Crown of Renewal

by Elizabeth Moon

  “You are both reckless fools,” Arian said when Kieri had finished the first mug of sib. “You had no one with you—not even one King’s Squire—you might both have broken your heads falling down—and what if an iynisin had come through?”

  “I didn’t think of that,” Kieri said, startled. Why had he not thought of that? The use of magery could be sensed by others who used it. As for no one around … “I did not want to expose anyone else to whatever danger there might be.”

  Arian heaved a sigh of the kind that conveys entire paragraphs. Kieri winced. “Fools,” she said again. “A king—the only king we have, the only lord of an elvenhome we have, the only father our children have—and you still think you should face danger alone? Yes, you had a paladin with you—” The glance she sent Paks could have pierced steel, Kieri thought. “And I do not doubt, had it come to that, she would have warded you as much as she was able. But she, too, was bound into the magery. A paladin is not immortal; she could have died of it for all you knew and been no help at all.”

  “Gird was there,” Paks offered.

  Arian’s snort was eloquent. “Gird is your patron, Paks. Not Kieri’s. Gird is always with you, yes. But did Gird save you from falling on the floor like a sack of rocks?”

  “I admit we should have had someone on guard,” Kieri said. “I did not think of iynisin, and I do not know why, since I know they were involved.” He took a deep breath. The lethargy was fading now—how long had it been? He realized he had no idea. One glass? Two?

  “Your eyes have gone blank again,” Arian said. “Drink more sib.”

  Partway through the next mug, he fell asleep and woke in his own bed to the sound of babies nearby, not crying but making other baby sounds and … splashing? Sunlight streamed in the window. He sat up. Arian and one of the nursery maids were bathing the babies; as he watched, Arian lifted Falki, laid him on the towel in her lap, and rolled him up like a cheese roll. Tilla kicked a final time as the nursery maid lifted her.

  “I’ll take them, my lady,” the nursery maid said after bundling Tilla in another towel. She went out with a babe in each arm.

  Kieri looked at Arian; she tried to keep a serious face but then grinned. “I’m fine,” he said. “I don’t even ache where I hit the floor.”

  “You scared me,” she said. “If—”

  He was up and by her side and laid a finger on her lips. “I’m sorry I scared you. The worst didn’t happen, thank Falk and Gird and all the gods, and I won’t be that careless again. I will try to understand the compulsion that made it seem reasonable. No one was there—”

  “But Paksenarrion.”

  Kieri shook his head. “It wasn’t Paks. I’m sure of that, because—now that I can remember it all—she asked if we should have someone in the room.”

  “Gird, then?”

  “I don’t think Gird could affect me. Falk might, but I didn’t sense Falk there. But something … I can’t believe the danger from iynisin never occurred to me.” He stretched, then started dressing. “I can’t believe we did what we did—what I think we did—and I can’t believe your grandfather didn’t know it. If he could tell it was a mix of elven and human mageries, why couldn’t he tell it was me?”

  “Would that have made more sense to you? That you were going to travel back in time to enchant them?”

  “I suppose not,” Kieri said. “I would have thought it even more impossible.” He pulled on one sock, then another. “Where is Paks?”

  “I don’t know. I had Queen’s Squires carry her to her room; I haven’t seen her since. She has the freedom of the palace.”

  Kieri finished dressing and belted on his sword. “Someone should check on her. She looked worse than I felt.”

  “I’ll come with you,” Arian said. She picked up the sword that had lain by her chair and hung it to the baldric she still wore. “I’ll be glad when I fit back into my proper gear.”

  Kieri touched her shoulder. “It won’t be long.”

  Upstairs, outside Paks’s chamber, they heard nothing at first. Arian tapped on the door. A peculiar noise, like a truncated snore mixed with a gulp, came from the room. Then a yawn. “Uh?”

  “Paks, it’s Arian and Kieri. We were worried.”

