House of Shadows (46 page)

Taudde said slowly, “That being so… I think I could bear to give up ill will against you, eminence.”

The king leaned back in his chair, regarding Taudde with no expression Taudde could read. “Could you, indeed.”

Pressed, Taudde said, “How can I know until I see what you will do, eminence? I have hated you all my life, but now I see that this was a boy’s hatred. I think I could give it up… I
wish
to give it up… but I don’t know yet whether you intend to open your hand, or rather lock me again into silence and… and despair.” He stopped, shaken by his own words. He hadn’t intended to say so much.

“And if I should open my hand? Would you wish to leave Lonne? Have you finished… listening to the sea?”

Taudde doubted one could ever finish listening to the sea’s music. He thought that once one stood on the harsh shore below the Laodd and heard the waves break against the cliffs, that sound would always underlie all others. He answered without thinking, “If I return to Kalches, I will miss the sound of the sea all my life. Learning to listen to it properly would
take
all my life.” Then, too late, he realized what he’d said. He added hastily, “But of course I would never again dare break your ban, eminence. I would go to Kalches and never return to Lirionne. I would swear any oath you might require of me.”

There was a little silence.

“And break any oath you made, if war comes,” the king said at last. “No, do not protest. You would not be able to keep any such oath, Prince Chontas Taudde ser Omientes ken Lariodde. There is no point in requiring you to swear one. Answer me this: what would you do if I asked you to stay in Lonne?” He paused, and then went on, still quietly. “I think now that my mistrust of Kalchesene sorcery has made Lirionne vulnerable in ways I did not
expect. I banned sorcery in Lirionne—and then found that, once Seriantes blood and death had been poured out into the dark,
I
could not prevent Ankennes from destroying the Dragon of Lonne.
Your
sorcery prevented that. You have not flung that fact in my face. But you have hardly needed to. You ask me for generosity. Does it surprise you to learn that I am inclined to be generous?”

This did surprise Taudde. It did not seem politic to say so.

“I would not ask you to serve me,” the king added, “but I would ask you to serve my son—though I understand your oath to him would be secondary to the fealty you owe your grandfather and your cousins, his heirs. If I ask you to remain on those terms, and continue your study of the sea, and teach bardic sorcery to those of my people who might be fit for that study, would you do this?”

Taudde realized that he was staring in open amazement. Turning, he went to the window and pressed his hands against the iron bars, trying to think. He looked blindly out over the sea. The sound of it came to him, ceaseless and indifferent in its power. He was cold. His hands were numb where they touched the metal.

At last he turned back, still not knowing himself what he would say.

The king remained patient. He folded his hands across his knee and waited, his cold gray eyes hooded and unreadable. At his side, Prince Tepres rested a hand on the back of his father’s chair and gazed at Taudde with an expression not quite so closed. Taudde could see that the prince hoped he would agree but believed that he would not.

“I think…” said Taudde. “I think I showed you too much power in those caverns. Whatever you suggest now, I don’t believe you could ever allow me to stay in Lonne, save as your close-guarded prisoner, held behind walls of silence.” He stopped and waited for a response.

“It is true that you are a dangerous man,” answered the king, calmly. “Your power concerns me. Your skill concerns me. I would fear what you might find to do, if the solstice should give way to a summer of iron and fire. I would not wish my mages to face you
across a bloody field. I will be plain: I do not wish our peoples to face one another upon such a field. I would prefer a quiet summer followed by a calm turning of year into year. I would be pleased if your country and mine could reach a more permanent amicability. And you, Prince Chontas Taudde ser Omientes ken Lariodde? What would you prefer?”

Taudde answered slowly, “Eminence… now that your dragon is roused, I should hardly wish Kalches to face Lirionne across a field of war.”

“Quite so.” The king gave a grim, satisfied little nod. “If I were to permit you to return to Kalches… you would inform your grandfather of your opinion, would you not? Would he hear you?”

