Banner of the Damned (107 page)

My bath did not refresh me. Instead, I emerged shivering in spite of the warmth, and my skin hurt. By the next day, I was so ill with fever that I could not get out of bed, much less do magic. But I wrote to Ivandred, saying,
I am here and have news for you
.

He wrote back almost immediately, telling me to transfer and use his scrollcase as a Destination.

I was sitting stupidly in bed, the scrollcase and note on my lap, when Anhar came in with a tray of food.

I showed her the note, then croaked, “I don’t know what to do. I need more information—Ivandred is going to want proof, he’s going to ask questions I cannot answer.”

“Emras, tell them you cannot transfer. You are clearly ill. Birdy also told me to tell you that he knows where to begin some research, that is, with whom. Eat this. I’m going to take away this cider and brew you some listerblossom.”

Oh, the relief just to be able to share! My already raw throat tightened with tears as I wrote to Ivandred.

The answer was almost immediate, and it was from Lasva.

Emras! You vanished! Hannik feared that your experiments had done something dire to you, for he says that he has not had any contact from you, either. Emras, we are riding for home. All around me everyone talks unity, loyalty, the bond of the ancient Marloven. They sing the Hymn to the Beginnings with fervor on Restday. But the word peace seems to recede farther into the future.

For three days I tossed on my bed, my mind crowded with nightmarish images. Even after I remembered the dyr long enough to crawl out of bed and close it in with Lasva’s lover’s cup, the fever raised every fear I’d endured, going back to childhood. I was in the kitchen again, but it was not the kitchen at Alsais where I’d spent six months. It was Darchelde’s kitchen, only seen once, a distorted room filled with bread dough to knead, but my hands were tied. Sheris, who I had not thought about for over ten years, followed me up to the secret chamber, reaching with her fingers and saying,
Your family hates you, Emras, everyone hates you
. She metamorphosed into Carola, who offered me a cup full of poison, the cup beaten from gold, with the raptor-eyed fox etched round its rim.
Drink it, before the Sartorans catch up with you
.

I ran away, into the jarlan’s old room, where the walls had been replaced with mirrors that reflected one another into infinity, as I ran and ran and ran, ever more lost in darkness.

But the worst of all was Lasva, presiding sorrowfully as she whispered over and over,
Why did you betray me? Bring me the dyr, so we can have peace at last.

I’d wake up gasping, to find myself drenched with sweat. Anhar was often there, and once, Birdy, holding out a cup. Frightened, they brought me green kinthus as well as willow bark, and that enabled me to sleep
dreamlessly. When I woke at last, I found Anhar sitting beside my bed, teasing a small kitten with a feather tied to a string.

“What is happening?” I whispered, my voice quite gone.

“The king and queen are riding back,” Anhar said, flicking the feather up. The little cat arched its tail, wiggled its behind, and pounced. “They’re going to celebrate harvest up in Sindan-An. Something bad happened there, that’s the rumor, anyway.”

I hoped whatever it was had not happened to the jarlan, who was one of Lasva’s staunchest supporters. She’d already lost her middle-aged son and her older granddaughter at Olavair’s battle. But I could not waste my strength on politics, about which I could do nothing. With recovery came the weight of anxiety and the sense of impending trouble.

“If you are awake, I’m going to get you some food.”

“I am ravenous,” I discovered.

“Excellent! The healer said an appetite means recovery.” She smiled and scooped up the kitten. “Come along, Rosie.”

I had to know the dyr was safe, and I could use it to assess what was going on. I got out of bed, clutched at the wall as I swayed, light-headed, then I trod to the box, and banished the illusion. The dyr was safe, exactly where I’d laid it. I picked it up, ready to project myself—and back came Anhar’s words about intimate trespass.

I knew that. I’d known all along that there was something wrong with what I did, but the urge to listen, to know, was so strong. And the danger was now so great. Given how many times I’d used it, what was wrong with one more?

I reached, and there was Lasva, her lower back aching as she rode, her lips gritty with dust as Ivandred and Haldren talked. I could hear a few words, all of them military. I delved into Lasva’s memories for her last sight of Kaidas, and there it was, so powerful I reeled back and fell into my chair.