  The thud of bare feet on the floor, then another yawn, and finally the door opened. Paks had color in her face again, and after a few more blinks, her eyes brightened. “I haven’t slept this late in years,” she said.

  “I’m glad to see you upright,” Arian said. “Kieri woke less than a half-glass ago. Do you remember what happened?”

  “We worked magery,” Paks said. “And—” She grimaced. “We’re going to have to work it again.”

  “Not today you’re not,” Arian said. “And not alone, either.”

  Paks left the next day as suddenly as she had come. “I must be back in Fin Panir for Midsummer,” she said.

  “A rule for paladins?” Kieri asked, smiling.

  “No … just … I must go.”

  “Go with our prayers, then. Come again—we still have to wake those magelords, you know.” She waved, already moving away. Kieri sighed. Her Old Human magery had helped him, but what if she did not return? Supposedly he had it, but he felt nothing when he tried to imagine what it might be like.

  The western elves, who had left immediately after the twins were born to take word to their king in the west, had not yet returned. Elves’ sense of time again … He had expected them back by now, since travel by their patterns seemed instantaneous, but to them it might be no time at all since they left.

  On second thought, that might be convenient in this instance. He did not know how to explain to them what he and Paks had done. He was sure they would have questions he could not answer. How had he imposed enchantment on the past? He had no idea. Why had he not then broken the enchantment? And so on. It would be simpler not to tell them: in this day, the magelords were there, silent and motionless, and if the elves hadn’t known who put them there, they did not need to know now.

  On that thought, he set to work in his office, reading through reports from supervisors of various projects he had put under way. Every time his thoughts veered to what Paks had brought up—the possibility that Sekkady still lived, perhaps in another body, and might still be a menace—he pushed it away and forced himself into the details of the day.

  Later, he tried twice—very carefully, with a King’s Squire sworn to secrecy at hand, and sitting down—to reach with his magery to Kolobia and do something—anything—that might wake those he had enchanted. He was sure he found the place again—he felt it the same way he felt his former stronghold, or Vérella, or the winter quarters in Valdaire. But that was the most he could do, lacking Paks and Gird. And though he asked Gird for help, nothing more happened.

  Except that night after night, he remembered what Paks had said and could not push aside the thought of Sekkady still alive, in another body, searching for him, threatening his children. His dreams were troubled. He did not want to bother Arian while she was so busy with the babies. He would try something else.

  Arian was asleep; the babies were asleep. Kieri sat by the window in his own chamber, the box of selani tiles open before him. He took one without looking and then read the rune. Sorrow. He took another. Loss. Another and another and another: pain, rage, distance, death, each one drawing a fine line of pain on his heart as Sekkady had long ago used a stone blade on his skin to draw a fine line of blood. And then, with the bloodstone he always had with him, Sekkady had sorcelled that blood into the stone and murmured to Kieri as he did so.

  Even if you escaped this place—but you will never escape—you could not escape me, for your blood is with me, and with it your fear and your submission. By this stone I command you. Here you are, held motionless and silent, even when you know what I will do to you. So will you be always, everywhere and anywhere, every time and any time. And someday, I will let you have something precious to you, and you will think you are safe, but I will come, an
d you will kneel before me, helpless as you are now. And I may let you beg for mercy, but you know now as you will then that my will is greatest, and you will surely suffer all I desire.

  He had heard that voice in dreams even after escaping; he had forgotten those dreams, the words that once more caught him, held him motionless, his throat clogged with fear. Cold sweat ran down his back, he could scarcely breathe, he scarcely knew where he was or when—

  At the screams, he fell back into the present. A baby crying, screaming—and now two of them, loud enough to hear through the closed doors and the passage between. Shaking, he stood up, staggered a few steps before he caught his balance, and went quickly through the passage to the queen’s suite. Arian was awake, sitting up in bed; nursemaids had already picked up the twins from their cradle. Wide-eyed, Arian stared at him. “Kieri! What’s wrong? What’s happening?”

