Tne wine, mulled in deference to the freezing cold of the gatehouse chamber, steamed as Torien drained it from a gold pitcher into crystal goblets. Strong Ossetian red would disguise the taste of dranath for those still jumpy about its use; Linis in particular dreaded its very name.
She would drink from Rusina’s goblet. The stalking cat depicted with consummate Fironese skill had been as appropriate for its original owner as it was laughably inappropriate for Linis. In fact, Torien mused as he watched the green, gray-white, and blue tints darken with the color of the wine, it would be better to give this one to Jolati.
His wife was sifting a precise amount of dranath into each cup. He and she were alone, preparing this small ritual for the other devr’im who would arrive shortly. She was singing quietly under her breath, some poem she’d written in the old language. He was silent.
The beauty of the goblets never failed to impress him. His own sunset over the sea; Deniker’s jade-green waterfall foaming white into a sapphire ocean; the black wolf padding through red flowers beside a brilliant blue river, that had belonged to Oclel. Antoun would use it today, just as Linis would drink from Rusina’s, and Valeda’s goblet would be Martiel’s.
“The last time we did this—“ Torien began incautiously.
“You’ve left Andry’s cup unfilled,” Jolan interrupted. “You’ll be using it, of course. Pour some in.”
Everything in him rebelled. He was Chief Steward here, Andry’s trusted and valued deputy, center this day of the ms’salath. But he was also a sorcerer. He could almost feel the gold rings burning his flesh as if in protest. Or warning.
“No,” he said.
“To all intents and purposes, you’re Lord of Goddess Keep.” Jolan faced him across the small table, eight filled goblets and one empty one between them. “It’s a harmless symbol, Torien. Just in here. Just among ourselves.”
“No.”
For an instant he thought she’d argue. Then she gave an irritated shrug. “Very well. As you wish.”
Cold, quiet morning air was pierced by a deafening note from the great horn. Both of them clapped their hands over their ears, then quickly grabbed for the glasses rattling dangerously against each other.
When the incredible noise ceased, Torien had to shout to hear his own words past the ringing in his ears. “Goddess! Is he trying to be heard all the way to Skybowl?”
A few moments later Ulwis and Deniker arrived, the latter complaining that it had taken both of them and Crila besides to rouse Nialdan from sleep.
“And since he’s the only one who can lift that damned horn—let alone pat enough air into it—he’ll be as late getting here as he was in sounding the alarm.” Deniker scrubbed his fingers through his pillow-crimped brown hair and grimaced at the wine goblets. “Shouldn’t we eat something before we guzzle that? Wine on an empty stomach is bad enough, but with dranath mixed in—“
“Always food!” His wife poked him in the ribs. “You just worked off the silkweight you gained gobbling everything in sight at the Rialla. I ought to send you out with Lord Edrel’s troops to get some exercise.”
“Half a silkweight,” he grumbled, and picked up his goblet.
How usual they sound, Torien thought, as if this was practice—as if there weren’t thousands of Vellant’im ready to tear Goddess Keep apart and weave our rings through their beards. As if Andry were here to lead MS...
Which name reminded him of the decision he’d have to make. He had two choices for the configuration of colors. One put the three diarmadh’im in the middle; the other placed Martiel at one end, Crila at the other, with Torien himself taking the center. The first distributed their relative immunity to iron across the whole spectrum. But the second was the more powerful, for it concentrated their strength.
It was rather like castle architecture, he thought, remembering when Sorin of Feruche had visited here and they’d discussed the Castle’s design during long evenings around the fire. There were certain ways to construct an arch to stand alone—and other ways to buttress it, if the space to be bridged was very wide. Torien could make a simple, strong arc of power, or use the two other diarmadh’im to bolster the Sunrunners.
How much simpler it had been when Andry had taken the center. Then, all Torien had to do was fashion the shield that would keep iron from harming his Lord. Now he must lead as well as protect.
No one else seemed concerned about any danger. Except for Nialdan, they had all assembled now. Antoun looked as if he hadn’t slept since Summer, but he calmly lifted Oclel’s wolf goblet and went to stand by the balcony windows to await the sunrise. Linis and Martiel had evidently come from the same bed: his shirt was sagging off her shoulders and her cloak was thrown around his. Each had a smile for Torien as they claimed Rusina’s and Valeda’s cups. But Crila, shivering despite heavy wool clothes and a fur-lined tunic, provided a jolt to Torien’s slowly gathering confidence.
She reached for a goblet, then stopped. Nialdan’s, shimmering with reds and green, had been filled; so had Torien’s own. Andry’s was the only one left, and it was empty.
