Song of Unmaking

by Caitlin Brennan

  Kerrec met Curtius’s stare until it dropped. “Whatever penalty the riders may exact.” He bit off each word as he repeated it. Sometimes, Valeria thought, he remembered all too well that he was born to be emperor.

  Nikos did not seem to have heard their byplay at all. His eyes were still on the healer. “How bad?”

  “Bad,” Martti said bluntly. “He was mending when he came back from Aurelia. That’s been undone. From the signs, I’d say it’s been unraveling for some time.”

  Nikos’s glare leveled once more on Kerrec. “How long?”

  “Since just after the Midwinter Dance,” Kerrec answered.

  “And you rode another Dance? Knowing you could break beyond repair—and take the rest of us with you?”

  Kerrec’s lips tightened. “I make no excuses. Obviously my judgment was impaired. I should have known, and withdrawn from the Dance.”

  “You knew,” Gunnar said from halfway down the long curve of the riders’ table. “For the gods’ sake, don’t lie to us. I’m at fault, too, for sensing something was wrong and not doing anything about it.”

  “None of us did,” Nikos said. He rubbed his eyes as if they ached. “We’ve all been desperate. There’s so much lost that we may not ever regain. We’re all to be faulted for refusing to see what was in front of us. We needed him—therefore he had to be whole. Even when we knew that there was no way—”

  “I think I’ve heard enough,” Briana said. She did not say it particularly loudly, but it stopped the Master short. She stared down any other rider who would have opened his mouth.

  She looked very much like Kerrec when she did that. She sounded like him, too, with her impeccably royal accent. “Master Healer, is there anything you can do?”

  Martti shook his head. “Not here. The Mountain protects itself. Some workings break under the force of it. Maybe that’s what happened. Though I’m not sure…” He trailed off.

  “So it wasn’t the first Dance? It was already breaking?”

  “It is possible,” Martti said. “I’ve never seen a working like it. It’s almost like a village healer’s spell, but the intricacy of it, and the way it’s woven all the way to the heart of him—it’s marvelous. If I could have seen it when it was new, before it unraveled…”

  “Can it be woven again?” Briana asked with a touch of sharpness.

  “Not here,” Martti said again.

  “But elsewhere?”

  “It’s possible,” said Martti. “Away from the Mountain, in the Healers’ hall in Aurelia, maybe…”

  “So I had been thinking,” Briana said. She turned to the Master. “Are you going to expel him?”

  “I am not,” Master Nikos said.

  Not all the riders were pleased to hear it. Valeria noticed who was not—and who was. Was she? At the moment she could not be sure.

  “He can’t stay here,” Briana said. “Whatever has got hold of him, it will kill him if it keeps on. Will you let me take him back to Aurelia with me?”

  “It might be best,” Nikos said. Valeria wondered if he meant to sound as relieved as he did. “There is even a title for him if he needs one.”

  Briana nodded. “Rider-envoy,” she said. “He held the office before. He can take it up again. And while he’s in Aurelia, with so many orders of mages besides the healers, surely one or more of them can discover what—”

  “Do I get a say in this?”

  Briana looked at Kerrec with complete lack of sympathy. “No,” she said.

  “You are not my master,” he said.

  “I am,” said Nikos, “and I tell you also—no. You have forfeited the right to speak for yourself.”

  “Do I get a choice of sentences, then?” Kerrec demanded.

  “No,” Nikos said again.

  “You won’t strip me of my rank?”

  “Do you want that?”

  Kerrec’s face was stark white. His nostrils flared. “It’s what I deserve.”

  “It’s not what you’ll get.” Nikos turned back to Briana. “He’s yours. If you can bring him back whole, I’ll thank you with all my heart and soul. If not…so be it. We may be coming to the end of our time in this world. All the omens seem to be pointing to it. But I’m not going down without a fight.”

  “The Augurs have said this?” Valeria asked. She did not mean to speak aloud, but there it was. Maybe Nikos would ignore her as he had been doing since this inquisition began.