…
and there I was, mud to the eyebrows, and that colt dancing around with his tail up and his ears saying, “How smart are you now, two-leg? Put a halter on me, will you?”

Lasva laughed. And the laughter released an overwhelming flood of anguish, sweet and yearning and sorrowful, and so intense my throat constricted as she thought,
Oh Hatahra, how very wrong you were. Love does not always die, but how can death’s pain be worse?

“Emras? Are you here?”

I jumped, glanced around my room as my head panged—and somewhere on the road days and days north, I felt Lasva looking back down the long column of riders. “Emras?” she said again.

She’d heard me! I flung the dyr to the stone floor, where it rang and spun. Some of those spells I’d removed must have been a protective ward of some kind that prevented victims—objects—targets—
people
—from hearing my thoughts when I listened.

I forced myself to my feet, retrieved the dyr, my mental shield firmly in place, and I threw it in the box.

Then the long journey to my bed, where I dropped flat. I had time to take two steadying breaths when Anhar was back. “You’re flushed. Is the fever back?”

“I walked to my desk,” I said—and hated the lie. “To test the dyr,” I forced myself to say.

She grimaced. “Don’t. Eat this instead.”

I was halfway through a thick savory soup, accompanied by a hot rye bun slathered with honey and a hunk of cheese when someone scratched at the door.

“Birdy,” Anhar said. “Enter!”

Birdy walked in, greeted us, then gave me another of those puzzled, slightly wary glances.

“What’s wrong?” Anhar said.

“Remember tall Nashande, who was a year ahead of me when we were scribe students?” Birdy asked. “He’s a royal archivist now, and I trust his discretion. So I asked him to do some excavation into the records about this dyr. Apparently just looking at those records sends some kind of spell alert, because this just arrived, after three days of silence.”

He held out a tiny scroll. “It’s addressed to you, Em,” he added. “It’s from your brother.”

“Olnar? But I haven’t heard from him since…”

“Read it,” Birdy said gently.

Birdy, will you share this with Emras after you read it? Exhort her to respond!

Emras: I am going to assume that your friend Birdy, who is known to be in Marloven Hesea, is inquiring after an object made of a substance called “disirad” that vanished from the world during the Fall of Old Sartor four thousand years ago. This much you would have learned had you been properly taught. We do not know the purpose of dyra because so many records were destroyed in the Fall, but we do know that there is at least one in existence. It is in the possession of a Norsundrian commander, and it has been used to throw kingdom-wide enchantments. There are other rumors of uses,
some too harrowing to describe, but this much I can tell you: All of these uses are evil. If you have even seen a dyr, we have to know! I do not know why you never answered any of my letters, but Emras, what are you doing and why? Who have you become?

I looked down at my half-eaten meal, sickened. I set aside the tray and covered my face with my hands.

“Emras?” Anhar asked.

“I can’t eat any more. I am sorry. The food is good, but…” I tossed the letter down, my mind working rapidly.

Anhar picked up the tray, sending a worried look at Birdy, then left us alone.

“Birdy,” I said. “You’ve read this.”

“Yes.”

“First, I never received any communication from my brother. When we came to this kingdom I sent a Name Day greeting, describing our journey, and received no answer. Then the Herskalt convinced me that Olnar would only scold me for learning magic on my own, and that once he found out, he’d be jealous at how much faster I’d learned. I believed that, because Olnar hadn’t answered me.”

“You were always competitive,” Birdy observed.

“We
all
were. We worked harder because of it.” He assented, and I said, “Do you have any desire to use the dyr?”

His hands flicked out in the shadow-ward, his upper lip curling with repugnance.

“The Herskalt,” I said as I felt my way through the tangle of thoughts, “never quite lied. But he didn’t tell me all of the truth. It’s like the mirror wards in that garden, distorted reflections of what’s real. Though the Sartoran Mage Guild is probably not as controlling, as venal, as he led me to believe, I think there is a little truth there. I do remember some of the things Queen Hatahra said.”

