“I can’t possibly help you. Or Kinderra. Please, just go. Just. Go.” She buried her face in her hands.
“Mirana, look at me.” He gently pulled her hands down from her face. “Mirana.”
She searched his face, his eyes like windows to the midnight sky.
“The Aspects Above have given both of us this keep vision for a reason. Your ancestor built the watchtower. You must be a key to understanding its power. I am here to help you unlock those secrets. As Trines, we are bound by the same fate to save Kinderra from destroying herself. Only together can we do this. I need you. Kinderra needs you. You need me, too. Do you understand...” he pointed to the knife, “that is not the path for you?”
She would never lie to herself again. She knew she was at the center of all the rage, the pain, the crushing failure, and the suffocating sense thousands had perished.
She was so tired. So very tired of trying to find answers where there were none. She wanted it to be over. All of it. She stared at the long knife on the floor at her feet. “For summers, I’ve searched for a way to prevent myself from becoming the Dark Trine.”
He scowled, more from pity than from confusion. “Do you truly believe that is what you are?”
What else could she be? “Ai. Someday.”
He hung his head for a moment and exhaled. “The Trine powers are blessed and terrible gifts. I know. Since I was a small boy, I, too, have seen unspeakable destruction from my own hands in events that had yet to take place. I can show you how even such a horror as that can be a gift. I can show how it can be used for knowledge, to find a way to stop even more violence. Or why it is necessary to let such damning actions continue for the greater good.”
When she didn’t respond, he frowned. He picked up the knife and set it on the table next to where he knelt. He took her hand and placed her palm on his chest over his heart. “What do you feel?” Her hand trembled beneath his. She did not want to reach out with her Healing gift. She wanted to destroy it.
“Mirana. Reach out to me with your Aspects and tell me what you feel.”
She took a breath. “Your heartbeat. Your life.”
He nodded. “Ai. Every heartbeat, every life, every single one feels like this. Every life note in Kinderra just like this one will be extinguished in this bloody civil war unless we stop it. Unless we can understand the power of Jasal’s Keep and use it to save this land, all of this—” he patted her hand over his heart, “will be gone. Do you understand?”
No. No, she did not understand. How could the salvation of everyone and everything she loved come from her when all she saw was destruction at her hand?
“The Aspects Above confer their gifts upon us, but it is we mortals who make the decision how to use them. You will not destroy anything unless you decide to do so.”
She began to shake again. “I am frightened.”
“I know you are.” He took her other hand and now held them both in each of his. “But I will help you. You no longer have to bear these burdens alone. Not your fear. Not your Trine Aspects. Not the keep. We shall bear them together, and we shall find a way to save Kinderra. Together.”
She could not speak, overcome by the possibility of a fate beyond destruction and death. Her heart banged in her chest. Tetric Garis said she was the key to understanding the keep. Was his belief in her worth risking Kinderra? Risking Teague?
Lord Garis’s amulet glowed softly. It appeared to breathe in ebbs and pulses with a life-light of its own.
“Do you mean it?” she whispered, terrified to believe him.
He gripped her hands tighter, so she could not deny his conviction. ... Fear can make us do terrible things ... And, ai, you made a terrible choice to lie to yourself ... But your heart was pure ... You meant to try and save Kinderra, even by withholding knowledge, even by lying to yourself ... Those are not the actions of an evil one ... Those are the choices of a Trine ... “If there’s even the slightest chance the power in the keep will stop this war, we must find out how. Is that not worth living for?”
The Trine Prophecy came back to her once more. Was Tetric Garis the “hope that remained?” For her?
She drilled her gaze into his eyes. “Swear to me you won’t let me destroy Kinderra.”
“Ai, I swear it. With all my Aspects.”
She rose and stepped over to the Codex. A link opened, and the chain fell away. She clutched the tome to her. “Then let us save Kinderra.”
She and the Trine both turned at the sound of rushing footsteps.