  Her luck in that respect had run out. “The Augurs see darkness and confusion,” Nikos said, “war and terror and the fall of nations.”

  “No more or less than they ever see,” Gunnar muttered, “and no clearer, either.”

  Valeria had seen more, but if they were not asking, she was not telling. She had seen the world’s Unmaking.

  That was the end of it. They were dismissed. For once in her life on the Mountain, Valeria was not the one called to account for her sins.

  When the riders rose from the table, Briana stayed where she was. She was still gripping Valeria’s arm, which kept her there, as well.

  They all left, all but the Master. Kerrec had been the first to go—running away, damn him.

  Valeria would deal with him later. Briana was dealing with the Master now. She let Valeria go, then braced her hands on the table and leaned toward Nikos.

  “Now,” she said. “Talk to me. What did the Augurs really say?”

  “Very little,” Master Nikos answered. If he was angry, he did not show it. “The Dance was corrupted before the omens could be read.”

  “You will pardon me, I’m sure, if I say I don’t believe you. It was not the purest Dance there ever was, but it was completed. I saw the patterns like shapes of fire in the air. What did the Augurs say they meant?”

  Master Nikos pressed his fingers to his brow as if to quell the pounding inside. “The Augurs say that there is no meaning. It’s all chaos.”

  “The war? The empire? Everything?”

  “They said,” said the Master, “‘All that can be done, may be done, and all that is made may be Unmade.’ And they said, ‘There is a worm in the Mountain’s heart.’”

  Briana sat back slowly. Her face had gone pale. “They said nothing about the war? Whether it will be won or lost?”

  “That seems to be in the lap of the gods,” Master Nikos said.

  “It certainly seems to be in our hands,” said Briana. She looked as if she had found strength somewhere. “We’d best get about it, then—all of us.”

  “What would you have us do?” he asked.

  “You’re asking me?”

  “Lady,” he said, and in that word he put a great store of meaning, “you seem to see more clearly than I. I ride the patterns—I even shape them. I do not interpret them, still less act upon them.”

  “Maybe you should,” she said.

  Master Nikos studied Briana for a long while. What he was seeing, Valeria thought she could understand. Patterns upon patterns, strands of duty and destiny and a confusion of futures, and through them all, the shock of uncertainty.

  Maybe he could make more sense of it than Valeria could. Or maybe not. This was not the world he had expected or wanted to live in.

  She was almost sorry for him. But he was the Master of the riders’ art. He should have been better prepared.

  He was no weakling even so. He straightened at last and said, “None of us pretends to know everything. We leave that to the gods. I see some of their purposes, dimly, and some of those frighten me. But I’m bound to further them as much as I can.”

  “No one is bound to anything,” Briana said. “Even the Call leaves room at the end for a choice—to accept it or turn away. You choose to help the gods, you say. That’s a great good thing if you do mean it. If you don’t, you’ll not be answering to me. The gods will call you to account—and maybe more to the point, the Ladies to whom they give obedience.”

  Master Nikos bowed his head. “If that must be so, then so be it.”

  “Don’t be wea
k,” Briana said sharply. “Don’t give up. We need you more than we ever have. If you fail the test, there may be no empire left.”

  “Maybe that itself is a weakness and a failure,” Nikos said. “Maybe it’s time the empire had its own, human heart instead of relying on the whims of gods.”

  Briana raised a hand. “Don’t say it. Try not to think it. You have to be strong. That’s not a choice, Master. That’s what has to be.”

  Master Nikos sat back in his chair. He was almost laughing—which was more alarming in its way than if he had risen up in a killing rage. “By the gods on the Mountain! I never thought I’d see the day when I was taken to task for every aspect of my tenure, and by a woman at that.”

  That was not well calculated. Briana’s eyes narrowed. “I am the Regent of Aurelia. As such, I have no specific authority over you, but I speak on the empire’s behalf. I render no formal judgment. But be aware, Master of riders, that you are under scrutiny. You are charged with the empire’s fate and its future. That future demands choices that no Master has ever had to make. You must make them. If you do not, or if you choose wrongly, there will be consequences.”