Taudde tilted his head, amused despite himself. “Oh, yes. Once he was finished shouting at me. He would certainly wish to know of your dragon.”

“If you will not remain in Lonne, I shall send you back to him,” Geriodde Nerenne ken Seriantes stated. “But I wish you to remain, on the terms I have outlined. I desire goodwill between us, and likewise between our countries. That you are a prince of Kalches could be useful to me, if your desire runs alongside mine.”

Taudde looked at him for a long moment. At last he said, “Whatever your desire or mine, eminence, I must tell you, my grandfather will not accept the borders as they now lie. He will not and cannot permit Lirionne permanently to own lands so close to the heart of Kalches. However cautious of your dragon he may be, this will remain true. I would not try to persuade him otherwise, nor would he hear me if I did.” He paused.

“Am I to understand that your grandfather desires war and will not be dissuaded?”

“No,” said Taudde. “I hope he would not be displeased if I tell you plainly that he does not desire to resume the war. He will pursue that course only if he must. But which of the lands that you and your father and his father took from Kalches will you yield back, to persuade him to a different course?”

The king tilted his head judiciously. “We can discuss the matter.
You
may approach your grandfather for me, when the time comes for such an approach. If you will, Prince Chontas.”

Taudde looked at him. He could hear the distant sea and the whisper of the breeze. He said at last, “I confess I don’t understand how you can imagine you may ask
any
of this of me.”

“I would have to trust you,” the king answered calmly. “Prince Chontas… other than Miennes and Ankennes, who in Lonne knew you were Kalchesene? I will go further and ask: who were your allies? Which of my people aided you?” The king paused and then went on softly, “If you will remain in Lonne as anything other than my prisoner, or if you will approach your grandfather for me, then you and I must trust one another. Fondness is unnecessary. Civility will serve well enough. But trust is essential. And because I have power here and you do not, you must trust me before I may give trust in return. I will do no harm to those you will name. But if you would remain in Lonne, you must name them to me.”

This talk of
trust
was entirely unexpected. The Dragon of Lirionne, speaking of
trust
? Yet… there was no deceit in the king’s voice. Taudde heard ruthlessness in it, yes, underlying every quiet tone. But no deliberate deceit. Nor any inclination toward cruelty. But then, sometimes ruthlessness was enough like cruelty to serve… Taudde shut his eyes and asked himself,
did
he want to stay in Lonne, here where the sea met the shore? Not as a prisoner, after all, but as… some sort of ally?

And could he possibly bring himself to trust this dragon king?

The answer to the first question was uncomfortably clear. The answer to the second… uncomfortably opaque. He said, “Do you know what you are asking?” and then waited, his eyes still closed so that he might listen with all his attention to the king’s answer.

“The first step into trust,” the king said steadily, “must always be blind.”

Taudde opened his eyes and met the king’s gaze. The gray stare was cold, patient, merciless… but Taudde found no deceit hidden in the king’s eyes, as he had detected none in his voice. Perhaps a man who had all the power in his hand had no need of deceit.

But he knew even as he thought this that it was wrong. That the candor Geriodde Nerenne ken Seriantes offered him was an unusual and precious gift, and that if he failed to take that gift now it would not likely be offered again.

Speaking at all felt like… a step over a cliff’s edge, when clouds hid what lay below. And yet… and yet… “My servant Benne, who was first Miennes’s servant,” Taudde said quietly. “He is more clever than he appears. He guessed. And…” Taudde nearly said
no one else
. To his own surprise, and driven by an instinct he prayed was sound, he said instead, “And a woman of Cloisonné House, a woman called Leilis. It was chance I was touching her hand when Ankennes pulled me into the dark, chance she was dragged after me. She was neither my servant nor my employee nor my ally; indeed, her first thought when she realized my true nationality was to warn the Laodd. But… I acknowledge that once she came to believe I posed no threat to Lonne, she then tried to protect me.