“Mirana!” her father cried, her mother running just behind him. They rushed over and drew her into their arms.
Her mother kissed Mirana’s forehead. “Thank the Aspects.”
“Is she all right?” her father asked Lord Garis.
“I will be,” Mirana answered for the Trine. He retrieved the long knife from the table and held it out to her, his face set like flint. “I will make this right. All of it. Somehow. I promise.”
She sheathed the weapon with a determined thrust of her hand.
CHAPTER 16
“A spent blade must be sharpened or its metal used for a new purpose.”
—The Book of Kinderra
Kaarl stood by the window in the prime’s chambers. Dawn cut a faintly brighter swath of sky on the eastern horizon than the darkness above it. Below in the courtyard, Desde gave preliminary orders to the provincial troops. She still wore her light armor and chain mail from the previous evening’s Choosing Ceremony. It glinted in the torchlight as she moved. In another corner, Morgan Jord spoke with a small group of white-uniformed men and women, the defenders of the il’Kin. Yesterday, they had been Kaarl’s to lead. Yesterday, he served as a defender commander. Now, he was Steward of the Quorum of Light.
The role of the Quorum’s steward was full of contradictions, and he hated them all. The Quorum itself comprised all of Kinderra’s primes and seconds, and decided policies affecting the entire continent’s Fal’kin. Its steward, however, was both the most and least powerful person in Kinderra, as far as he was concerned. Ai, he would serve as a proxy voter for absent provincial representatives, and he would also break a deadlock by casting a decisive vote in the rare instance it might occur. That was all well and good.
The steward, however, had no true vote in Quorum proceedings, giving up the needs of his or her province for the greater good of Kinderra. He would continue to direct the il’Kin strike force, but now as a noncombatant tactician, not as a battlefield commander.
He looked at his hands. The cuts and scrapes from the grynwen had healed. While he didn’t bring down every Ken’nar he fought against, more times than not he left them corpses if they dared confront him. Sometimes he did not even leave that much. With no vote of his own, how would he be able to keep Kin-Deren province safe, let alone the rest of Kinderra?
He caught his reflection in the glass of the window, the gray just beginning to silver his black hair, the silver eyes of his infamous ancestor staring back. The Quorum members would never let him remain steward on principle. It stood too close to Jasal Pinal’s dictatorial status as Primus Magne, the sole governing leader over all of Kinderra’s Fal’kin. The whole of the Fal’kinnen would never make that mistake again.
At some point, his transgressions would be found out. When they were, he could lose far more than just his role as steward. The Quorum could expel him from Kin-Deren province. He touched the garnet resting against his chest. He’d be lucky if his expulsion was the only sentence handed down. His amulet could be removed from him. He’d no longer be a Fal’kin, or even a defender. He’d be nothing. He let his hand fall.
The choice was obvious. When the Quorum convened in the autumn, its members would award the permanent steward’s seat to Tetric Garis. As a Trine, Tetric already gave his Aspects in service to all of Kinderra. As steward, the il’Kin would be his to command. In one brilliant move, all that Kaarl spent his lifetime building, serving, and bleeding would be gone. Nothing would stop the man from en
folding the il’Kin’s fighters into his Dar-Azûlan provincial ranks and effectively dissolving the strike force.
If he wished to remain as the leader of the elite unit, he would have to swear allegiance to Tetric Garis. Or he would have to step down from the il’Kin’s ranks. He had no choice but to accept the mantle of stewardship, and maybe even fight to keep it. That was the contradiction he hated the most—to save the il’Kin, he had to leave it.
Kaarl held his sword. He hefted its familiar weight, noting again its exquisite balance. It was a fine instrument, forged true of hard Tash-Hamari steel. The cross guard of its hilt was crafted with two eagle’s heads, the heraldic of Kin-Deren province. Pits and scratches etched the entire length of the blade, every mark delivered by a Ken’nar weapon. The grain of the leather wrapping the scabbard was worn smooth. The thin bands of silver once crisscrossing the sheath had since broken and were missing in places.
