Roberson, Jennifer - Cheysuli 08 (55 page)

           
Aidan smiled back. "I believe
it is required."

           
Kellin nodded. His father walked
very steadily toward the dais on which he stood. "How does one know if one
is worthy of what he inherits?"

           
"One never does." Aidan
stopped before the dais. "I know, Kellin. For now, it is enough."

           
Kellin swallowed heavily. "Did
you come for him?"

           
"I came for you. I came to bind
the Lion."

           
"Bind ..." Kellin sighed.
He felt very old. "I feared it, once." He stroked away a lock of
hair. "The Lion lay down with the witch."

           
Aidan nodded. "I know."

           
Kellin wanted to smile, but his face
felt old, and empty. "You prophesied for me, that day. You said I would
marry."

           
A glint, purest yellow. "Most
princes do."

           
"But you knew it would be
Ginevra."

           
The glint died. Aidan's eyes were
calm. "It seemed a tidy way of achieving what we all of us have worked
for."

           
"The Lion lay down with the
witch. And so the prophecy—"

           
"—continues." Aidan's
expression was solemn.

           
"Despite what you may hope, it
is not yet complete. There are things we still must do."

           
"Ah." Kellin put his hands
to his belt, then undid the buckle with fingers that felt thick and slow. He
slid the links free. "Here. This is yours."

           
Aidan took the broken chain as
Kellin redid his belt. "Sit down, my lord. It is time I chained the
Lion."

           
He was too weary to question the
task. He sat down. The Lion's mouth gaped. Kellin touched the wood and felt an
echo of ancient power. Mine? he wondered. Or left over from my grandsire?

           
Aidan stood before the dais, before
the firepit.

           
His eyes burned feral yellow in the
umber light of the dying day. In his hands were links. "Shame," he
said, "who began the qu'mahlin. His nephew Carillon, who took back Homana
and ended the qu'mahlin. Then came Donal, son of AH and
Duncan
—and after him, Niall, followed by Brennan."

           
Gold chimed on gold. "The next
link is broken. Its name was Aidan. I shattered it myself to bargain for my
son. To know without a doubt that what I sacrificed would make Homana
stronger." He held up the shorter length. "Two more links. One of
them is Kellin. The other is named Cynric."

           
Kellin waited.

           
Aidan smiled. He turned to the
firepit and dropped the two halves into flame.

           
Kellin started up from the throne,
then checked.

           
Aidan said clearly, "The chain
shall bind the Lion."

           
Their eyes locked. He does not ask,
he TELLS.

           
And then Kellin laughed. He stood up
from the Lion and walked down the dais steps. He knelt beside the firepit with
his back to the Lion, and knew what he must do.

           
Aidan waited.

           
What is fire, but fire? I have
withstood godfire: I have made godfire. This comes from my jehan—surely its
flame is cleaner. Kellin drew in a breath.

           
He put his hand through flames, then
farther into coals.

           
It burned, but did not consume.
Fingers found metal. He sought the shape of the link and could not find it.
What he found was something else.

           
"Free it," Aidan said.

           
Kellin brought it out of the flame,
unsurprised to discover his hand was whole. He opened it. In the palm lay an
earring. The head of a mountain cat stared back at him.

           
"More," Aidan said.

           
Kellin set the earring onto the rim
of the firepit.

           
He reached into the flame again, dug
down into coals, and took from the pit two lir-bands.

           
Aidan was patient. "And
again."

           
"Again?" But he set the armbands
also on the rim and plunged both hands into the blazing coals.

           
Aidan smiled. "A king must have
a crown."

           
Kellin drew it forth. A rune-wrought
circlet of lir gleamed against his palms. Its workmanship was such that no man,
looking upon it, could withstand the desire to set it on his brow.

           
The voice was light and calm,
pitched to reach the dais. "So this is Cheysuli magic." Ginevra's
winged brows rose as she walked the length of the hall. "Does all your
gold come from fire?"

           
"No." Aidan answered.
"Our gold is merely gold, though blessed by the gods in the Ceremony of
Honors. This gold, however, is to replace that he lost in misadventure."

           
"Misadventure." Her gaze
dwelled on Kellin.

           
She had tamed the silvered hair by braiding
it into quiescence with blood-red cord. "The sort of misadventure that
rendered him without memory of name, of rank—of race." She looked now at
Aidan. "You are the one my father most feared."

           
In dying light, Aidan's hair glowed
russet. "He never told me so."

           
"He did fear you. He never told
me so—my father was not a man to admit to such things as fear—but I think he
must have. He spoke of you repeatedly, telling me how it was, in your madness,
that you came to him in Valgaard to bargain for your son. I think he did not
know what else you might do, and it frightened him."

           
Kellin clutched the circlet. The
gold was warm in his hands. What passed between his father and Ginevra was
undivulged even in gesture; he could not decipher it.

           
Aidan's face was relaxed. "I
might have chosen you."

