Champion of the Rose - Kobo Ebook (21 page)

No use continuing to hope it somehow wasn't true. The child she hadn't chosen would come.
Some time
soon it
would become more than 'the baby', an abstract idea that did not seem to belong
to her, no matter how many buds Aristide found on the Rose.

-
oOo
-

It was the smell which stopped her.

On a cold morning it was like a needle from sinus to
brain. Rust and storm-dust and something
else which brought Soren to a heart-pounding halt, apple in hand at the wide
stable door. As her brain slowly
processed the body's warning, horses whickered and shifted. The entire stable was awake.

Suddenly lack of palace-sight felt like an amputation. Soren squeezed the mageglow until it flared
to its full brightness, setting long equine heads tossing at the glare. The stable was etched in sharp relief, stalls
and rafters, bales of hay. And, winding
through wisps of straw across the floor, a stream of black glinting red.

Third stall on the left. No glossy bay head poked over the gate, no dark mischievous eyes sized
her up in hope of a treat. No soft nose
or warm neck or any sign of Vixen except that shining swatch of blood.

Quite without thinking, Soren wrapped her arms protectively
across her stomach. Shadows swallowed
the stable as the mageglow was blocked, then fled as she caught herself. She turned, seeing nothing but anxious horses
and the same walls and buildings she'd seen every morning. Less Vixen. Plus blood.

Nothing leapt out at her. Fingers falling slack, she dropped the apple. It bounced in the dust and rolled to one
side, still gleaming from Soren's efforts to polish it. Nothing leapt out. A grey to her right blew noisily and thumped
the wall of its stall. Nothing.

Unable to bring herself to go forward, Soren went back. Her chest kept fluttering. The Moon knew how her face looked, for when
she tapped on the Palace doors, the guards who opened them took one glance and
drew their swords.

"What is it, Champion?" the shorter of the pair
asked. He had more crow's feet than
face, but he moved like a young man to put himself between Soren and the
dark. The other was only a step behind,
suddenly exuding alert competence.

Their reaction spurred Soren to try and pull herself
together. The Rose was silent. Because she wasn't in immediate danger, or
because it had withdrawn its protection from her, as it had Strake? Or had it simply not known that someone or
something had come in the night to butcher her horse?

"One of you fetch the Captain of the Guard," she
said, and was proud her voice wobbled only a fraction.

The younger man immediately saluted, and left at
double-pace. Soren turned and walked
back to the stable, followed by the other guard. She'd dropped the mageglow as well. She couldn't remember when, but there it was,
a harsh white star sitting in the dust a foot from her apple. The guardsman saw the blood and swore.

"Don't go too close," Soren said, forcing her
throat to work. "There may be signs
which can be used to track the killer."

He nodded, looked around, then hoisted himself up onto the
nearest gate and leaned forward so he could peer into the stall. Soren made no move to follow. She would not allow that sight into her head.

As she watched, the guard turned his free hand palm to
ceiling and, fingers splayed, lifted it in commendation to the Moon. Even the mask of laugh-lines couldn't hide
grim shock as he climbed down.

"The blood's drying," he said, peering at every
corner of the stable. "Not hours
ago, but it didn't just happen."

Soren turned away. She supposed if the killer had still been here, she would not even have
had the chance to see that Vixen was dead. Or perhaps the Rose would have stopped her, or it. Countless experiments had not provided her
the trick of using the palace defences, but surely–

Cold metal pressed against her fingers. An unstoppered flask, thin and smooth. The guard's eyes were kind, fatherly. Soren made no more pretence of composure,
tilting the flask to her lips and letting a draught run down her throat. Vicious cheap stuff, but it served its
purpose, burning her back into some semblance of alive. Returning the flask with a nod of thanks, she
checked Strake's breathing. Still
asleep.

Had Vixen been killed by the same creature which Strake had
hunted long ago? Was that what they had
encountered in the Tongue? But how and
why had it suddenly emerged here? Why
Vixen? Why no warning from the Rose?

