Lance of Earth and Sky (The Chaos Knight Book Two) (14 page)

As with his last imperial supper, they had left him just enough time to rush back to his chambers, scrub the field dirt and animal musk from himself, and fall into clothing that he hoped would pass muster for an imperial event.

When he'd returned from the skyship battle, there had been a hand-tailored imperial captain's uniform waiting in his wardrobe, which he only now discovered. Unsure if it had been Renard's doing, Allingworth's, or both, he donned it, and tucked Linnea's pendant behind its white silk dress scarf.

The performance and dinner were to be held in the Arboretum, which both unsettled Vidarian and piqued his curiosity. The heavy doors were held open this time by ornate brass pillars, and hanging blue lights led guests along the garden paths.

It may as well have been a completely different place for how they had transformed it. Far from being overgrown, every hedge and tree and hanging vine had been meticulously trimmed. Flowers bloomed and filled the room with their rich and wild fragrances. The sun-sphere high above had been dimmed to a pale blue light, casting the twisting paths and hanging branches in false moonlight. It was deeply beautiful, but Vidarian could not help the dropping sensation in his stomach.

There were perhaps a dozen guests, all fantastically garbed. The ladies in particular bore jewelry that changed color with their movements. Vidarian had never heard of or seen such gems before; they must have awakened with the gate. The emperor was surrounded by such ladies, and after a moment's hesitation Vidarian abandoned any hope of speaking with him.

He turned, and met intricately worked brass and lavender gemstone eyes. Beside the metal figure stood Justinian, resplendent in heavily embroidered robes, recognizable by his porcelain mask.

“
It's a pleasure to meet you, Captain Rulorat,
” Iridan said, quite as if they had never met before. A chill crept down Vidarian's spine as he tried to ascertain politic from sincerity. But Iridan's metal face revealed nothing.

Justinian—at least, Vidarian was certain that it
must
be Justinian—gestured, a rolling movement with his hands. And he kept gesturing until Iridan spoke again.

“
Please pardon my friend. A terrible accident rendered him unable to speak. He wishes me to tell you that it is his pleasure to meet you as well, and that he has heard much about you from the emperor.
”

Vidarian stared, poleaxed. Clearly this was politicking—Justinian must have remembered their meeting. Or didn't he? No—surely this was some elaborate ploy. “I'm—pleased to meet you both as well.”

“
I do hope that you'll enjoy the performance.
”

“I'm sure that I will.”

A small gong sounded, and the guests drifted toward the chairs that had been assembled in a particularly brightly lit clearing. Iridan bowed, and turned that way himself, his body rotating silently on perfectly worked hinges.

Vidarian made his way to an empty seat in the second row, and their brass-bodied performer took his place beside a fountain of flowers set in front of the chairs.

“
I was created to assist in diplomacy,
” Iridan began, his torso swiveling at his waist as he turned to address the guests. Despite his distance from the seated guests, his voice carried with preternatural ease, as though he were right in front of Vidarian. “
As you have experienced, my voice is simultaneously telepathic and aural. It is beyond language, and indeed beyond words' intent. No creature may successfully practice deceit in my presence without my knowledge. Yet my creator's path in generating this effect passed through music, the universal language of beauty and truth. Music, perhaps, was always intended to be my greater purpose, for a time without deceit.
”

And with this, he began.

At first there was no sound, and then—the barest thread of vibration. The audience leaned forward, grasping for it; Vidarian found himself moving with them before realizing what he was doing. A rhythm emerged: it was a subtle clicking, the brush of a leaf against a window, and yet it pulsed, slowly but steadily increasing in tempo.

Then, the most extraordinary sound. Iridan's jaw opened only slightly, and what issued forth was something like a violin, something like a horn, but exactly like neither. It seemed to cut straight to the soul, and then it began to dance, capering through melodies and rhythms that called to mind spring winds, chirping birds, spreading hills.

The glowing gems at Iridan's arms and shoulders pulsed more brightly then, and more sounds emerged: the soft, buttery pluck of a harp, the low solemn burr of a stone flute.

