Roberson, Jennifer - Cheysuli 08 (11 page)

           
Slowly he resumed his seat, aware of
a minute trembling seizing all his bones. "Who?" he asked.

           
"Who is your master?"

           
"Lochiel, of course."
Corwyth smiled. His cordial attitude was undiminished by the threat he exuded
without effort, which made the moment worse. "Do you know of another man
who would presume to steal a prince?"

           
"Steal—" Kellin stiffened.
Me? He wants—me?

           
Urchin stirred on his stool. His
thin face was white. "Are you—Ihlini?"

           
The dead cubes and sticks scattered
on the floor came abruptly to life again, flying from the dirt-pack to land
again upon the table and commence a spinning dervish-dance across the scarred
surface. Purple godfire streamed from the cubes; the black sticks glistened
blood-red.

           
Urchin sucked in an audible breath.
Kellin, infuriated by Corwyth's audacity, smashed a small fist against the
table top. "No!"

           
The cubes and sticks fell at once
into disarray, rattling into silence as the dance abruptly collapsed.

           
"Too late," Corwyth
chided. "Much too late, my lord." He looked at Rogan and smiled.

           
The awful tension in the Homanan's
body was plain to see. "No," he whispered hoarsely. "Oh, gods, I
cannot—I cannot—"

           
"Too late," Corwyth
repeated.

           
Rogan looked at Kellin.
"Run!" he cried. "Run!"

           
Kellin lunged to his feet, grasping
for and catching a fistful of Urchin's tunic. He saw the blue blaze in
Corwyth's eyes, sensed the pain radiating from Rogan's shattered wrist. I must
do something.

           
"Urchin—" He tugged on the
boy's tunic, who needed no urging, then together they scrabbled their way
across the room, jerked open the door, and fell out into the darkness.

           
"Did you see—" Urchin
choked.

           
"We have to run. Rogan said
run." Kellin yanked at Urchin's tunic.

           
Urchin was clearly terrified.
"H-horses—"

           
"They will lie in wait for us
there—we must run, Urchin!"

           
They ran away from the roadhouse,
away from the road itself, making for the trees. They shared no more physical
contact; Urchin had at last mastered himself. The Homanan boy, accustomed to
fleeing, darted through the wood without hesitation. City-reared Kellin now was
less certain of his course and followed Urchin's lead.

           
A branch slapped Kellin across the
eyes, blurring his vision. He tasted the sourness of resin in his mouth, spat
once, then forgot about it in his flight. He could see little of the ground
underfoot, trusting instinctively to the balance and reflexes of youth as well
as the training begun in Homana-Mujhar.

           
"Urchin—?"

           
"Here—" Ahead still, and
still running, crashing through deadfall and undergrowth.

           
Kellin winced as another branch
clawed at his tunic, digging into the flesh of bare arms. And then he saw the
glint of silver in the trees and slipped down into the creek before he could
halt his flight.

           
Kellin fell forward, flailing impotently
as cold water closed over his head.

           
He kicked, found purchase, if
treacherous, not far under his feet, and thrust himself upward to the surface.
Kellin choked and spat, coughing, shivering from fright and cold.

           
"Kellin—" It was Urchin,
bankside, reaching down. Kellin caught the hand, clung, and scrabbled out onto
the creek bank. Urchin's face was seamed with branch-born welts. "We can't
run all night!"

           
Kellin tried to catch his breath.
"We—have to get as far—far from them as we can—"

           
"There was only that one.
Corwyth."

           
"More." Kellin sucked air,
filling his chest.

           
"Kick over one rock and find a
single Ihlini ... kick over another and find a nest." He scraped a forearm
across his face, shoving soaked hair from his eyes. "That's what everyone
says."

           
Dry, Urchin nonetheless shivered.
"But if they're sorcerers—"

           
"We have to try—" Kellin
began.

           
The forest around them exploded into
a spectral purple glow. Out of the blinding light came two dark shadows,
silhouetted against livid godfire.

           
Kellin grabbed at Urchin and swung
him back the way they had come. "Run!"

           
But Corwyth himself stood on the
other side of the creek. With him was Rogan.

           
Urchin blurted his shock even as
Kellin stopped short. Breathing hard, Kellin nonetheless heard the soft
susurration of men moving behind them.

           
The hairs on the back of his neck
stirred. "I taste it," he murmured blankly. "I can taste the
magic."

           
Corwyth smiled. Rogan did not. The
godfire painted them all an eerie lavender, but Kellin could see the pallor of
his tutor's face. Rogan's eyes glistened with tears.

           
Pain—? Kellin wondered.

           
"My lord," Rogan said.
"Oh, my lord . . . forgive me—"

           
Comprehension brought sickness.
Sickness formed a stone in Kellin's belly. "Not you!" No, of course
not; Rogan would deny it. Rogan would explain.

           
"My lord .. . there was nothing
left for me. I had no choice."

           
Corwyth lifted a minatory hand.
"There was choice," he reproved. "There is always choice. I may
be, to you, an enemy, but I suggest you tell the truth to this boy, who is not:
it was neither I nor my master who forced you to this."

           
Kellin's conviction was
undiminished. Rogan will deny it—he will tell me the truth. After all, how many
times had Kellin been told of the perfidiousness of Ihlini? This is some kind
of trick. "He hurt you," Kellin declared. "He broke your wrist;
what else can you say?"

           
"There was no threat,"
Corwyth countered quietly. "The wrist was merely to prove the need for
care. I have no need of threats with Rogan. All I was required to do was
promise him his dearest desire."

           
"Ihlini lie," Kellin
declared, even as Urchin stirred in surprise beside him. "Ihlini lie all
the time. You are the enemy."