“You claim to put a high value on trust, eminence. These people trusted me. I can only hope now that I have not betrayed them to your vengeance. They are simple people and no danger to you or yours. I must hope you will keep your word and do no harm to them.”

The king lifted a hand at one of his guards, who went to the door and opened it. Benne and Leilis came in together. The big man looked strained, but calm. The young woman was white as parchment. Almost as astonishing as the mere fact of her presence, Leilis carried a finger harp in her hand: his own, a harp made of pale mountain birch and strung with delicate silver wires. For one of the few times in his life, Taudde found himself utterly bereft of speech.

“I did not find either of them so simple as you would have me believe,” Geriodde Seriantes said. His tone held something that was not quite amusement, but certainly included irony. “Each of them told me everything he or she knew of you, evidently believing I should be swayed by this to clemency, and begged my pardon on your behalf.

“Your Benne—I use the pronoun advisedly—came to me to intercede for you. He is an eloquent man when he holds a quill. After he confessed he had been Miennes’s spy, I commanded him to write down for me all the secrets he had learned through his years of spying. He told me there were people who would die before revealing the secrets they thought they held hidden, but that of course he had no recourse if I would compel him.” The king gave Benne a raised-eyebrow look, and the big man looked down, flushing. “Then he asked me how I was different from my cousin, who compelled men beyond their own choice to do murder for him. This was insolence, but I found I had no answer.”

Taudde said nothing.

The king nodded toward Leilis. “Now, this woman, Leilis, was not half so shy as you have been in bringing to my attention how great a service you did for me. She asked me if I did not care for justice. I had some difficulty recalling the last person who spoke to me with so little care for her own safety. Then I remembered that my wife used to speak to me so.” He paused.

Taudde still said nothing. He could see that Geriodde Nerenne ken Seriantes liked and approved of Leilis, and found himself in return wanting to like and approve of the king. This was clearly a dangerous impulse, as well as a horribly uncomfortable one.

After a moment, the king went on, “I promised them both that I would spare you if I could, which, of course, I already intended. I am aware of the promises you made to each of these people. I wish to see the art of Kalches for myself. Do you understand?”

“Yes,” said Taudde. He wanted the harp Leilis held as a man dying of cold in the mountains longs for warmth. “You will, of course, require an oath that I shall do nothing with that harp save keep those promises.”

“I require no such oath,” said the king, astonishing them all.

Or, no. Taudde saw that Prince Tepres was not astonished. The glance the prince gave Taudde was wary, but the look he bent on his father was merely exasperated, not in the least surprised.

“Eminence—” the senior officer of the guard objected.

“I cannot guarantee either your safety or this prisoner’s continued imprisonment if he touches that instrument,” warned the mage, speaking for the first time.

“Peace,” returned the king. “Trust must be reciprocal. If it is merely required of a prisoner, it is coercion.” He lifted a finger in a minimal gesture toward Leilis. “Give Prince Chontas the harp.”

Leilis’s first step was hesitant, but then her brows drew down and her mouth firmed. She crossed the room to Taudde with decision and put the finger harp into his hands. She was careful not to let her hand brush his: the unconscious care of long, long practice. Taudde did not let her step back; he caught her hand in his, setting his teeth against the immediate dissonance. “I gave your name to the Dragon of Lirionne,” he said to her.

Those grave eyes met his, utterly forthright, not in the least surprised. “I hoped you would.”

Taudde found his mouth wanting to curve into a smile, and sternly tamped it straight again. Yet it took him a moment to discipline himself to study merely the dissonance that clung to the woman, and not the graceful curve of her lips or the smooth line of her cheek. He had to tell himself very firmly that the dissonance, too, was fascinating. It was, in fact. Taudde studied it… only for a moment. It had become, as he had expected, familiar to him. Taudde opened his eyes, surprised to find he had closed them, and let go of Leilis’s hand, not quite willingly. She began to draw away, then met his eyes and stood still.