Toban had the sword made for him when he passed thirteen summers. It had been a bit too long, a bit too heavy for him then. He had taken it as a compliment that the old seer believed he had enough skill to master it. It had saved his life and the lives of those he protected more times than he could count.
“I know nothing of the way one must mince words just to gain sentences. This is insanity. I am a defender, Toban. A fighter, a warrior. Not a politician.” He shook his head. What would Toban have said if he had called the old man such?
Why in the name of the Aspects Above had Toban Kellis named him his successor?
Privately, he knew the real reason, one he had not wanted to admit to himself. The seer prime knew Kaarl had all but lost the will to fight. Had Desde spoken to her father? After thirty summers of bloodshed, he was nearly beaten inside. The deaths of so many of the il’Kin over the recent summers had allowed hopelessness to creep into his heart. The old seer knew—with his Aspect, maybe he was even certain—Kaarl’s next major campaign could be his last.
He placed the blade on the desk. For as long as he had known Desde’s father, the seer had sat behind its ornately carved wood. He touched the surface, its dark walnut wood, smooth with wax and use. There, on the front panel, was the chip in the wood from the heel of his boot when Toban sat him on the desk’s top to tell him his father had been killed. On the back leg of the chair, just below the mortise-and-tenon joint, was the nick where he flailed with his sword, showing off for the prime. On the far corner was the tiny groove he had made with his fingernail as he stood asking to be joined in union with Desde.
Kaarl had given command of the il’Kin to Morgan, his defender second, elevating him to defender commander. It was time. Perhaps a younger man with a fresh perspective could pull the elite troop back from the brink of extinction. Toban had probably felt the same about giving him the chair of stewardship.
He smiled. “You were always one step ahead of everyone, weren’t you?” He hung his head. How could he even hope to fill the void left by that great man?
He could not. He would not even try. He would have to find his own path. He had wondered not all that long ago how one could avoid one’s destiny. His wife, always so perceptive of his mind, told him he couldn’t, but he could choose how to face it. Toban would not have named him to the post had he not been a capable man, even to save his life. He would strive to honor the man he loved as much as his own father, but he would not imitate him.
A knock interrupted his thoughts.
“I have come—” Tetric Garis began.
“I know why you are here.”
Kaarl remained facing the window, away from the other man. As the Trine crossed the room, his heavy boots echoed unusually loud in the chamber, breaking the early morning’s stillness.
“You’re coming to the Ford?” he asked, hefting Kaarl’s sword. “I thought Defender Jord would be leading—”
“After Mirana’s revelation, we have no idea what to expect now. We may need every defender we have,” Kaarl replied, watching him from the corner of his eye. “I will be deliriously happy if my time is wasted. I intend to strategize a defense with Desde and lend my amulet to the battle seer’s defense group, if it comes to that.”
Tetric set the sword down on the desk, nodding with approval. “Or act as Mirana’s bodyguard.”
Kaarl turned to face him at last and frowned.
“She will be safe with me. It is for the best.”
“Apparently, my wife agrees with you.”
The Trine drew next to him to look through the window down at the courtyard. “Despite the law, even I don’t think Desde would truly consider expelling Mirana.”
He looked at Tetric in alarm. “Expulsion? What are you talking about? Mirana was traumatized by some damn nightmare she believes has her bringing about the end of time. That is why she left the Choosing Ceremony. Being terrified is not a crime.”
The other man’s gaze remained fixed on the courtyard below. “No. But refusing to choose an amulet is. A capital crime your daughter committed most publicly. To say nothing of possibly withholding information. The sentence for refusing an amulet is expulsion from the province, to be killed on sight if she ever steps foot back within Kin-Deren’s borders.” He lifted his face to take in Jasal’s Keep.
He could not think of a single word that would adequately express his hatred of Tetric Garis at that moment.