  Nikos rose to his feet. His back was stiff. “Are you asking for my resignation?”

  She met his glare. “Truthfully? No. I don’t think you’re incompetent. I do think you’ve been faced with more than you bargained for. You’ve lost a great deal, and I’m afraid you’ll lose much more before this is over. You’ll be asked to give everything you have, and then give again. I wouldn’t blame you if you backed away from it. Any sensible man would.”

  “Sensible,” Nikos said. His mouth twisted. “There’s sense, and there’s reality. If I go, who takes my place? The one I was grooming for it is so broken he may never be whole again. No one else has the training or the strength. The Called of the past two years have been remarkably gifted—but they’re children. It will be years before any of them is ready. We need a leader now, not ten years from now.”

  “So,” said Briana. “Will you lead?”

  “I will try.”

  “You will do it.”

  That was one of the riders’ own most cherished instructions. Master Nikos clearly was not pleased to be treated like a recalcitrant student. Equally clearly, he saw the justice in it.

  A rider did not bow to any mortal, but he could grant the emperor’s heir his sincere respect. “You’ve given me much to think on, lady,” he said.

  “I should hope so,” said Briana.

  Seventeen

  Briana kept her royal face all the way from the Master’s hall to Kerrec’s rooms. He was not in them. He was under guard until he could be taken away from the Mountain.

  That would have to be soon. But not today. Once the door was shut and there was only Valeria to see, Briana dropped where she stood. Valeria leaped in alarm, but her fit of shaking was neither weeping nor convulsions. She was laughing.

  It was hysteria, mostly. Valeria was rather tempted herself. She filled a cup from the water jar by the bed and brought it to Briana, and persisted until she drank it.

  By then she had stopped shaking. Valeria sat on the floor beside her.

  “That man,” Briana said, “is the most frustrating person I have ever run across—and I live in the imperial court.”

  “All riders are,” Valeria said. “It seems to go with the gifts. The older they are, the worse they get.”

  “Kill me if I ever turn into one of them.” Briana lay back and closed her eyes. “Dear gods. I gave the Master of the Schools of Peace and War a dressing-down as if he were one of the stableboys. Will he blast me to a cinder, do you think?”

  “I think you gave him too much to think about.”

  “That would be a good thing,” Briana said. She sighed. “And yet again, through all of this, he never once acknowledged what you did. Is that riders’ discipline or is it more of their stubborn blindness?”

  Valeria shrugged. “I’d rather be ignored than sent away. I was there for a reason. I did what I was meant to do. It’s over.”

  “You know it’s far from over. You’re down another First Rider. That’s going to hurt.”

  “Didn’t you hear the Healer?” Valeria said. “The Mountain protects its own.”

  “You have a cold heart,” Briana said.

  “I’m a rider,” said Valeria. “Which I suppose makes me blind, too.”

  “I don’t think any of us is seeing clearly,” Briana said. “All I can see is that there’s a war on, and not only on the frontier. I don’t think this year is going to end as quietly as it began.”

  “I know it’s not,” Valeria said, not particularly loudly. She rose to her knees. “Here, do you need help? You should rest.”

  “So should you,” said Briana.

  “I will. Just let me get you to bed first.”

  “I can get myself to bed,” Briana said, fixing a cold eye on Valeria. “What are you plotting?”

  “Nothing,” said Valeria.

  Briana’s glare did its best to sear the truth out of her, but she was adamant. She helped Briana into bed over her protests. Then when Briana was safely settled, she went where she needed to go.

  There is a worm in the Mountain’s heart.

  Those words had been echoing behind everything Valeria did and said since the Master spoke them. He seemed to think they pointed to Kerrec. She knew otherwise.

  She also knew what she had to do. She would do it properly this time, if she could—or as properly as she dared.

  Master Nikos was standing by the stallion paddocks in the evening light, watching his Icarra and Kerrec’s Petra scratch one another’s necks over the fence they shared. They were none the worse for their adventure in the Dance.

