,” Camwyn said. The sky lightened moment by moment. “We can see well enough now, though.” He stood. Under his bare feet, the roof was chilly and a bit damp.

  “We should wait until the dew dries,” Aris said. “I slid off the porch back home once on a shady bit I hadn’t noticed was still wet. It’s the only bad thing about early morning roof-walking.”

  “How long?” Camwyn asked. “We still have classes and chores.”

  “Not long after the sun comes up, in summer,” Aris said. “Gwenno says it’s not just the dew; it’s the dew with the dust and moss and stuff on the roof. It’s slippery like thin mud.”

  Camwyn sat back down. Together they watched as the edge of the cloud turned pink, then gold. More and more color had seeped into the world—enough to tell the greens and reds and yellows. But when the first spear of sun struck the palace roofs, the colors seemed to shout. “It feels like we should do something,” Camwyn said. “Sing or pray or something.”

  Aris looked at him. “In the old times they did.”

  “You know that?”

  “Yes. Before Gird, when the magelords worshiped Esea Sunlord, the priests would sing every morning, and special songs at the year’s turnings. My father showed me an old book with a few of the songs set down. Not the special ones, the everyday ones.” Aris closed his eyes and began to chant. Camwyn didn’t know the words. After a moment, Aris opened his eyes and said, “That means ‘Welcome, great light, and brighten our eyes, show us the truth and let no evil escape our gaze.’ I don’t remember the whole thing. Father said it was magelord language, but now all we know is Common, and it’s mostly northern.”

  “How did he know it?”

  “It’s a family thing. We’re all supposed to learn enough of it to read what’s in that old book. I’m trying, but it’s hard.” He touched the roof. “Feel: it’s drying now. As long as we stay where the sun’s hitting and pay attention to our feet, we’ll be fine.”

  That morning they explored in the opposite direction from the treasury, which suited Camwyn well enough, and were back downstairs and in their proper clothes in time to escape any scoldings. Camwyn reported to Mikeli that Aris would be his companion on the roofs. Mikeli frowned a little. “I’m glad you like Aris better now, Cam, but he’s younger and smaller. He’s not going to be much help if you slip.”

  “He kept me from slipping this morning,” Camwyn said. “He told me about roof-walking at the Training Hall in Fin Panir.”

  Mikeli blinked. “And did he tell you about the whaling he got for that?”

  “Yes,” Camwyn said. “I suppose Juris told you.”

  “He did.” Mikeli sighed a little. “Very well, then. Juris also told me Aris has been out windows and up on roofs since he was knee high and only fell once … but here, once would be more than enough. And both of you are heavier now.”

  “We’ll be careful,” Camwyn said. Another few bites of stirred eggs and he said, “I … do understand now, sir king, why you took Egan away.” He looked up to meet Mikeli’s serious gaze. “He was making me not like some people … lying about them.”

  “Yes,” Mikeli said. “I hated the necessity—he was only a boy, and maybe a boy could learn to change, but the danger was too great.”

  “I don’t think he would have changed,” Camwyn said. He dropped his gaze to his plate and stared at the last two sausages. “I think … I think he was one of those with someone else inside them.”

  “Why?” Mikeli asked.

  “One time…” Camwyn had not been able to bring himself to tell anyone about it before; he had tried not to remember it in the days he thought of Egan Verrakai as his best friend. “One time he was close to me … very close … and his eyes … and his voice … he was saying things I could scarcely hear, just a murmur…” He shivered at the memory, the sudden jolt of fear, the instant of revulsion so strong that he’d jerked away from Egan. And Egan had grinned.

  “Just a trick his brothers used to play on him, he told me,” Camwyn said. “But I was cold—I shivered and shivered, and you remember the physicians said I had taken a chill.” He looked up and saw his brother’s face white as salt, a look of stark horror.

  “Cam! And you told no one?”

  “I—I was afraid. And I didn’t know—”

  “Bless Gird and the High Lord for protecting you,” Mikeli said. “For I believe what you describe was an intent to take you over—to kill you, the real you, and insert a false you—whichever ancient Verrakai inhabited Egan—instead.”

  A sudden thrill of fear ran through Camwyn. “Could there be … anything left? Of them—him—it?”

  “In you? I’m certain not,” Mikeli said. “And Egan—his body and whatever lived in it—is very thoroughly dead.”

  Camwyn was not so sure. What if Egan had been trying to insert magery—just that? Or if the insertion or wakening—whichever it was—of magery had been only the first step in taking him over?

  If
it came from Verrakai, it was definitely evil. If not … maybe not. Beclan’s had been awakened during an attack by Verrakaien … but was it by the Verrakaien or, as Mikeli had told him, by Gird allowing its use for his protection? Camwyn took that confusion to his lessons and wished he dared ask the Marshal-Judicar directly. Inattention earned him a rap on the head in the Marshal-Judicar’s class and two bruises in weapons practice.

  “I don’t know where your head is today, my prince,” the armsmaster said, “but if you go fluff-minded like that when beset by an enemy, you’ll be dead. Feel that—” He tapped unerringly on the bruised spot under Camwyn’s banda on the left side. “Tell me now if you remember what lies under it.”

  Camwyn recited the relevant organs and admitted he would likely be dead after a while.

  “And not soon enough, in that pain,” the armsmaster said, scowling at him. “It would be a miserable sweating, groaning death you’d have, amply long enough and far too late to repent ignoring your lessons. You’ve improved this year, but it’s no time to be letting your mind wander.”

  “Yes, armsmaster,” Camwyn said. That was all one could say in such straits, and his rib still hurt.

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  By the end of the first few days of formal meetings, receptions, and dinners, Arian felt stuffed with new knowledge about Tsaia, its people, and its history. She very much needed a quiet day among trees and flowers where she could think and try to make sense of it all. But the palace complex had no quiet gardens, not even a tree-shaded walk. How could people live this way?

  When she mentioned her desire for time outdoors, among trees, the king quickly arranged a picnic with peers’ wives and children. The party, already a little boisterous, rode out to a grassy field bordered by trees, just off the main south road. Arian relaxed in the open air, smelling grass and trees instead of stone and fabric. She laid her hands on one of the trees … but it had no root-connection to others beyond the stone-paved south road, no communication with the eastern forest.