  He could not answer. He stood there, his ears almost shattered by the volume of the babies’ cries, desperate and helpless. Arian looked back and forth from him to the babies and pushed herself out of bed. She went first to the nursery maids. “Are they injured?”

  “No—they just woke suddenly, screaming—”

  “Take them down the passage, all the way to the back of the palace—you—” She spoke to the Queen’s Squires who had looked in to see what the commotion was. “—go with them. Walk them up and down; it will soothe them. I will deal with the king.”

  The nursemaids carried the babies out; Arian came to Kieri. He could not look directly at her. Tears blurred his vision. Her hands on his were warm, firm but gentle. “Kieri … you are in some evil enchantment. Let me help.”

  He shook his head. She must not come closer—what if it caught her, too? But she was already there, her grip now commanding, pushing him toward one of the chairs set near the fireplace. “Sit—you are trembling enough to fall.”

  He sat as if his legs had failed. She sat across from him, holding his hands … he looked down at hers, such strong, competent hands, only to see them change, broken, twisted, bleeding, and hear Sekkady’s triumphant, gloating laugh as he had heard it the very night he escaped while the man who freed him suffered.

  A groan burst from him, and a fresh flood of tears. He clung to Arian’s hands until finally he could breathe again. She pulled one hand free and wiped his face with one of the towels laid by the fire for the nursemaids to use. He reached for it and began mopping his face himself.

  “I—I’m sorry—”

  “Shhh. You have done nothing wrong—”

  “Nothing but put you in mortal danger, you and our children both—”

  “What? How?” She sounded far too calm, he thought.

  “The selani tiles … I was looking … thinking …”

  “Thinking what?”

  “Something Caernith said about them and something Paks said—I can’t say it, Arian. I can’t.”

  “Don’t, then.” She got up, dipped another towel in the can of warm water on the hearth, and wiped his face, then his hands. “I remember what Caernith said. What memories prompted your thoughts?”

  “I was … hoping … that something horrible could not be true,” he said. He looked at her then; she showed no fear, nothing but concern for him. He took a breath; his voice steadied. “But the tiles gave me no hope.”

  “You know the tiles do not show an immutable future,” Arian said. “If they warn of danger, we will meet it. If they promise doom, we will defeat it.” She put out her hand; he took it automatically. “Whatever it is … we have already defeated the Pargunese, the iynisin who sought our deaths and dishonor, that one who poisoned me and betrayed you … We will prevail.”

  His breath eased. “Arian—there are things I never told you—”

  “Of course there are. We both have fifty years and more behind us, and we have been together only two winters: we have not begun to tell each other everything.”

  “But this is important. The man who … who owned me for most of my childhood—”

  She put her hand on his lips. “Kieri … is this a tale best told late at night? I can see you need to tell it, but should it not be told by day, in clean sunlight?”

  “I do not know,” he said. “Memories, bad memories … I had forgotten, meant to forget forever, but they have come now—”

  “We have two problems,” she said. “A daughter and a son who woke screaming, I think from their link to you—for when I woke, the entire taig was roused. If it can wait until daylight, if you can be calm and let the children rest—”

  “It is for the children I fear,” he said.

  She sighed. “Well, then. One night without sleep will not kill any of us, even the babes. Come—we will go back to your chamber and see those tiles, and you can tell me all.”

  He began with what she already knew and then with what he had not told her before, and what he now feared. “He said I would always be commanded by his magery because my blood was in his stone. But after all the years, I was sure he must be dead. When Tamarrion and the children were killed, I wondered if he might have done it. But that was orcs, and how could he have commanded orcs from so far away?”

  Arian said nothing, just held his hands, strength and clarity in her grip. Was it her own elven magery? Or just her character? He went on, more slowly now. “When I first heard of the Verrakaien changing bodies, it did not occur to me—it should have—that he might have done the same. I didn’t ask Dorrin. I didn’t think …”

  Arian glanced at the selani tiles still on the table. “Perhaps this is your thought rising again in the wake of the magery you did with Paks. Seeing those old magelords—perhaps they reminded you of Sekkady.”

