Banner of the Damned (95 page)

The remarkable thing, I soon discovered, was that Lasva had known even less freedom than I had. Her earliest memories were of kindly but firm hands disengaging her fingers from something forbidden, and admonishments if she tried to run, or leap, or shout, always beginning with the phrase
A princess must
…

“Emras!” Lasva herself was there, her entire countenance expressing pleasure. “Emras! I am so glad to see you here. Come! Here is food. And places to sit. Or would you like to dance?”

I declined, without telling her I did not know the dances. She stayed with me until I had a plate and a cup of my own, but I could not eat: the fast I was breaking was the hunger of the heart. I watched with the dizzy languor of emotional starvation as she tripped lightly off to dance again, leaving me surrounded by people having a good time, while I remained effectively invisible. I forced myself to take a bite. Another. But my eyes blurred as I watched them all: Pelis, fingers entwined with a blonde potter; Nifta head to head with a tall, somber herald; Marnda gesticulating as she talked to a couple of silver-haired women on the far side of the room.

Anhar kissed the assistant baker with the attitude of a lover, and I thought, When did that happen? She left him to join the dance, every bit as graceful as Lasva, but part of the circle instead of in the center. She danced on her toes, her fingertips up in Bird-on-the-Wing, while around her hands flapped or gripped into fists of concentration or dangled, as dancers concentrated on their steps. Did she still write to Birdy? Did she dance when she went to Colend? I had never asked. I had never cared, though she had been thoughtful enough to bring me back little gifts: pastry, and letters.

I put the wine cup down. It was making me maudlin. Yet I could not blame the wine for the sorrow aching in my chest. No one noticed me because I had cut all the connections we make to others by asking such small questions,
Did you dance in Colend?
and
Who is your new friend?
And then listening to the answer.

I slipped out, my emotions in a turmoil of self-pity worsened by the unaccustomed wine, and returned to my tower to discover a letter waiting in my scrollcase, which I had bespelled to form an illusory candle flame when a letter transferred in.

It was from the Herskalt:
We need to consult
.

Grateful—desperate to get away—I transferred immediately. He was there waiting. When I met that acute gaze, the urge to defend myself, to explain the smell of wine that surely accompanied me made me flustered, but all he said was, “Ivandred is in the field, as I’m sure you know.”

“I did not, actually,” I said. “I probably have been remiss, if I am to be of use to the king and queen. I have been unaware of events outside my tower.”

“Recollect that Marloven kings prefer their mages to be unaware of
events, until their services are needed,” the Herskalt replied. “You’ve done nothing amiss. Your progress is excellent.”

Somewhat steadied, I said, “Am I going to be needed, then?”

“Not at this moment. I suspect the trouble will come within the next few months, and it’s probable it will be in the south,” the Herskalt said.

“I thought Totha was settled after… after what happened.” I knew it was weak to avoid stating the truth, but I could not get my lips to form the word
massacre
.

The Herskalt’s lips twitched. “Suffice it to say that Totha is only part of the problem. Jarl Bluejay has been flattered by his cousin in Perideth into thinking that he deserves an independent kingdom. What Perideth wants is the Jayad. And Totha as a buffer.”

“Does Ivandred know all this? What am I to do?”

“You will continue doing exactly what you have been: working on those wards.”

“I have been working so hard.”

“I read your notes here. I presume they were for me,” he said, touching my papers, now neatly stacked. “I hasten to give you credit for hard work. But I think you have lost sight of magic’s potential by miring yourself in details, then coming back here to lose yourself in the lives of individuals who will never make a difference in the world, in spite of their intriguing minds.”

“What should I be doing?”

“Let us combine two lessons in one,” he said as he made a curious gesture with his first two fingers and picked up the dyr.

The adjacent wall that I had wondered so much about vanished. Beyond it lay an impossibility in the middle of a castle late at night: a garden in daylight. He led the way, and I followed, distracted for a moment by the long tail of brown hair he wore neatly tied back. My own hair was just as long—unnoticed until now, as I had not bothered to get it cut.

He stepped onto grass as I put my foot through the divide between the hidden chamber and the garden. I tried to study the transition but my eyes slid away. I forced my gaze back, but black dots dappled my vision as I tried to bring the doorway into focus. At that moment, my foot stepped through, encountering sudden cold. It was a shock, like the touch of ice that burns then goes numb.

But just as my lungs contracted on a gasp, I was through, and the cold was gone. I looked around, though there was nothing to see that would explain the imperceptible disorientation: the garden was surrounded by
a hedge of thick flowering trumpet lilies. The grass was thick and green, the flowers growing in scattered profusion summer bright. Some I recognized, and some I did not.

“Sit down,” the Herskalt invited, indicating a marble bench. He sat down beside me and put his hands on his knees. “Today’s lesson is about ordinary people who choose to influence those in power and whose choices therefore affect nations.”

I was about to protest but halted. I was no longer a scribe, and further, I had exerted myself to influence Ivandred with the spells I had given him to avoid battles.

The Herskalt gave me an approving look. “You are finally learning that influence is not the equivalent of evil. Nor is it always good.” His hand flickered in a complicated sign, and I jumped when without any warning, a semblance of a familiar place formed around me: the staff dining room in Alsais’s palace.

I say a semblance, though at first it seemed we were there. But there was no smell, no sense of air moving; further, I was still seated and nobody could see me. I could also see the Herskalt next to me as he indicated a smiling man of about thirty, his face round, his curly hair a rusty red whose color reminded me of Birdy’s when we were young.

“This is Kivic, a Chwahir spy hired as a bridle man,” the Herskalt said. “From this garden we can move back in time in a limited way. I believe it will be instructive for you to see the world through his eyes.”