Music transported them, pulled them away from the Arboretum with its soft sun-sphere and marble fonts, sang of the stars on a summer evening, of distant worlds. There was truth here, the truth Vidarian had felt to his bones when the Starhunter showed him the world beyond the gate. He was there again, caught up in its majesty, its splendor, its terror. A melancholy crept through—lines of melody rose and fell as if looking for a companion, leaving space for a song that never materialized—but the sense was fleeting, replaced by surety, a plucking overture.

And Iridan brought them back again. Gradually the other instrument sounds faded, made their gracious exits, and the horn-violin remained, accompanied only by low and steady notes from the stone flute. They returned to the Arboretum, heard the little night birds chirp softly from their nests, saw the blue lights against the leaves once more.

*
Four were made,
* Ruby said, and a dozen faces turned toward Vidarian as sharply as if he'd thrown water at them.

Ruby?
he thought wildly.
What are you doing?
But she did not hear him.

*
Four were made,
* she said again, a strange and distant cadence in her words, as if someone else spoke with her voice. The sun ruby in Vidarian's pocket grew hot, glowed red. *
Iridan, the youngest, brass-voiced, singer of truth. Modrian, brother, silver-voiced, chanter of law. Arian, sister, golden-voiced, keeper of verse. And the fourth—
*

Justinian turned, his hands at his face—and the mask slipped away, falling. Gasps from the audience covered the sound of the mask striking the sand path and breaking in two.

Iridan shook his head, a strange and human movement from his gem and metal body. He seemed to awaken from a trance. As he looked out over the audience, he took a step backward, startled to see them all watching him.

The emperor stood, lifting his hand to Iridan in concern, but to no acknowledgment.

Iridan turned, the stiffness in his movements betraying a return of memory, of betrayal. “
Justinian, my friend? You know of the existence of my brother and sister?
” The fourth he did not mention, as if he hadn't heard it.

Justinian stared, his jaw slack. He looked out at the audience, wild with shock—and suddenly froze, his eyes widening even further.

In the front row, Oneira's face, perfectly painted and framed by her precisely sculptured hair, lost all of its poise. She stared at Justinian, the shock and betrayal written for an instant in her eyes, telling Vidarian that Justinian had never revealed himself to her. Shock melted into grief, then lit into rage, only for a fraction of a moment. Then she lifted her skirts in white-knuckled hands and strode from the clearing without a word.

The guests all stood in a flurry, and the Arboretum erupted into shocked conversation. The emperor's face was already an unreadable mask, which said as clearly as Oneira's that he, too, had not known that Justinian lived. Vidarian stood and carefully made his way to the exit by means of a winding path that looped far from the main clearing.

“What happened?” he said softly, once he was sure he was out of hearing range of the guests.

*
The music…called something out of…this shell. I need to get out of here, Darian,
* Ruby said softly. *
This…thing,
* she shoved an image of the sun ruby at him, and the feelings that clung to it were revulsion, horror, fear that gripped his stomach. *
It makes me think things that I don't know…and now…that wasn't me, saying those things. It wasn't
me. *

“It's my fault, not yours,” he said, and the truth of the words cut at his throat. “We'll get you back to your ship. I promise.”

“I
wish that I could give you a ship, Vidarian. Truly I do.”

They were not in the throne room, for which Vidarian was quite grateful. Lirien—Vidarian worked, still without total success, to think of the man and not “the emperor”—looked haggard, here where his subjects and courtiers could not see him, bare of the mineral treatments and tricks of the light that Renard used to keep him appearing at all times vigorous, fresh, indomitable.

Calphille sat to his left, poised like a butterfly on her chair. Renard's hand was there with her, also; the gown she wore, black and sunshine yellow, would have been unthinkable on any other maiden Vidarian had seen at court. She wore it effortlessly, and as she looked with naked worry on Lirien, she was surely unaware of the classical stylishness of her golden hairclips, the enviable cut of her gown. Vidarian would hardly have known any of these things, but he'd heard the whispers from the other noblewomen, which Calphille herself could not be immune to.

Oneira, immaculate as always, would have been aware of Calphille's aesthetic perfection, had she not been drawn deep into herself, listless as Vidarian had never seen her. She sat to the right of the emperor, but the distance of her gaze belied faraway thoughts.

Vidarian felt his shoulders sinking as he took in Lirien's sincere regret, and consciously firmed his jaw. “I came here in a skyship,” he said carefully, watching the emperor for any sign of outrage. “The
Destiny
. It was lost in the errand for which I was summoned.”