“My lord?” she asked, blinking in confusion. “Which am I to take?”
“Lend her yours,” Deniker said to Torien. “I assumed you’d take Andry’s.”
Jolan sent him a meaningful glance that he chose to ignore. “No,” he replied. “We’ll find another for Crila.”
“Our new devr’im don’t match the colors of the goblets they inherited, anyway,” Ulwis added with a shrug. “A cup is a cup, after all. It’s the wine that counts.”
By this time the gatehouse was echoing with the noise of those coming into Goddess Keep. Parents called to children, masters to apprentices, and—loudest of all—animals to each other as they were herded inside. As Nialdan finally appeared, disheveled by Ms struggle through the crowd, Edrel could be heard shouting for passage.
“Let him handle it,” Jolan murmured as Torien took a half- step to the door. “That’s what he’s here for.” Raising her voice as well as her crystal cup of dranath-laden wine, she said, “Goddess grant us strength to do her work, and success for all we do in her sacred Name.”
One by one the goblets—including the plain ceramic one found in a cupboard for Crila—were drained and set back onto the table. The devr’im waited for the drug to take effect, eyes beginning to sparkle as the first flush of sensuality slid through their veins. It would be followed by an augmentation of power—and this was what decided Torien on how to construct his arc.
“Martiel,” he said quietly. “You’re to my left. Then Linis and Antoun.” Perhaps it wasn’t wise to place the lovers together; Martiel’s first instinct would be to protect Linis. But she would work better feeling his presence beside her. If it became necessary for Torien to demand everything Martiel had, Antoun would bolster Linis. “Deniker,” he added, “you’re on Antoun’s left.”
Torien looked at each of the others in turn. “Crila, on my right. Nialdan, Jolan, Ulwis,” Strongest of the Sunrunners (even including Jolan), Ulwis would be even stronger for the dranath.
And if it came to it, which he begged the Goddess it would not, then the five faradh ‘im could be ejected from the weaving for their own safety and the three diarmadh’im function alone, with Torien himself as the keystone of the arch.
Such a fine irony: sorcerers doing the work of the Goddess. Torien wondered suddenly if there ever had been a sorcerer Lord or Lady of Goddess Keep. That would be the biggest irony of all.
“And wouldn’t it be funny,” Evarin was saying as he measured out dranath, “if they took one look at your conjuring, turned tail, and ran like all Hells were after them? Pol would never get the chance to make us knuckle under.”
Andry sipped at the hot taze and made a face. “You could’ve brewed this a little stronger, you know.”
“Don’t change the subject. Do you want it to be seen that all Sunrunners and even the Lord of Goddess Keep are—“
“You’re assuming Pol is powerful enough to take me on. You’re also assuming that our aims conflict.” Andry glanced at the eastern Desert, where the thinnest swath of deep blue draped the dunes. Morning was coming. Occasionally during this interminable night he’d wondered if it ever would. “He and I want the same thing, Evarin,” he went on softly. “A very, very large pyre of very, very dead Vellant’im.”
“But it depends on who does the killing, doesn’t it?” The Master Physician took a gulp of taze, hands wrapped around the cup for warmth. “I mean, if they really are scared out of their minds by the dragon-teeth trick, then Tilal will get them and most of the credit. But if it’s you, working the ros’salath...”
“You still don’t understand, do you? It doesn’t matter who kills them as long as they’re dead.”
Evarin shrugged. “It’d matter to the Vellant’im. A sword is a lot cleaner. The pile of corpses would be bloody, but at least they’d die sane. And there’s this to consider, too—if the ros ‘salath does the work, none of our own people would have to die.”
“That’s the choice Pol faced. Which lives are more important—ours or theirs? The answer is obvious.” Andry paused, swirling the steaming liquid around to catch up the last undissolved particles of dranath. “He’s had his moments of compassion, of course. Not weakness. He’s never that. But at times he’s been reluctant to see any more deaths, including theirs. It argues well for a prince when he feels that—can you imagine Rinhoel or Chiana regretting the necessity of killing, for instance? But Pol is also practical and ruthless enough to realize that such things have no place when a civilization is threatened.” He paused once more, listening to what he’d just said. “Rohan would appreciate the tragedy of that. We must behave like barbarians in order to defend our civilized selves.”
“Use a steel knife to excise the putrefying flesh caused by a steel sword,” Evarin mused. “I suppose so, my Lord.” He glanced into Andry’s cup, saw that it was as empty as his own, and poured in fresh, undrugged taze. “I’m not—“
What he was not, Aadry never learned. Out of the shadows between campfires came a quartet of flames. The three of Sunrunner’s Fire belonged to Hollis, Jeni, and Chayla. Feylin strode along beside them, carrying a more conventional candle in her gloved fist.