He did not give me time to recover from my amazement— I found myself in Kivic’s head as he watched Torsu, the dresser he eventually killed.

The Herskalt’s gestures—the impossibilities made manifest—the ease with which all of this occurred, struck me anew with the power of magic. Once again I felt like the most clumsy beginner. I
had
to learn how to do these things!

At first Kivic’s murder of Torsu did not affect me, because it meant so little to him. I did not believe she was really dead until I looked down at her, feeling her lifelessness through “my” hands. That is when I recoiled, closing my eyes and clapping my hands over my ears, which was stupid because my mind was trapped inside his.

But then I was alone with my own thoughts, and the Herskalt rose from the bench. Once again he gestured with two fingers toward the hedge, which vanished, and we stepped through into the hidden chamber.

Giddy with amazement, I sat down abruptly as he replaced the dyr in
its porcelain bowl. “Where is he now?” I asked. “I remember the queen saying something about demanding restitution.”

“You may find out on your own. I have given you the means to understand him, and also Lasva, so that you may better serve her. But you seem to prefer your reticence.”

“I do not want to look at myself through her eyes,” I said. “The dyr feels like trespass enough.”

“You do not have to look at yourself through her eyes,” he replied. “If you do—and many of us could not resist—you will merely discover what we did, that few people are as interested in us as we are ourselves. They regularly misconstrue our motives. They judge us according to their own personal standards and believe them universal. You will learn nothing about yourself. However, you could learn a great deal about the people most important in your life through their experiences—specifically the ones that brought you all here.”

Why should I
not
look at Lasva’s life through her own eyes, and just avoid the circumstances in which I was in her thoughts? That very evening I had been mourning my lack of connection. I knew that I would never use what I learned against her, she who had been so good to me. If anything, by bettering my understanding, I could better my service.

“I will,” I said.

I

So I immersed myself in Lasva’s life and Queen Hatahra’s memories—though at first I was as frightened as if she could catch me at it and have me exiled. I found her just as daunting from the inside. Davaud was unexpectedly sympathetic, though we had thought him so dour from our distant perspective. Thence into Kaidas’s memories.

As summer waxed and waned, I put more effort into the wards—and extra effort was required, for I discovered that the Marlovens’ additions were simple, almost simplistic, compared to what I found below.

The characteristics of the tenth level mage captivated me. I was almost certain that a female mind lay behind the structure. Her protection-spell skills far surpassed mine, so much so that I had to stop and comb through those old dusty books belonging to Andaun-Sigradir in search not only of magic spells but also of the history of the castle through a mage’s eyes. I found lessons on protections, akin to the all-but-forgotten elementary magic text that I had memorized while crossing the continent. These spells seemed clumsy, fussy, and were definitely slow. The constant stresses about carefulness and preservation
reminded me of Greveas, all but forgotten. Was this unknown mage Sartoran? If so, why the structure that appeared to be based on Venn knots?

Once again I had to slow down, but my reward was new insight into how magic was layered into keyed enchantments.

I brought that knowledge to the dyr. Without actually touching it—I was far too cautious for that—I attempted to tease apart the layers of enchantment that I could perceive around this object whose material was still unidentifiable. Not quite metal and not quite stone.

And so I came to the end of that year. I made sure to attend Kendred’s sixth Name Day celebration. My reward for an evening of anecdotes about children, the prince, and elementary lessons was Lasva’s happy smile when I entered her chamber. Ivandred was not there, which should have served as warning for me. But I, in my ignorance, looked out at the sentries walking the wall, their breath clouding as they slogged through a heavy early snow, and thought, at least the season of war is ended for another half-year.

How wrong I was became apparent when gossip arrowed through the castle that the Jarl of Totha had not come to renew his vows. “Snowed in—what a fool excuse!” Such words passed from lip to ear. They seem to want trouble, I thought at the time, and withdrew to my tower, shaking my head over the unaccountability of Marlovens.

It was not quite two weeks into the new year when an unprecedented event occurred. I sat at my desk, my sketches of that tenth level before me. What was missing?

Lasva threw open the door to my work room, fans swinging, eyes wide and blue. She was too distressed to speak in their language. “Emras, what have you done?”

I turned so quickly I almost fell off my stool. “Your highness,” I said—I, too, fell into old habit as I responded in Kifelian and scrambled up to bow in the full peace. “I? Done?” I began to point at my sketches, wondering how to put into words what I was working on.

“Magic. The Jarlan of Totha says that Ivandred slaughtered hundreds of them using magic.
Hundreds
, Emras. That can only have come from you.”

“Impossible,” I declared. “All I’ve taught Ivandred is how to prevent battles.”

In answer Lasva held out a much-folded piece of paper, obviously sent via scrollcase.

I looked up, confused by a half-familiar name. “Bluejay?”

“The jarl,” Lasva said. “One of the many Haldrens. Emras, can you take me to Gdan, and then to Ivandred? I have to try to make peace.”

“Take you to her by magic?” I asked. “Lasva, they might… not make a truce.”

Lasva said bleakly, “Then they don’t. I must find out about this Norsunder accusation. Oh, Emras, please see the necessity of haste! You must know their Destinations—don’t you have that written down somewhere?”

“Destinations might be in one of the records I have yet to peruse,” I said. “But I can do better, though it will hurt, I fear. These transfers are harsher because there is no time to lay down the relative protections around each Destination—” I stopped explaining when I saw her anxiety. “I can transfer to her scrollcase, if you can give me her scrollcase sign. If she has it with her, we will transfer directly to her.”