Lirien sighed: tired and remorseful, to Vidarian's relief. “You are right. But every single one of my skyships is committed to the war effort, and cannot be diverted.” He stood and strode away from his chair, pacing.

Vidarian watched him, straining for any sign of judgment or doubt. He had not told the emperor the nature of his errand, only that urgent business called him away from the city, a matter of personal honor.

Lirien stopped in his tracks and turned. “Oneira—the Company has provided you a skyship, has it not?”

Oneira stirred, blinking as if waking from a dream. “Pardon, your majesty?”

“The
Wind Maiden
. She is at your disposal, yes?”

Now Oneira's dark eyes sharpened. She let a moment pass, visibly calculating how she might resist the emperor's will without losing his esteem, then said, “Apologies, majesty, but the
Wind Maiden
is currently commissioned for my research expedition to Rikan.”

The look that Lirien gave Oneira then bordered on impatience, and Vidarian wondered if he was about to see the imperial will made manifest, but Oneira scented the direction of the wind.

“There is a way I could continue my studies,” she said. “No other single artifact is a complete subject, but the automaton Iridan would be more than so.”

Now it was the emperor's turn to be taken aback. “You're suggesting that he journey with you?” Lirien asked, voicing Vidarian's thoughts. The notion of traveling with—as Oneira called him, an automaton—had not entered his mind.

“Yes, your majesty. I have requested to study him before, but the proper opportunity has not arisen.” Unspoken was the notion that she had not been permitted, and this was her price.

Lirien remained unsure. “Iridan is tremendously valuable. To transport him over an ocean—”

“With respect, majesty,” Vidarian said as gently as he could manage, “I am a water elementalist. Iridan would be under no threat of loss to the sea.”

Oneira's head turned toward him, a mixture of speculation and gratitude on her face that quickly turned to ice, then thawed again as she turned back toward the emperor.

“An acceptable arrangement,” Lirien said at last. “Vidarian, I will hold you responsible for Iridan's welfare.”

“Of course, your majesty.” He was nowhere near as certain as he sounded, but to an imperial command there was only one answer.

“If you will excuse me, I have an audience with the Rikani ambassador.”

Vidarian and Oneira rose, bowing first to the emperor, and then exchanging nods with Calphille. The dryad's eyes were full of worry again, and Vidarian was surprised to find it directed at him. He smiled, hoping to reassure her, wishing that there had been more time to see to
her
welfare. The currents of the palace pulled as determinedly as any he had encountered at sea.

They left the small audience chamber, passing into the hall. There was only one way back to the main arteries of the palace, and so Vidarian and Oneira were forced to walk together, or risk obvious impropriety.

“What is this errand of yours, anyway?” Oneira muttered.

Vidarian told her.

Oneira stopped, and Vidarian stopped with her, certain she was about to refuse the use of her ship. But she only stared at him, calculating, then nodded once, and set off down the hall again.

The
Wind Maiden
had a crew of able-bodied men and women all precision-trained by the Alorean Import Company, but for the journey they would need supplies, and preparing the ship took the better part of two days. A skyship was not limited by the tide, but every item brought aboard must be justified, for it directly impacted the ship's maneuverability.

There was also the matter of charting a course. Ruby was clear on the location of her body—*
There is only one place my crew would have taken me.
* But safe airspace must be found between the imperial city and that West Sea location, and a means of recovering her body once they arrived.

This latter Vidarian tried not to think on overmuch. He would be the one to pull her corpse from the waves—a thought that had shadowed his dreams since first she had reawakened.

Thalnarra and Altair joined them as a matter of course, much to the complaint of their erstwhile Sky Knight apprentices. The gryphons would be a welcome guardian force—but the surprise, as they charted course and negotiated delicately over the supply of the ship, was Isri.

The seridi appeared one morning in the planning room—a side chamber graciously donated by Oneira—with a young olive-skinned girl with bright green eyes. Save for her eye color, she reminded Vidarian painfully of Lifan, his ship's windreader. He told himself Lifan and the rest of his crew would be safe with Marielle, but in spite of everything he couldn't help but be weighed down by a sense of having failed them all.