“I doubt it will come to all that,” the Trine said. “Mirana’s situation is complicated. She is under the age of majority, although Desde’s pronouncement elevating those fifteen and older to Fal’kin does call that into question. And she is now known to be a Trine.” He turned to Kaarl. “I convinced Desde that your daughter’s case should be heard by the Quorum when we meet in the autumn. There is no way your wife, even as a prime, could be impartial in such a situation. Furthermore, we Trines are dedicated to all provinces, so that makes provincial expulsion impractical, if not impossible.”
Kaarl’s eyes widened in disbelief. “We are about to march into war. We don’t know if we will have an assured victory or a massacre. You dare speak of my daughter’s expulsion and possible execution at a time like this?”
“I told you, she will be safe with me.” Tetric raised his palms in apology. “Only I can make Mirana what she must become. You know this.”
“What she must become?” he asked, desperation edging his words. “Aspects Above, man, we’re dragging her to the Ford. The Dark Trine will most certainly be there. He stands too much to lose by not being present.”
“Or gain.”
Kaarl curled his hands into fists, as much to keep them still as to answer the desire to use them. “If she goes to the Ford, that black-hearted Ken’nar bastard will kill her.”
“Desde has given her to me as my scholaira. I will complete her training. She will remain with me until she does choose an amulet.” The Trine placed a hand on his shoulder. “No harm will come to her. I will guard her as if she were my own child.”
“You decided my own child’s future without me?” He looked down at the man’s hand. His gaze slid back to the Trine, who prudently stepped back from his gesture. “Alone? With my wife?” His voice dropped to a menacing growl.
The tall Dar-Azûlan now held his ground, his eyes like shards of black ice. “So you could watch over her while she slept for a few hours. Your wife is prime of Kin-Deren province. She need not consult with anyone regarding her Fal’kin. Even you.”
The tension in his fists spread up his arms and across his chest to settle within his vermilion garnet amulet. “You’ve all but taken my il’Kin from me. Now, you take my only child as well?”
Tetric made no move. “She tried to kill herself.”
Kaarl froze. “Wh-What?”
“I barely had time to save her life.”
“She-She didn’t say a word.” That hairline cut at the hollow of her throat. It hadn’t been a buckle scratch from her armor. “She just fell asleep in my arms. Holding that accursed book of Jasal’s to her like the ragdoll she had when she was a babe. I ju
st thought she was exhausted from the ceremony. I knew the amulets were overpowering her. That’s why I grabbed the nearest one I could reach. I just wanted her to take the damned thing and leave before they drove her into a faint. She didn’t say a word. Not one word.”
A moist, burning sensation seared Kaarl’s eyes. Something wet traveled down his cheek. ... Oh, Miri ... What have I done? ...
He hitched up his shoulder to wipe the dampness away from his face. “Do you believe—” He swallowed his emotions back under control. “Do you believe this nightmare of hers? Is it truly a vision?”
Tetric shrugged and sighed. “I have seen something of it. It is alarming, but I don’t understand it. Yet.”
“Does Desde know? What happened?” he asked. The Trine shook his head. “I’d like to keep this between us.”
“Ëo comprende.”
Kaarl and the Trine both stood silent for a long moment, observing the Fal’kin below out the window.
“The summers have not touched Desde,” the Dar-Azûlan said at last.
He watched his wife in the courtyard. A smile briefly touched his face. Tetric was right. Desde was still a strikingly beautiful woman. He, however, felt older than Toban at the moment. “I know where all those summers went.” His smile faded.
Is that what he had done to Mirana? Driven her to try to take her own life?
Tetric nodded. “I think we both share some of those lost summers.” He turned back to him. “I do not intend for your daughter to stay at the Ford any more than you do. I also understand Desde’s moral and, frankly, legal dilemma. As the prime, she cannot hold back her child while sending others’ children to the Ford when she has made such an order. But with Mirana as a Trine, I’m not sure it’s worth the risk to have the girl at the front even in a support role.”
Trine Rising Page 18