“Don’t say it,” Hollis warned as Andry opened his mouth.
“I’ve already had enough nonsense from your stone-skulled brother to last me until next Winter.”
Andry got as far as drawing breath to speak. This time it was Chayla who forestalled him. “Whoever thought we’d stay behind at Feruche doesn’t know us very well.”
“I_»
Jeni’s turn. “My mother’s up there,” she said quietly.
“But—“
“But nothing.” Feylin eyed him quellingly. “I’m a physician—maybe not in his class or Chayla’s, but I know my way around the average sword cut.”
Evarin began, “I hope we won’t need—“
“We hope so, too,” Hollis said, dark blue eyes exactly the color of the eastern sky, and flashing with the same quicksilver fire. “But if you do, here we are.”
Andry nodded. Then a terrible idea hit him and he glanced around wildly. “Please don’t tell me my mother came with you!”
Feylin snorted. “Tobin has more sense.”
Pol was telling Visian thanks-but-no-thanks regarding a certain piece of armor when Kierun and Dannar showed up, the immense dragon tapestry from Stronghold slung between their saddles.
Sethric rode along behind them, two brass rods taller than most young pine trees propped in one stirrup.
“Forgive me if I don’t climb down, my lord,” he said. “It was hard enough to get up here. Where would you like your banner displayed?”
“Rohannon? Come on, wake up.”
He grumbled and turned a shoulder into his cloak, seeking warmth that wasn’t there.
“I know, I know—it’s still black as soot outside,” Idalian said. “But Prince Laric wants us ready by dawn.”
Rohannon’s only response was to pull the cloak up over his head.
“There’s taze,” Idalian added slyly.
He rolled over and cracked an eyelid. “Hot? Really hot?”
I
Idalian grinned and held out a steaming cup.
Rohannon grabbed and gulped. The strong brew scalded his tongue. “Goddess, that’s good! All the way to my toes!”
“We’ve got a little time to enjoy it. I sent Aldiar to saddle our horses.”
“That wasn’t very nice. Horses scare her, you know.”
One instant Idalian was crouching beside him; the next, he was flat on his rear end with astonishment.
“Her?”
Rohannon lowered his face and drank once more, hiding his own sudden shock. He kicked his brain into a rapid mental review of his every encounter with the skinny, black-eyed sorcerer. By the time he looked over at the stunned sprawl that was Idalian, there was a little smile on his lips.
“Well, of course she’s a her. What did you think she was? Drink up. I don’t know about your lord, but mine hates it when I’m late.”
“My lady? I have something for you,” Pol said, and Sionell turned. “It won’t fit as well, but it’s more appropriate.”
He held up the armor that Tallain had removed from Birioc of the Merida shortly after he’d removed Birioc’s head. Though not modern in workmanship and thus unsuited for protection in modern battle, the breastplate was beautifully crafted of thick leather studded with uncut topazes and emeralds. Visian had wanted Pol to wear it, but the moment Sionell appeared Pol had something else in mind.
She was staring at it. So were Maarken, Chay, and Riyan. It pleased Pol that three of his four most powerful vassals— Walvis was off giving Feylin roughly the same lecture he’d tried to give Sionell—would witness this.
“Appropriate?” Sionell asked.
Pol nodded. “After the Merida were defeated at Zagroy’s Pillar—“ Fifty days ago? Fifty years? “—the Lord of Tiglath was made Regent of Cunaxa. I find the armor a fitting symbol. It would honor me if you’d wear it.”
What he didn’t say was that when the sun hit those topazes and emeralds and the gold fittings around them, she would be visible at two measures. The Vellant’im might recognize the armor and believe that even the Merida had joined the Azhrei’s army. More important, if she left the rise he intended her to occupy—right next to Kierun and Dannar with the dragon tapestry unfurled—she would be quickly identifiable and just as quickly whisked away to safety. Battle-canny, Chay, Maarken, and Riyan understood that without his having to mention it.
Sionell wasn’t Slinking about that at all. For this was the first time Tallain had been mentioned between them except in anger and guilt since the day he died. Damn you, you clever bastard, her eyes told him. He acknowledged the accusation with a level look. There was no way she could refuse the armor, the regency, or the “honor”—but she was clearly suspicious of how extensive the trap really was. So he told her.
“Things happen in any battle,” he said quietly. “If one of them should happen to me—and to Meiglan—“
“That’s enough,” Chay snapped.