  Kieri took a long breath. “Perhaps. I didn’t think of that … they were from a time when he could not have been alive. Unless … could someone really live so long?”

  “I doubt it,” Arian said. Her brow furrowed in thought. “Surely the mind wears out. We must ask the elves.”

  “Not elves,” Kieri said. “They do not pay enough attention—or not always. They might not recognize someone in a different body.” He looked over at the tiles, each rune clear in the lamplight. “If it was my hidden thought coming forth that moved the tiles … then I should be grateful … but I cannot.”

  “I can,” Arian said. “For if we know a danger is possible, we can think how to meet it. It is the unknown danger that defeats forethought.”

  Kieri felt his heart lift at her confidence. “There are always unknown dangers, but you’re right.”

  “Well, then. Do you think any of those old magelords you propose to wake from enchantment knew a version of Sekkady? They certainly cannot know you were his …” Her voice faltered.

  “His slave,” Kieri said firmly. “No. Even if he was alive then, in an earlier body—and they knew him—I was not yet born, so they could not have known about his use of me. But if his powers are from those days, which is likely, then any of those magelords could pose a similar threat once awakened.”

  “And that is good to know,” Arian said. “We will be alert to such dangers.”

  “But how will we know? How do we know he’s not here now? It could be anyone.” Fear gripped him again.

  “Let me try the selani tiles,” Arian said. She moved to the other side of the table, and—looking Kieri in the eye—picked up the tiles on the table, dropped them back in the box, stirred all with a finger, and then drew one out. “Ah. The one we’ve picked so many times: Awake. So we shall be, awake, alert, and … let’s see.” She drew another one. “Joy.”

  Kieri shook his head. “Your skills exceed mine when it comes to finding good outcomes.”

  “I have not endured what you have. That cruelty would leave darkness in anyone it touched.” Her expression hardened. “I would gladly kill him if he is not dead. Not only for your sake, though that is enough, but for the sake of all he tormented.”

  Kieri shook his head. “No—it is my past and mine to solve.”

  “If he thre
atens our children and you are not near—I will kill him. Do not say no.”

  Kieri nodded. “I would never ask you to let harm come to our children—for any reason. If—if the worst comes and he overpowers me … if I stand between him and you, if I become a danger to them … kill me if you must.”

  “Kieri! NO!”

  “Can I be certain I will not yield to his magery? Suppose he was right and implanted something in me—or the stone really does control me—” Panic rose again; he heard it in his voice.

  “It won’t. I’m certain it won’t. You were not controlled by elven magery—not even an iynisin. And you escaped him when you were but a boy.”

  “With another’s help.” He had told her that before; now the details seemed important. “We must face the possibility that I am not really free of him.”

  “And this is what kept you up so late?”

  “I … think so. Yes. The selani tiles seemed to … to threaten me with that.” He shook his head sharply. “It is being a father again, Arian, that frightens me most. That children of mine could suffer as I suffered. Sekkady … if he lives, if he comes, that is what he would want to do. Make them suffer. Make me see it and be unable to stop it.”

  “Then you will stop it,” Arian said. “Having thought now it might happen, you will think how—and you will stop it.”

  “How can I know—?” That came out in a rush, and grief cut it off.

  “Ahead of time? You can’t. I didn’t know I could ride in a dragon’s mouth. I didn’t imagine I would ever need to. But I did—and you will do whatever you need to protect the children—all the children—and so will I.”

  “My lord.” Caernith, one of the western elves, bowed from the doorway. “We are returned from the west.”

  Kieri looked up; more than a hand of days had passed since that terrible night. He was still shaken, but calmer and glad he had not needed to cope with the elves immediately. In the meantime he had changed his mind: they needed to know what he and Paks had done. “Welcome back,” he said.