An explanation occurred as she bent to pick up her abandoned
mageglow. She had spent the last week
expecting some move from Lady Arista or one of the more disgruntled Barons, or
any of the faceless thousands she suspected of wanting to do away with her
Rathen. What better way to hide an
assassination than to link it with a past killer? A few random deaths to match those recorded
in the histories. Then Strake.

Grimly, Soren sorted through her tumble of palace
dreamings
, trying to isolate who had been on the move. But what she saw asleep was always an
uncertain mess. And wasn't it wishful
thinking, seeking a human killer rather than facing a seemingly invincible
monster out of the past?

The guard began examining the ground at the stable entrance,
but since this was one of the most trampled areas of the palace grounds, Soren
doubted he'd have much luck. She turned
her attention to the palace wall, and the well-lit gatehouse. The grounds were not strongly fortified, but
the wall was still too high to simply scramble over, and the gatehouse and
watchtowers were manned night and day.

If it was the thing from the Tongue, it had to have reached
the stable somehow. Perhaps the wall
posed little obstacle. Perhaps it had
come through the gatehouse.

In answer to her thought, a swear-sword appeared to raise
the portcullis, no doubt anticipating her morning departure. Not widespread slaughter, then. Just Vixen. Just Soren's horse.

No more morning rides, Soren thought as the Captain of the
Guard,
Helaine
Vereck
,
arrived trailing a handful of guards she'd evidently collected en route.
Vereck
was a
competent woman of few words, and she needed no direction to do her job. In short order the entire area blazed with
light, there were patrols scouring the grounds, and a snub-nosed young woman
was examining the floor of the stable as if the hollows and scuffs actually
meant something to her. Stable hands
sleeping in the loft above were woken by the noise and had to be restrained
from swarming the scene.

The Guard had a few minor mages in its service, and Soren
waited until a sleepy-eyed diviner pronounced himself perplexed, then
left. Very likely
Vereck
breathed a sigh of relief not to have her erstwhile commander watching, grimly
intent.

It would not be true to say that Soren felt overwhelmingly
relieved to walk back into the security of palace-sight. But it did allow her to make absolutely
certain nothing was anywhere near Strake. She flicked her attention across Aristide, various Barons in residence,
the Chamberlain, the Marshall, and anyone else who had ever prompted her to the
slightest suspicion. No-one obliged her
by being blood-spattered, knife in hand. Most were still asleep, only the Marshall fumbling through morning
routine.

Trying to look everywhere in the palace at once made it a
little difficult to walk in a straight line, but Soren proceeded to do so,
searching out anomalies, any hint or sign. Anything.

News was spreading with disobliging speed. The most unusual thing in the palace at that
moment was the number of people rushing to wake others and talk excitedly. Though the sky was barely shading toward
dawn, the palace was rapidly coming alive. If there was a vital clue to be found, it was lost in gossip.

On cue, Fisk turned into the corridor ahead. Soren intercepted him and said tersely:
"Go wake the King and tell him what's happened." Fisk, already brimming with excitement,
looked caught between dismay and pleasure at her command, but didn't argue.

That done, Soren returned to her apartment.
Halcean
was just
emerging from her room, and stopped in faint confusion at the sight of her
charge returning so early.

"Forget something?"

Shaking her head distractedly, Soren watched Strake's face
as Fisk reached him. The shutter came
down during the hesitant explanation, but Strake kept any shock or fear to
himself.

"Champion?"

Soren forced herself to turn her attention back to her
aide.
Halcean
had thrown herself wholeheartedly into her new role, obviously finding
considerable entertainment in handling the importuning hordes, but there'd been
little chance to get to know her. She
was far too much a stranger for Soren to begin to explain.

"I won't be seeing anyone but the King this
morning," she said instead. "Keep
them away."

"Of course,"
Halcean
said, now wholly startled. Her
expression as Soren headed toward her bedroom was one of proprietary concern,
and Soren realised that to
Halcean
she would be 'her
Champion' in a grey imitation of the way Strake was Soren's Rathen. The thought didn't help.