“If it should,” Pol insisted, and glanced at Maarken. “You’ll be Regent of the Desert. Riyan, your father will take Princemarch again, as he did for me before. But he’ll need your help. He’s not as young as he once was. Sionell ... Cunaxa is yours. Among you, I ask that you raise my children exactly as you’ve raised your own.”
“I fail to see the point of this depressing conversation.” Sionell took the leather breastplate from Pol’s hands. “Maarken, help me get into this thing, please?”
Well satisfied, Pol bowed slightly to them and walked a few paces away. A brief weaving of the remaining starlight showed him Tilal and his cavalry of Ossetians, Syrenes, Giladans, and physicians from all over the continent. They would not reach Skybowl by dawn, but if everything went as planned, they wouldn’t have to.
And if it didn’t—which was what he expected, the last thing he would admit to anyone—then Tilal would provide fresh reinforcements for a battle of hideous proportions.
Curiously enough, the certainty that events would turn out much differently than any prior planning could anticipate didn’t bother him. By rights he should be a raving madman about now. But his father had been right (And when had he not been? Pol asked himself with an inner smile): there was a centered serenity in knowing that whatever happened, there would be only one thing to do about it. He’d know. When the time came, he’d know.
He returned to the others. Visian had joined them. Sioneil was gone. “Giving back the armor she borrowed from one ef her Tiglathis,” Chay explained.
Pol nodded and told them Tilal’s location, finishing with, “Audrite said the moons won’t rise until the sun is fully up, but they’ll come low and fast. So we have some leeway in the timing of all this. If everyone will get into position now, then I think we’re ready.”
“Not just yet.” Chay cleared his throat and divided a look between Maarken and Riyan. Finally his gaze rested on Visian. “It’s yours to give.”
“Not mine, great Lord of Radzyn,” the Isulki said promptly. “My people are only its guardians. It is for Sunrunners and sorcerers both to gift it, as my brother and lord, Kazander, told me to do.”
“There’s a Sunrunner,” Chay said, pointing to Maarken, then to Riyan. “And there’s a sorcerer.”
“And I’m both,” Pol said impatiently. “What are you talking about?”
Visian pulled from his tunic a circlet of beaten gold, set with chunks of white jade. “It is called—“
“—the selej,” Pol whispered. “The White Crown.”
Visian seemed to expect that Pol would know. The other three frowned to varying degrees. At last Riyan’s brow cleared and he sighed.
“Yet another tale my wife didn’t listen to, I suppose.”
Pol couldn’t take his eyes from the heavy gold, the dull milky jade. So unlike the fierce bright glow of the real selej that had formed around Rosseyn’s head: no power, no burning throb of potent stones.
“It’s ... a symbol,” he said at last. “Given to the Isulk’im for safekeeping a long time ago.” He looked hard at Visian then. “You want me to wear it?”
“Azhrei, Lord Kazander said this to me—‘You know who I would have wear it.’ And I say to you of my own words—in truth, is there any other who could?”
“If the word of ufaradhi is required, you have mine,” said Maarken.
“And mine, as diarmadhi,” Riyan added.
After a moment, Chay said, “If all the forms have been observed—even though none of us understands them—then put that thing on and let’s get going.”
Dear, irreplaceable Chay: a treasure of uncommon sense and bruising practicality. Father of two Sunrunners, including a Lord of Goddess Keep, he considered those gifts just another sort of talent, like music or mathematics.
So Pol accepted the selej from Visian and set it around his head without any trepidation whatsoever. It was only a symbol, like the jeweled armor he’d given Sionell. There was no power in it. No magic.
Still, for the moments it took the chill gold to warm against his forehead, he had a sudden image of Rosseyn captured beneath the real one. Beyond his dark, living face in the mirror, Pol imagined Gerik’s eyes like amethysts and Merisel’s like emeralds, liquid with helpless grief at what had been done to their beloved friend. All these long years of secrecy and imprisonment, sprung from one woman’s schemes—and not just Rosseyn’s plight, either. The diarmadh’im had spent centuries in fear for their lives. The faradh’im had never known their true heritage. The population of thirteen princedoms had remained utterly ignorant of those who longed for their destruction because of something that had happened fifteen generations ago.
And all this long while, the Isulk’im had kept the White Crown safe—with only the vaguest idea why.
