Limits of Power (15 page)

“Will your exercises help us run faster?” Rort asked.

“Yes,” Stammel said. “And carry more when you run. And plan what to take and ensure that you can survive until you rebuild. I can help you with that, if you will.”

“That is worth learning,” Cadlin said. “But we have work to do now. Shall I hang the bow back up, Matthis, and the sack of bolts?”

“Show me the peg,” Stammel said. Cadlin led him around, told him where to reach up for the peg. Stammel hung the bow there, then went out and found the bolt he had shot dangling from the bark of an oilberry tree, it had had so little force left. When he came back in with it, Rort was gone. He sat down at his own workspace and checked the point on the bolt before going back to sharpening Cadlin's tools.

Chaya

W
e ask formal audience, sir king,” Amrothlin said. Behind him, a group of elves nodded. He looked tired but determined. “It is a matter of importance.”

“Of course,” Kieri said. He was in a better mood this bright morning; even the prospect of dealing with elves didn't daunt him. A good night's sleep. An early morning session in the salle. Both had left him feeling in tune with spring. “I have matters of importance to discuss with you, as well.”

“Sir king, we wish to leave.”

“Leave?” He certainly had not expected that.

“Yes. As there is no elvenhome for us here, we find only sorrow where once we found joy. The memories of what we have lost gall us every moment and make the days that should be brief long. If you and the queen had less ability with the taig, we would stay out of duty to tend it, but it is our belief you can do what must be done.”

“Is this really all about your sorrow or is it that yesterday you told Arian things you wish you had not?” Kieri asked. She had told him that only direct challenges and questions kept Amrothlin talking. “Perhaps you wish to keep other secrets you know I would ask about.”

A faint flush darkened Amrothlin's cheeks. “It is true I spoke too freely to the queen. I did admit there were things I could not say. Not yet, anyway.”

Kieri scowled. “Your time is not as our time, Uncle, I know that well. So what seems hasty to you may be a lifetime to us, who must deal with things as they come. I am not a hasty man, save in war and at great need, but even I can see death on the horizon. I am still your king, bound by the oath the Lady and I shared, and you are bound by your oath as well. You owe me the knowledge you have withheld.” He paused; Amrothlin glared. “Was it not through lack of knowledge that my mother died and I was taken? That you could not rescue me from those years of torment?” He pushed away the lingering suspicion that the elves—or some of them—might have left him there on purpose. “Withholding knowledge can cause as much harm as knowledge untimely given.”

“Are you telling us to stay, sir king?” Amrothlin's expression was challenging, but Kieri felt a subtle lessening of the elf's resistance.

“Yes,” Kieri said, putting all the warmth he could into his voice. “Exactly that. Your actions have shaped this realm; your experience and wisdom will help me.” He paused. “There is also the matter of the iynisin.”

All the elves looked away. “You cannot pretend they do not exist,” Kieri said. “Do you think you will be safer elsewhere? Do you have entry to another elvenhome?”

“No,” Amrothlin said. “Not yet, at least, though we might hope. But
you
cannot protect us from iynisin.”

“I might, if you tell me what I ask,” Kieri said. “My magery was growing when Orlith was yet alive; if you help me, perhaps it will become—”

“My lord—” one of the other elves said, looking at Amrothlin.

Amrothlin's expression silenced them both. Kieri saw surrender in his gaze. “You are the king,” he said, bowing to Kieri. “You are my sister's son, the Lady's grandson, all we have left. I will stay and assist you as I assisted the Lady.”

“But we agreed—” one of the others began.

“I cannot command you,” Amrothlin said without turning around. “But he
is
the king.”

The others nodded slowly, and Kieri relaxed slightly. They needed something to do, he thought, some assignment. He had no idea what they were capable of, what tasks best suited them. But he had one of some urgency in which they could be helpful if they would.

“These patterns,” he said. “I need to know if there are more in the palace, what power they confer, who can use them, and if they exist anywhere else in Chaya. Can they be changed so iynisin cannot use them, or must we rip up the stones?”

This got the elves moving; Amrothlin assigned some to seek out patterns in the palace and others to look at other buildings where—Kieri was sure—the elves already knew such patterns existed. Others were told to paint reversal patterns on heavy cloth to lay on patterns found so anyone attempting to use a destination pattern would be sent back. That left Kieri alone with Amrothlin, who now looked wary.

“So, Uncle,” Kieri said. “Sit down and let us continue.”

Amrothlin at first was as hesitant to answer Kieri's questions as Arian had reported, but Kieri kept insisting, and finally Amrothlin's resistance gave way. But it was less helpful than Kieri had hoped.

“I should tell you about the Lady's first heir … before my sister, your mother.”

“I am listening,” Kieri said.

That was not, however, where Amrothlin's story began, for he started long before. The tale chilled Kieri's blood; it made sense at last of Paksenarrion's story about the underground stronghold where she had nearly died. Vanryn ago—the vanryn of the elves, ten thousand winters to humans—the elves had lived in the far south that humans called Old Aare, and fewer vanryn ago they had moved north, finally over the mountains. And there the Lady's first heir had chosen the Severance over his mother's obedience to the Singer, turning inexorably into the vicious being imprisoned in the banast taig.