  He kept his eyes on the stallions, but Valeria could tell he was aware of her. She leaned on the fence some distance down, in front of Sabata’s paddock. He came to be petted and fed a bit of sugar, then wheeled on his haunches and erupted in a fit of bucks and caracoles. In spite of all her troubles, Valeria could not help but laugh.

  Master Nikos came up beside her. He was smiling. “You’ve done well with him,” he said.

  Valeria blinked. Compliments from any of the elder riders were rare. From the Master, they were nonexistent. “He does it for himself,” she said. “I’m only there to offer suggestions.”

  Nikos laughed. “So are we all,” he said.

  She eyed him suspiciously. The stallions could soothe any rider’s temper. Even so, this seemed excessive. “What is it?” she asked. “What’s happened?”

  “No more than you already know,” he said. “You acquitted yourself well in the Dance.”

  Valeria was immune to flattery. “Oda did most of it. I did what had to be done.”

  “You did it well,” he said. “You do understand that this has no effect on your rank or training. There’s still a great deal for you to learn.”

  “Why, did you think I’d demand to be made a First Rider? I’m not ready for that. I’m not ready to be even a Fourth Rider, not yet. I don’t know nearly enough about training horses. Or history and strategy. Or—”

  “Good,” he said, and that stopped her. She was babbling. “I am sorry that you’ll be losing your primary teacher, but Gunnar has agreed to oversee your education. He’s not as gifted as Kerrec or as experienced as Andres. Still, he believes in your talents and he isn’t dismayed by your gender—and he has more feel for the Dance, in some respects, than any other rider, even Kerrec. In that he’s as nearly your equal as any of the riders.”

  Valeria heard him in a sort of despair. Her stomach clenched at each mention of Kerrec’s name.

  It was all quite reasonable. She could tell the Master had given it a great deal of thought. She should be honored, and to an extent she was.

  But she had to say what she had come to say. “I do thank you—really. I like Gunnar. He’s a good teacher. But I need to go with Kerrec.”

  Nikos frowned. “We all wish he could stay here—it wrenches my h
eart to send him away. But he’ll destroy himself, and likely all of us, as well, if he stays. In Aurelia at least he has some hope of healing.”

  “I know that,” said Valeria. “I need to go to Aurelia with him. If we’re both away from the Mountain, I can—”

  “You are not a Healer,” Nikos said. “You are a rider. Your teachers and training are here.”

  “Kerrec can teach me,” Valeria said. “He’s been doing it for a year. It doesn’t matter how much or how little magic he has—the knowledge is still there, and he can pass it on.”

  Nikos drew a breath. Valeria would wager he was praying for patience. “I understand what he is to you. Whatever you young things might think of an old man who has never had a wife, I do have some knowledge of what is between a man and a woman. Still, his destiny is elsewhere, for now. Yours is here. Without him, we need you more than ever.”

  That was true, and it was bitter to hear. It did not stop Valeria from saying, “At this moment, if I could wring his neck, I would. But that’s not what matters. If I go to Aurelia, continue my studies, do what I can for him—”

  “Valeria,” the Master said. His voice was almost gentle. “You can’t take the whole weight of the world. You need to be here. He needs to be away from the Mountain. There are mages by the hundred in Aurelia, and Healers of more strength and skill than any we have here. He’ll be in good hands.”

  Valeria shook her head. “You’re blinding yourself again. Can’t you see how the patterns are running? My path leads away from here. It will lead back, and so will his—if the gods allow. But I have to go.”

  “I see the patterns,” Nikos said. “I see that your greatest safety is here.”

  He saw nothing. He knew nothing of what was in Valeria—what she was and what she might do if she stayed.

  She tried to tell him. The words were there, ready to be spoken. But when she tried, they vanished in the Unmaking. It was like a geas, a spell of binding.

  If she had not been sure before that she needed to remove herself from the Mountain, that persuaded her. She had to give in to the spell—but she refused to let it stop her. She could talk about Kerrec, if not about herself.