A symbol, without any power—not the kind of power Pol had come to understand in the past days. For him, the selej was a symbol of Gerik and Merisel and Rosseyn, his ancestors. He would wear this crown for them. But for others, as well. Kazander. Chay and Maarken and all the rest of his family. Those who had taught him and loved him. Andry, who had in some ways driven him to understandings he would never have reached without his cousin’s constant goading. Rohan. Sioned. Meiglan. Sionell. All of them— even the Vellant’im in their fear and superstition. For by using exactly those things, he would spare their lives.
He glanced at the horizon. Not long now. He would know what to do. He was sure of nothing else, but he would know what to do. The serenity of his wholeness was absolute.
It only occurred to him at that moment to wonder if, in the knowing, he would have the strength.
If not... well, intelligence (Rohan would have been more honest, and called it cunning) would have to make up for it.
Which reminded him. “My Lord Battle Commander,” he said to Maarken, “is there any chance of a concert?”
I I
At least he used sterile needles. I’d hate to come so far and fail so spectacularly only to die of blood poisoning.
Sioned and her five companions had spent the rest of the sleepless night locked in a windowless chamber and tied to chairs. Meiglan was with them, plainly glad of the company and not the slightest bit afraid of the dawn. “I’ve been soiled beyond use. I wasn’t supposed to come into contact with anybody but priests.”
A massively muscular guard, having planted his boots in the middle of the doorway and his unsheathed sword point between his boots, announced, “I say your words.” Presumably this meant he understood their language and would repeat everything he heard to the High Warlord. After this, he neither moved nor spoke again all night.
Foolish, Sioned thought. If he ‘d kept his mouth shut, we might have discussed plans he could report later.
Then: Plans? I’m the fool here.
She could do nothing. Not with steel piercing her hand. The High Warlord knew that. So why not make them feel even more helpless by warning them their words would be understood?
So they said nothing as they waited for the morning.
Of them all, Sioned alone knew what Pol intended: to surround Meiglan with the kind of weaving she herself had used so many years ago—and from this very castle—to screen Rohan and Roelstra as they fought. Pol would do it with the help of a few diarmadh’im while Andry constructed the ros’salath—thus elegantly avoiding any chance of a battle for control.
But now he would have to expand his weaving to include Sioned, Alasen, Ruala, Bern, and Isriam. And with Ruala unavailable to Andry—and Ruala’s husband more inclined to help Pol than the Lord of Goddess Keep—where would the sorcerers come from to protect the ros’salath from iron?
Sioned had hoped the Vellant’im would all be dead or dying by now—thus even more elegantly avoiding any battles at all. The prospect of disposing of the enemy had brought the others willingly to her aid here. But she hadn’t missed their revulsion when they learned she meant not to cripple but to kill.
She gave a mental shrug. Condemn her act as they would, they were glad enough of it. Feeling guilty over it, of course. There’s your precious “civilization” for you, Rohan. I could excuse myself by saying I didn’t use my gifts and therefore didn’t break my vow—but you’d know that for an expediency the instant I opened my mouth. I was always more of a barbarian than you. Ruthlessness comes easier and quicker to me.
If not for the needle in her palm, she would have charred the High Warlord and all his minions to a crisp without a second thought.
It was still quite dark when the High Warlord arrived with an escort of twelve. Meiglan arched a delicate brow.
“Two for each of us? How flattering to be considered so dangerous still.”
“Terrified of five helpless women and a boy,” Alasen added, her biting scorn a perfect foil for Meiglan’s sweet sarcasm.
But as she was first to be untied, hauled to her feet, and bound once more, Meiglan said icily, “Hurt her, hurt any of them, and the Azhrei will burn you one layer of skin at a time.”
. The High Warlord’s bow was a masterwork of mockery— but their guard and two of the escort cast wary glances at the captives.
As he straightened, Sioned bit her tongue between her teeth to hold back a cry of sheer anguish. The shift of his black hair from one ear had revealed a gold gemstone piercing the lobe, a glowing drop of topaz that she had last seen Rohan wear. The pain was as intense as if someone had made Sorin’s Feruche into a whorehouse. For this alone, she promised herself, forbidding tears, for this alone, I’ll kill you.
Outside in the predawn gloom, the courtyard was thick with horses being saddled and warriors coming into formation. The High Warlord led the way through the gates, holding a torch aloft. The clans camped around the lake had assembled to watch the little procession. Silence began to unnerve Sioned. She had been stared at by thousands during every Rialla since 698, but never in such profound—and malicious—quiet.
Light flirted with ragged edges of the crater, gilding crags where dragons had perched and preened. Below somewhere, not yet within her sight, was a length of sand strewn with Ruala’s dishes; beyond that, Pol’s army. Andry should be about ready to play Fire games with the former, while the latter watched and cheered. They would be eager for the battle Sioned had hoped to spare them.