The girl, Isri said, was a Finder. She was possessed of a unique telepathic sense specifically tied to objects. If she touched an object belonging to a person, she could find that person, living or dead.

Her name was Alora, and she had nearly driven herself mad before Isri had found her and brought her to the mindcrafters in the Imperial City for training.

“You will know the general location of Ruby's body,” Isri said, the sleekness of her feathers conveying a calmness Vidarian envied, “but you'll need someone with Alora's talents to find its exact location, and convey it to you mind-to-mind that you might bring it to the surface.”

“I'm grateful, as always, for your advice and assistance,” Vidarian said, and meant it, “but will her parents allow her on such a potentially dangerous expedition?”

“She is an orphan,” Isri said, placing a feathered hand on the girl's shoulder. “And I have agreed to mentor her, if we might accompany you.” Now the tiny feathers around her beak lifted in a seridi smile. “In truth, it will be good for her to get away from the city and its multitude of sensations. It's little wonder so many go mad here.”

Vidarian thought painfully of Malloray, and how he must have suffered without knowing why, working all of those years for Rulorats. But the sea had helped him, too. Vidarian knelt and held his hand out to Alora. “I'm pleased and honored to have your service, then,” he said.

The girl smiled shyly and shook his hand, then looked to Isri for approval. The seridi nodded, and Alora giggled—a high, delighted sound. Then she blushed and ran from the room.

“She's shy yet,” Isri said, looking after her. “But incredibly talented.”

“I have misgivings on bringing so young a child on so dark an expedition,” Vidarian said.

Isri's golden eyes turned toward him, staring, as they often seemed to, straight to his heart. “Times are dark,” she said only. “We must all learn, and grow, faster than we might like.”

The ship was a fine one, a build and trim unfamiliar to Vidarian but impressive. Her measurements made no sense to him, and he suspected she might be Malinari, which raised more questions than it answered. But she was solidly built, and outfitted with more navigational and luxury mechanisms than even the
Luminous
had borne.

The greatest of its technologies remained hidden, however. For the first three days of sailing Iridan spent all of his time below decks, shuttered in his room. At first he would admit no one, to Oneira's outrage, but on the second day he permitted her entry, and they remained closeted for most of the day and night.

Oneira's crew was circumspect—assiduously so. None would engage beyond the most basic conversation, and so the trip was a strange one to Vidarian, taken on a foreign ship among sailors who rarely spoke. The gryphons flew alongside the ship, preferring to exercise their wings rather than ride, and Isri spent most of her time with her young apprentice.

Even Ruby was subdued, though Vidarian could hardly blame her. She provided a heading to the steersman, an uncharted expanse of ocean off the coast of Ignirole, and then she withdrew within—wherever she was.

On the third day, when Vidarian was beginning to give names to the cloud formations that passed below them, Ruby started speaking without prompting.

*
‘Dead’ is still the wrong word. When I awoke, I didn't know where I was. It took me days to realize I no longer had a human body, and I started to discover things about the place I was in. About here. It was as though doors opened, and beyond them was space, knowledge.
*

Silence stretched between them, punctuated by the whistle of wind against the rigging, and Vidarian was afraid to answer, lest he break the spell that had caused her to so suddenly describe what she'd been going through all this time.

*
There are things in here…things. I find them and I know things that I couldn't have known before. Sometimes they jump right out of me, skip ‘Ruby’ and go straight out into the world. And they're getting bolder. I'm not sure what I'm becoming.
*

“Regardless of where it came from, that knowledge has been a great help,” he ventured.

She didn't seem to hear him. *
I'm not dead, Vidarian.
*

“I—” he started, unsure where he would finish, but she was gone again, back behind one of the many doors in the “prism key,” as she referred to the sun ruby.

And as if Ruby's sudden speech had broken free the ice that stiffened the air of the
Wind Maiden
, Oneira emerged from the hold, blinking her eyes against the white light of the cloudscape, and joined him at the bow.

“He's a remarkable artifact,” she said after perhaps two leagues' worth of travel.

To ask if she meant Iridan would be to invite scorn, and so Vidarian said, “Your interest in him seemed rather abrupt.”

She cast him a look that was perhaps five degrees warmer than total dismissal. “Justinian came all the way to Val Imris, risked exposure to awaken and study the automaton. He desires to be near it, and so I will take it far from him.”