           
"To assure our survival,
aye." Corwyth's young face looked older, less serene. "To Ihlini, you
are the enemy."

           
It was an entirely new thought.
Kelhn rejected it. He looked instead at Rogan. "He's lying."

           
"No." Rogan's mouth warped
briefly. "There was no threat, as he says. Only a promise."

           
It was utter betrayal. "What
promise?" Kellin cried. "What could he promise you that the Mujhar
could not offer?"

           
Rogan shut his eyes. His face was
shiny with sweat.

           
"Tell him," Corwyth said.

           
"You would have me strip away
all his innocence?"

           
The Ihlini shrugged, "He will
lose it soon enough in Valgaard."

           
Urchin's face was a sickly white in
fireglow. He breathed audibly. "Valgaard?"

           
"Rogan?" Kellin swallowed
back the fear that formed a hard knot in his throat. "Rogan—this isn't
true?"

           
The tutor broke. He spoke rapidly,
disjointedly.

           
"It was him ... a year ago, he
came—came and asked that I betray you to the Ihlini."

           
"Lochiel." Rogan
shuddered. "Lochiel wants you." His entire body convulsed. "He
could not reach you. He could get you no other way. Corwyth promised me you
would be unharmed."

           
Kellin could not breathe- "You
agreed?"

           
"My lord—if he had intended
harm—"

           
"You agreed.”

           
"Kellin—"

           
It was the worst of all. "He is
Ihlini.”

           
"Kellin—"

           
"How could you do this?"
It was a refrain in Kellin's mind, in Kellin’s mouth. "How could you do
this?"

           
Rogan's face was wet with tears.
"It was not—not of my devising . . . that I promise you. But he promised.
Promised me ... and I was weak, so weak...."

           
Kellin shouted it. "What did he
promise you?"

           
Rogan fell to his knees.
"Forgive me—forgive—"

           
The stone in Kellin's belly grew. He
felt it come to life. It pushed his heart aside, then squeezed up into his
throat. His body was filled with it.

           
And the stone had a name: rage.

           
Kellin heard his voice—mine?—come
from a vast distance. It was an ordinary voice, shaped by normal inflections,
with no hint at all of shock, or terror, or rage. "What did he promise
you?"

           
"My wife!" Rogan cried.

           
It was incomprehensible. "You
said she was dead." And then Kellin understood.

           
"My wife," the tutor
whispered, hands slack upon his knees. "You are too young to understand ...
but I loved her so much I thought I would die of it, and then she died—she died
- .. because of the child I gave her—" He broke off. His gaze was fixed on
Kellin. He gathered himself visibly, attempting to master his, anguish. "I
refused," Rogan said quietly. "Of course I refused. Nothing could
make me betray you. I would have accepted death before that."

           
"Why didn't you?" Kellin
shouted.

           
"But then this man, this
Ihlini, promised me my wife."

           
Kellin shivered. He looked at
Corwyth. "You can raise the dead?"

           
The Ihlini smiled. "I am
capable of many things."

           
He extended his right hand, palm up,
as if to mock the Cheysuli gesture of tahlmorra; then a flaring column of white
light filled his hand.

           
"Magic," Urchin murmured,

           
"Tricks," Kellin declared;
he could not admit the Ihlini might offer a true threat, or fear would
overwhelm him.

           
"Is it?" The light in
Corwyth's hand coalesced, then began to move, to dance, and the column resolved
itself into a human shape-A tiny, naked woman.

           
"Gods," Rogan blurted.
Then, brokenly, "Tassia."

           
Kellin stared at the burning woman.
She was a perfect embodiment of the Ihlini's power.

           
Corwyth smiled. The woman danced
within his palm, twisting and writhing. She burned bright white and searing,
spinning and spinning, so that flaming hair spun out from her body and shed
brilliant sparks. Tiny breasts and slim hips were exposed, and the promise of
her body.

           
Kellin, whose body was as yet too
young to respond, looked at Rogan. The Homanan still knelt on the ground, eyes
fixed in avid hunger on the tiny dancing woman.

           
"Do you want her?" Corwyth
asked. "I did promise her to you. And I keep my promises."

           
"She isn't real!" Kellin
cried.

           
"Not precisely," Corwyth
agreed, "She is a summoning from my power; a conjured promise, nothing
more. But I can make her real—real enough for Rogan." He smiled.
"Look upon her, Kellin. Look at her perfection! It is such a simple thing
to make Tassia from this."

           
The tiny, burning features were
eloquent in their pleading. She was fully aware, Kellin saw; Tassia knew.

           
Rogan cried out. "I bargained
my soul for this. Give me my payment for it!"

           
The light from the burning woman
blanched Corwyth's face. "Your soul was mine the moment I asked for it.
The promise of this woman was merely a kindness." He looked at Kellin
though his words were meant for Rogan. "Speak it, prince's man. Aloud,
where Kellin can hear. Renounce your service to the House of Homana. Deny your
prince as he stands here before you. Do only these two things, and you will
have your payment."

           
Rogan shuddered.

           
"Speak it," Corwyth said.

           
"Leave him alone!" Kellin
cried.

           
"Kellin—" Rogan's
expression was wracked. "Forgive—"

           
"Don't say it!" Kellin
shouted. "Do not give in to him!"

           
"Speak," Corwyth said.

           
Tears ran down Rogan's face. "I
renounce the House of Homana."

           
"Rogan!"

           
"I renounce my prince."

           
"No!"

           
"I submit to you, Ihlini . ..
and now ask payment for my service!"

           
Corwyth smiled gently. He lifted his
other hand as if in benevolent blessing. Rogan's head bowed as the hand came
down, and then he was bathed in the same lurid light that shaped the tiny
woman.