Pol had hoped so, too. But where she had tried to prevent deaths today by killing last night, he didn’t want anyone to die.
You’d be proud of him, beloved. So am I, when it comes down to it. He understands now what it means to be High Prince. But his way isn’t yours, and it isn’t mine. He has what you never did, what not even I could give you.
Somewhere among the seven hundred at Pol’s command were Thassalante and ninety-eight other sorcerers. lanthe’s gift. I hope she’s watching—and writhing.
“Come on, Alleyn!” Audran hissed. “Don’t you want to know what happens?”
His sister frowned. “Princess Tobin—“
“But you don’t think she’ll let us listen, do you? You know how grown-ups are when important things are going on. Nothing but you shouldn ‘t be here and find something to do, and the battle will be over before we even know it’s being fought!”
Alleyn glanced at the bathroom door, behind which their grandparents were dressing by candlelight. A servant had tiptoed in a little while ago to tell them Princess Tobin would receive them whenever they were ready. Alleyn and Audran, roused from their nest of blankets near the hearth, knew very well what that meant.
But all they’d been told was to go back to sleep. At thirteen, this galled Alleyn for reasons different from nine-year-old Audran’s, but she had to admit she was in perfect sympathy with him. And, she reminded herself, she’d better go along to keep an eye on him. As the eldest, it was her responsibility to make sure he and the other children didn’t do something dreadful.
She pulled on woolen stockings in tacit agreement with her brother’s plan, but cautioned, “We’ll get into awful trouble.”
“So what?”
“You sound like Jihan,” she observed disapprovingly, then paused in reaching for her shirt. “This is her idea, isn’t it?”
“So what?” Audran repeated. “It’s a good idea.”
Alleyn was more convinced than ever that her presence was necessary. Jihan was capable of just about anything.
“Mama and Papa are there,” Audran said in a voice suddenly gone very small. “Don’t you want to know what they—“
Quick, back under the covers!”
They pretended to be asleep. Their grandparents paused for a little while beside their blankets on the floor, whispering too softly for Alleyn to hear. A loving hand brushed her hair. The caress reminded her of the mother she hadn’t seen in longer than she could remember; tears stung her eyes under closed lids. A moment later, the outer door snicked shut.
Audran was up at once, grabbing for his shoes. “Besides, Jihan doesn’t believe there’s anybody in the mirror. Why won’t anybody teach us how to call Fire? Then we could prove it.”
Both these indignities had rankled Alleyn, too—the skepticism more than the Fire. You couldn’t tell high-and-mighty Jihan anything. Antalya said she’d been very princessy for a while and it had been sort of annoying. This was as much condemnation as gently-spoken Talya could manage, followed immediately by the explanation that Jihan was very worried about her sister and her mother. Well, Alleyn hadn’t seen either of her parents since the terrible night Graypearl and Sandeia had burned, but she hadn’t turned all nasty and ordered everyone around.
Alleyn was a princess, too, and if it took a princess to stand up to Jihan, she was more than willing. There was a man’s face in that mirror, and they’d prove it. Even if they would have to rely on somebody else to call Fire.
The two of them sneaked out of the chamber and down the hall to the stairs. Jihan and Rislyn met them there, holding hands.
“We’re going up to the Attic,” Jihan said. “Nobody will look for us there.”
“Won’t they be having breakfast?” Alleyn asked, voicing what to her was a logical objection.
Jihan snorted. “This early? Climb all those steps just for a cup of taze and some bread?”
“We thought of that, too,” Rislyn said, and it was hard for Alleyn to believe that such shining green eyes saw nothing. “We’re pretty sure they’re in Aunt Tobin’s room. It overlooks the Desert, so it’s easier to go Sunrunning.”
“Big windows,” Jihan added. “And plenty of sunlight.”
Audran frowned. “Pretty sure?”
“Maara went to check.” Rislyn’s blind eyes turned to her twin. “I still say we should tell Tobren about this. Her father’s at Skybowl, too, you know.”
“Let’s leave her out of this,” Jihan replied, and for once Alleyn was in agreement with her. She didn’t much like Lord Andry’s daughter, either.
“Talya and Jahnev should be here by now,” Rislyn said. “Will you run down the hall and check, Audran? Thank you.”
He obliged. Moments later, Rislyn frowned slightly.
“I hear four people.”
Alleyn blinked. She didn’t hear anybody at all.
“Oh, Goddess,” Jihan moaned. “They brought Meig!”