Amrothlin went on—and on—with the tale, telling it as elves did, in great detail, connecting every action to its cause and its consequence. Hours passed, the sun's light shifting from window to window, but Kieri was afraid to break into that torrent of speech now revealing so much he had wondered about. It was nearly dark, and Amrothlin finally had come to Kieri's mother, when Kieri held up his hand at last, and Amrothlin paused.

“Another day, Amrothlin. You and I both need food and rest, and I have other duties, as you know. Come, if you will, the day after next.”

Amrothlin stood and bowed. “I will come,” he said. “The Singer's blessing on you.”

“Take care, Uncle,” Kieri said, standing as well. He felt stiff as a log and stuffed with knowledge he needed time to understand. “We know we have enemies still.”

That night Arian said, “Did he tell you anything useful or more roundabout tales?”

“I learned that his brother—my eldest uncle—was a traitor and turned iynisin,” Kieri said.

“It took him all day to tell you that?”

“That and everything leading up to it, connected with it, and … It's no wonder they won't answer simple questions, Arian. They don't think anything is simple.” He shook his head. “I suppose it's not, if you're looking at ten or twenty thousand winters as a short time; they can see the beginnings and endings, the connections.” He laughed, mocking himself. “So much for elves being peaceful lovers of harmony and song. I heard about quarrels that lasted thousands of years, and grudges held from before the Dwarfmounts were lifted up and set in place. I will never remember it all.”

“I suppose you could tell it to a scribe—”

“And get half of it wrong? No. No, I'll deal with the days as they come, use what I can remember. Oh—I didn't ask the steward—did the other elves keep on with the jobs Amrothlin gave them?”

“Yes,” Arian said. “They said all the patterns in the palace are on the lowest floor, and there's one in the courtyard, lightly incised into the stone. None in the cellars or pantries, none in the salle or in the entrance to the treasury and ossuary. They said they will have the reversal patterns painted in a few days.”

“Amrothlin's coming back in two days,” Kieri said. “I hope I don't have to listen to a single elf about anything tomorrow.”

Arian laughed. “Let us talk of other things, then.”

“Or not talk…” Kieri stroked her hair. “We have a child to invite, do we not?”

“We do.”

A
rian woke one morning some ten days after Dorrin had left, aware of the taig's intense regard. She felt perfectly healthy, in no need of the taig's care, and wondered why she was feeling its interest so strongly. Then she realized the taig's attention was not concern but a richly braided song of joy from tree and flower and every form of life outside the palace windows. Kieri still slept, but she could not sink back into sleep. Instead she rose and was half dressed when the sense of joy lifted in a dizzying cloud around her.

Delicately, she touched herself with taig sense and found two trembling sparks within. Healthy, yes—no shadow of the earlier poison. As she came into Kieri's bedroom, he woke.

“You had a reason for rousing so early?” he said mildly enough.

“I did,” Arian said. “More than one, in fact. Two in particular, but also—”

“Two … in particular?” She had his attention, no doubt about it.

“Two.”

“Do you know yet what—”

“One of each.”

“You're sure … of course you are. Let me—”

She came closer; he put his hand on her belly. She felt his attention, his hopes and fears, and then the joy as he knew for himself.

“Thank Falk and the High Lord and the Lady of Flowers,” Kieri said. He held her close. Arian nodded against his chest. “And you, my brave queen, so ready to risk again … we must be vigilant. We must not fail these children. Are you sure you wish to travel?”

“We still don't know who sent the poison, how the iynisin knew about the pattern here,” Arian said. “So my going to Tsaia should be safer than staying.”

“I suppose.” Kieri had been increasingly reluctant to send her.

“I know I will want to be two places at once.” She twined her fingers in his beard and changed the subject. “I wonder how many of the supposedly powerless magelords still have
their
talent.”

“It would be best not to find any more in the royal family,” Kieri said, shaking his head. “I'm serious about that: we need stability on our western border, and if the government falls apart…”

“I won't mention it if I do sense something,” Arian said. “Not to them, at least. Now: do we tell anyone about our good news or wait?”

Kieri thought about it a long moment. “We must think of your safety and theirs,” he said. “It might be safer to wait—though the way you're grinning—”

“And you!”

“Both of us, then—we can't hide that we're happy, and someone is sure to guess and say something even if we denied it. So I suppose we must tell them. But not everything. Twins! That can be a surprise for later.”

“We must go to the ossuary,” Arian said. “If your sister has more warnings for us, we must hear them.”

“Indeed,” Kieri said.

But the bones had no message other than a vague sense of satisfaction, which Arian took as good news. “So: I will leave as soon as Duke Mahieran is ready, and return as quickly as courtesy allows.” She pulled on her boots, glancing at Kieri.

“And you will be careful,” Kieri said again as he stood and offered her a hand.

“As careful as courtesy allows,” Arian said, laughing.

He held her hand. “As careful as our offspring require,” he said, not smiling.

“Yes,” Arian said, nodding. “That careful.”

By the end of breakfast, news had spread through the palace, and Arian was certain that already someone had slipped out the gate to the city. How long would it be before an elf arrived? And would it be Amrothlin?