Her Rathen was dressing, efficient but unhurried. Soren watched him leave for the stables,
waiting until he had passed out of palace-sight before she allowed herself
weep.

It was not as if Vixen had even really been her horse. Property of the Regent or the Darien Crown,
and mainly interested in Soren as a source of treats. And someone to gallop away with, madcap along
a beach. And she did love to be groomed,
vain creature.

Half Soren's tears were surely for the fact that there could
be no more morning rides, that she could not possibly risk venturing out alone,
or even in the company of guards. Man or
beast, the killer would effectively keep her prisoner, here where she could safely
see anything coming, could not help but see them, any more than she could avoid
witnessing the gossips' delight, the quiet attention with which Aristide
received the news, or the lowering frown on her
Rathen's
face as he returned.

There would be no Vixen to ride, anyway. Swallowing one last
hiccuping
breath, Soren rolled heavily off her bed and went to wash her face.

Halcean
was hovering in the
receiving room, and started forward as Soren emerged, only to sheer off when
Strake knocked at the door. Casting a
worried glance over her shoulder at her Champion seating herself in one of the
receiving room chairs, the aide opened the door to the King, then removed
herself from the room.

Strake took one look and said: "Crying over a horse?"

"I've spent more time with that horse than with
you."

Her voice was rusty-dry, and he grimaced, then said: "You've been riding out on your own each
morning?"

She just nodded. That
was not what she wanted to talk about. "Was it the same?"

"Unequivocally?" He sighed, then sat down opposite her, leaning forward with his eyes on
his clasped hands. "It looked very
much the same to me. But I've read the
histories, and there's enough detail in them for someone to reproduce the creature's
manner of killing. Slashes like claws,
continuing after death, the body uneaten." His fingers whitened, betraying what his face and voice did not.

"The Rose gave me no warning," Soren said, quite
steadily. She'd reached the stage of
numbness.

"It may not have known." Those long, dark eyes flicked up for an
instant. "The way it's constructed,
there would be little within the palace hidden from the Rose, but most of its
divinatory abilities outside are linked to the presence of
Rathens
,
or the Champion." His mouth
twisted. "Of course, if warning you
of the attack on the horse would have resulted in you running straight outside
to be cut up yourself, it may well have deliberately kept quiet. But I lean toward the former. It's certainly not omniscient, may not even
be able to reason complexly."

It just acted like it. Far too contradictory. "If
Vixen was killed by the same thing that hunted you in the forest, how could it
be inside the palace grounds? Why would
it trail you all the way from Teraman?"

He shrugged. "That's what we aim to find out. Is Aristide awake?"

"Oh, yes." Aristide had returned to his morning passion for staring at the
ceiling. He at least did not smile as he
lay thinking over the morning's news. "What do you plan to tell him?"

This distracted Strake enough that he stopped trying to
strangle his hands. "Most of
it. He's far more a mage than I'll ever
be, and I want to see if he can track this thing, or at least discover why the
Rose was able to. Which means, yes,
he'll know more about the Rose than is comfortable. Including that it attempted to prevent you
from coming to my aid. But not
everything."

Strake was very deliberately staring out the window. Soren didn't say anything at all and after a
pause he continued. "The
saecstra
was a brilliant move. He was right – I would never have trusted him
else." He shrugged again. "Yes, I expect he will think it very
convenient if this Deeping monster kills me. But he chose the wording of his oath, and it leaves him little room to
manoeuvre."

He stopped, his fingers again laced and white, his unease
having little to do with Aristide. Carefully, he loosed his grip and settled his hands on his knees,
breathing deeply. "I think he likes
the prospect of reviving Darest too much to risk losing
Rathens
altogether," he said, with determined focus. "If I do die, you may be certain he will
protect our child."

"I have no intention of letting you die," Soren
told him. And meant it. She had no idea how, but she refused
absolutely to ever face finding a pool of blood belonging to Strake. Never.