Alasen clenched her fingers and bit back a whimper of pain as the needle shifted in her right hand. Willing herself to relax, as desperately as she willed herself not to be afraid, she watched helplessly while Meiglan was freed of the white cords that bound her. Alasen’s own bonds were heavy ropes that cut into her skin despite Meiglan’s warning to the High Warlord. Her right arm was bent at the elbow and lashed to her chest, the rope looped around her neck. She could touch her lips with her fingers but couldn’t lower her chin far enough to pull the needle out with her teeth—for her left arm was drawn tightly behind her back and secured with the rope that circled her throat. Bending her head would throttle her; working around to gain some slack for her left arm would wrench her shoulder the rest of the way from its socket.
Sioned, Ruala, Beth, and Isriam were similarly bound. Hopelessly bound. Alasen once more sent an apology to Meiglan with her eyes, and once more received a gentle smile and slight shake of the head in reply.
Meiglan believed utterly in Pol’s ability to free her. Alasen wished she shared that belief. All around them— massed below on the slope of the crater and strung in clanmaster ranks on either side—stood more than two thousand Vellant’im thirsting for Meiglan’s Wood.
And mine. She heard the blood pounding in her ears with the acceleration of her heartbeat, and forced the rhythm back to something approximating normal. If she didn’t control her fear, her body would collapse of it.
She cursed her predicament’s irony. She had rejected her Sunrunner gift all her life. Now that she ached to use it, doing so would kill her.
She glanced at Ruala, standing to her right. She, too, looked unafraid, but not for Meiglan’s reason. Ruala looked as if she felt this simply couldn’t be happening to her. Alasen wished she could share that, too. But Ruala was with child, she remembered. During her own pregnancies she’d been so emotionally attuned to the baby beneath her heart that nothing else seemed quite real.
On Alasen’s left, Isriam was purely furious. Betheyn was worried for everybody but herself. Sioned stood beyond them, a few paces apart. Her green eyes, fixed on the High Warlord, glinted with bitter hate.
He was a magnificent sight, resplendent in snowy shirt and trousers, a diamond dripping rubies in one earlobe and a topaz in the other. He needed no weapon to imply physical power, and this morning carried none—only a golden knife in his belt. He stood on the tallest of the crags where all his men could see him—and Pol’s army, too, well out of arrow-shot beyond the “dragon teeth.”
The thought of the trick about to be played made Alasen feel a little better. But burgeoning confidence dissolved into confusion when a series of high-pitched whistles drifted up from the Desert.
Alasen gave a start when horses began to shift restlessly along the slope. The three whistles, each a different four-note sequence, were repeated. Then a second set of three sounded, and every horse in Vellanti possession either whinnied or began to move.
Sioned was grinning.
Radzyn horses were trained to stay put when their reins dangled. Riders grabbed for loose leather as the whistles sounded again. A dozen mounts escaped and galloped down to the Desert—and then Alasen understood.
Sioned laughed openly now as Vellant’im scrambled to re- strain six hundred frantic horses. Many warriors were dragged halfway down the hill before they got control of the animals; several were trampled beneath hooves that dug into the ground in response to the summoning whistles.
Another twenty or thirty horses broke free. Alasen nudged Ruala and whispered, “Foals are taught to come to mama with that whistle—a different one for each stud’s get. It’s taught to whoever buys them so they can call their horses for saddling.”
Comprehension sparkled in dark green eyes. “And all these horses are from Radzyn!”
Sioned’s laughter earned her a backhand blow from one of her clanmaster guards. She caught her breath and shook her head as if to clear it, but there was no pain in her eyes: only mockery as she laughed again at the High Warlord.
“Only sixty-two, out of six hundred,” Chay complained. “Damn.”
Andry shrugged. “Well, it was worth a try.”
“It made the Vellant’im even more nervous,” Maarken reminded them. “And that’s all to the good.” He paused to straighten the silver belt around Andry’s waist and brush a lock of hair from blue eyes. “Your turn, little brother.”
“Goddess go with you, my Lord,” Chay said gruffly.
Andry glanced at him, surprised. “I think that’s the first time you’ve ever called me that.”
“I don’t intend to make a habit of it,” was the wry answer. “Go on. And have a care to yourself, son.”
Andry grasped his father’s hands briefly in his own. “I like that title much better.” Turning, he said to Evarin, “You go stand with the ladies—and keep back. This is likely to singe anybody who gets too close.”
Evarin made sure the ladies were comfortably seated on their cloaks, then settled onto his own. If Andry drew too strongly on them, they wouldn’t be hurt if they toppled over. Feylin stood nearby the little circle of Sunranners, arms folded and gray eyes sharp as steel. “We’ll be all right,” Hollis assured her.