“She had definite opinions,” Birdy said with a quick, somewhat humorless grin. “But I don’t know that I’d go to her first on the subject of mages and magic.”

“But she had some convincing observations about mages in history who tasted power and liked it. Birdy, everything I’ve been told for the last ten years is suspect. My own morals are suspect. But I know three things. First, the Herskalt is going to be desperate to get the dyr back. Second, I have to confess to Ivandred and Lasva, and though I suspect
she will feel the way you do, he will see it as an aid to kingdom protection. Third, I can’t seem to stay away from using it. There’s a craving in me, which probably means I’ve turned into an evil mage.”

“An evil mage would justify its use.”

“Don’t you see? I
do
justify it. Birdy, I used it not an hour ago. I know how much it’s going to hurt Lasva, how betrayed she is going to feel…” I caught myself. “That is my personal burden. The dyr is a world burden, and the only thing I can think of is to ask the greatest favor I ever have from you: to take it and dispose of it.”

“What? Me?”

“Yes.”

“Em, may I remind you that I know nothing about magic?”

“That is exactly why I am asking you. The Herskalt cannot trace it if you carry it in that box. If it moves by normal means—walking, riding, aboard a ship—then magic won’t find it. All its tracer wards are gone. I saw to that before I left Darchelde.”

“Should I throw it in the ocean?”

“Yes. Perhaps not. What if the mer folk find it? What will it do to them? I think the only safe thing is to bind it to some future date, when maybe mages will be wiser. Will know what to do. Yes. The Sartoran Mage Guild might be angry, but on reflection, they might decide they are well rid of it. As for Norsunder, ah-ye! I hope by the time you reach wherever you are going that I will have solved that problem.”

He gave a short nod, his jaw working.

“The box will be carefully warded. The rest you will have to do, but it won’t be difficult, just laborious. I will write it all out and set up the enchantment, which is a series of interlocked spells. All you have to do to finish it is to choose as key the family name of someone who seems to be established and sensible. You’ll complete the spell by naming one of their descendants many generations away. Very specific. That will make the enchantment pretty much impossible to break, if someone finds it. Don’t tell anyone what it is, or where. Including me.”

Birdy looked around the room, then said, “Where do I go?”

“As far as you can get.” I crossed to my desk, where I kept the few coins left over from my days in Alsais. I took them out and stared down at them. For some reason hot tears blurred the gold on my palm and tickled my cheeks. “This is what I’m worth? Olnar asked who am I, and I don’t know, Birdy. An evil mage—ah-ye, I can see you are going to protest, and I know I’m overstating it just for the comfort of hearing it denied. But maybe I shouldn’t hear it denied. I am morally suspect, a mage
who can destroy weather patterns for half a continent and place dangerous wards. I am even an evil scribe, for I’ve broken the First Rule so many times I can’t even count them, and I helped others break the Second.”

“You are Emras,” he said, “and I love you.”

I met his eyes at last, startled, apprehensive—but I did not see in his gaze the grasping desperation of
zalend
, or the poetic passion of
rafalle
. It was the warm and steadfast love of human for human, necessary and infinite as light and air.

“I love you, too,” I said.

B

The time was coming—soon—when I was going to have to act, but just then, it passed with the cold trickle of snowmelt as I tried to recover.

Anhar finished her daily tasks and offered to read to me from Hadand’s letters, which I had avoided all this time. I could read them myself, of course, but I found her voice soothing and even entertaining, as she employed her talent at altering her speech to match the tone of the writer. I found it interesting and oddly cheering to hear the female perspective on the lives presented in the Fox memoir.

And so that day passed, and another, and the days turned into a week. Restday came and went, the castle filling with the rich aroma of harvest barley wine, and here and there, mulled wine spiced with cinnamon, a Colendi scent. Some peacock things had been accepted, like many of our pastries, now made by bakers all over the city.

Gradually I recovered my strength as the week stretched to the thirty-six days of a month, and another week after that. As my strength returned, so did the impulse to reach for the dyr. It was a hunger, its
absence like losing sight and hearing. The only way to endure it was to keep busy, because somehow, I had to put the puzzle pieces together.