“I hope he knows what he’s doing,” Feylin replied.
Evarin had slowly grown accustomed to the way these Desert people talked about Andry. It must be difficult, he thought, to hold in any kind of awe someone you’d swaddled, swatted, and sworn at.
Still, k stung him to hear so little respect for the Lord of Goddess Keep. “He knows better than anyone, my lady,” he told Feylin.
She snorted. “He’d better.”
Chayla’s mare nudged her shoulder, and she turned to stroke the animal’s nose. “It’s not Andry we should be worrying about,” she said. “It’s what the Vellant’im will do when they see his conjuring.”
“Run like all Hells would be my choice,” Jeni admitted nervously.
Chayla shrugged. “It all depends on what and how they believe. Those who don’t believe what they see and won’t be afraid—they’ll be dangerous. The ones who believe and are frightened will be easy to beat. But those few who believe and yet are unafraid—they’re the ones we need to fear.”
Hollis touched her daughter’s arm. “None of them would be here at all if they didn’t believe in their superstitions. That’s how their High Warlord and their priests compel them to battle.”
Jeni glanced around at the sound of hoofbeats, and scowled. “Whereas some of our mighty warriors «de into battle through sheer stupidity.”
Evarin followed her gaze. Lord Sethric and Prince Daniv had met near the larter’s contingent of cavalry. Their words were inaudible, but the gestures were eloquent: Daniv pointing to the unfurled dragon tapestry on a rise of dunes, Sethric jabbing a finger down at the sand his horse stood on.
“The Prince of Syr has no luck ordering a Lord of Grib to take himself and his useless leg somewhere safe,” Feylin mused.
Hollis smiled. “I take it the Lady of Remagev failed, too?”
Jeni climbed to her feet, lightning flashing from her cloud-gray eyes. “Well, a Lady of Castle Crag damned well intends to succeed! Idiot!” she spat, and stormed away across the sand.
Evarin opened his mouth to call the gM back where she belonged. But all his thoughts and all his breath were taken away with the first touch of Andry’s dranath-augmented colors.
He never saw Jeni stumble to her knees, or Daniv and Sethric leave off their argument, or Feylin leap to keep inexperienced Chayla from collapsing.
Eight young faces were reflected in the mirror, crowding close. In coloring, they seemed to come in two pairs and a trio, with one left over. Jihan and Rislyn were the palest, their fair hair coming from both parents and their eyes taking each color of Pol’s, blue and green. Alleyn’s braids had been lightened by the Desert sun almost to the red-gold of Talya’s; both had blue eyes and an infinity of freckles. Meig, standing on tiptoe in the front, and Jahnev and Audran, just beside him, were all brown-haired and pale-eyed. Maara was the different one, the dark one, her black hair and deep brown Fironese eyes making her seem some exotic changeling.
“So what’s it do?” Meig asked.
“It doesn’t do anything,” Audran replied. “But there’s somebody inside it.”
“Sure,” Jihaa said.
“Call Fire and you’ll see,” Alleyn challenged.
“We have more important things to do.” Jihan guided Rislyn over to the open west windows. The first full dawn’s light shone white-gold in their hair. Alleyn noted with grudging honesty that Jihan changed completely when helping her twin. “I can see Lir’reia—she’s circling straight ahead of where we’re facing, about halfway up the sky.”
Meig eyed the mirror, the nearly spent candles to either side of it, and the gemstones set along the top. “Who’s in there?”
“We don’t know. A man.” Audran looked at Talya. “Can you—?”
“I don’t know that I should,” she began.
“I can,” said Meig, and one of the candles flared to life.
Alleyn held her breath. He should be there, that strange dark face she and Audran had seen and Jeni had not. She should be looking into his black eyes, tilted at the corners like her mother’s and Lord Riyan’s and Maara’s.
Nothing.
“So?” Meig asked. “When does it happen?” Alleyn answered reluctantly, “He ... ought to be there...”
“He’s not,” Jahnev said with a frown. “Why?”
“I don’t know, all right?” she exclaimed, turning away. Jihan would never believe them now. She told herself it wasn’t important; she knew what she’d seen and Audran could confirm it. So could High Prince Pol, for that matter. But Jihan’s scornful glance from the windows pricked her pride all the same.
Meig shrugged and let the flame go out. He wandered around for a few moments, then curled into a chair near the sideboard. “Jahnev,” he said to his brother, “tell me when somebody sees Mama.”
And with that, he wrapped his arms around an embroidered pillow and went to sleep.