           
"Aye. And brought me
here," She cast a glance at Kellin. "My lord prevails upon me to
insist that had I been, I would never once have realized I was anything but
Cheysuli."

           
"But you are." Aidan
answered. "You are many things, Ginevra . .. among them Cheysuli. Among
them Ihlini."

           
Her chin firmed. "And the
mother of the Firstborn."

           
Aidan looked at her belly. She did
not show much yet, but her cupped hands divulged the truth. He smiled into her
eyes. "You may choose what you will be. The gods give us free will—even to
Ihlini."

           
"Choose?" She glanced
sidelong at Kellin, then returned her gaze to Aidan. "In what way do I
choose? And what?"

           
"How you shall be
remembered." Aidan rose.

           
"You may be Kellin's cheysula.
You may be Queen of Homana. You may be merely a mother—or the mother of the
Firstborn."

           
"I was and always will be
Lochiel's daughter."

           
Aidan inclined his head.

           
"And it will mark me," she
declared. "That is how they will know me!"

           
"Aye," Aidan agreed,
"because it is required."

           
His eyes were very feral in the
waning light.

           
Flames turned them molten. "As
it concerns you, my prophesying is done."

           
It startled her. "What?"

           
"You were the witch. But that
is done. When Kellin lies down again, it will be with his cheysula. If you mean
to be anything more, you yourself will make the choice."

           
Color stood in her face. "You
mean if I choose to remind them I am heir to Lochiel's power." She smiled.
"I could. I could do it easily."

           
"That would depend," Aidan
said calmly, "on how you chose to do it."

           
She stared fixedly at him, then
looked at Kellin.

           
She was, in that moment, pride and
glory incarnate.

           
Leijhana tu'sai, he thought, for
giving me the wit—or robbing me of them.'—so I might see beyond the wall of our
people's enmity to the woman beyond.

           
The fire kindled her eyes and melted
Ihlini ice.

           
The quality of her tone was pitched
now to acknowledgment, and a warmth that left him breathless. "Then I
would choose to be the woman who crowned a king. So they would know I want no
war. So they would know I am Ginevra, and not merely Lochiel's daughter."

           
"Then do it," Aidan said.

           
Ginevra lifted her head. She
advanced steadily.

           
Beside the firepit she paused,
stared up into the blind, gilded eyes of the Lion Throne of Homana, and smiled
a tiny smile. "Tahlmorra," she said dryly. "Is that not what you
call this?"

           
Aidan's voice was quiet. "All
men—and all women—have a tahlmorra. You were bred of Cheysuli gods as surely as
of Ihlini . . . they were—and remain—the same. In their view we are all of us

           
'Cheysuli.' The word means 'children
of the gods-' "

           
His smile was gentle, lacking in
threat, lacking in arrogance. "We have a saying, of twins: 'Two blossoms
from the same vine.' Though our vine was split and the two halves borne away to
separate gardens, the rootstock remains the same. It is time we
replanted."

           
She hesitated. "Asar-Suti? The
Seker?"

           
"We are but aspects of our
creators. When there is evil among men, look first at those gods from whom they
inherited it."

           
Kellin's belly clenched. "Then
he is not dead."

           
"The Gate was closed in the
destruction of Valgaard. It takes times to build another. While Asar-Suti
labors, centuries may pass."

           
Ginevra's smile was crooked.
"Then I had best crown the king before the Gate is rebuilt." She held
it out, above his head. Flames glinted off gold. Clearly she said, "In the
name of all the gods, even the Seker who is but one among them, I declare you Mujhar
of Homana."

           
Kellin bowed his head. The circlet
was cool as she slid it onto his head with trembling fingers. It warmed against
his brow.

           
"Done," Ginevra said.

           
Aidan smiled. "And so the Lion
is chained by the witch with whom he lay."

           
Kellin picked up the earring.
"But this is lir-gold! How could this chain me?"

           
"Memories," Aidan
answered. "History and heritage, and an ancestry that reaches across
centuries. When the Lion roars he must recall what went before, so he will rule
the world wisely. Responsibility binds a man; it binds a king more. Do not
discount its weight."

           
"No," Kellin said.
"Not ever again, jehan."

           
One of the hammered doors scraped
open. A man came in, Kellin got to his feet.

           
"Already," Aidan murmured.

           
Kellin stared at his kinsman. Hart's
hair was white. His gaunt face was lined with grief. He looked briefly at Aidan
and Ginevra, then fastened an unflinching gaze on his twin-bom brother's
grandson. "I came for Brennan," he said, "but it seems the gods
have seen fit to deprive me of my rujho."

           
Mute, Kellin nodded.

           
Hart looked at Aidan. "It would
have been yours, once. Is that why you are come home at last?"

           
Something moved in Aidan's eyes.
"I am come home for many reasons, su'fali. I am come to honor my jehan,
whom the gods have taken; to offer strength to my jehana; to pay homage to my
son, the Mujhar; to witness the coming of the Firstborn." The yellow eyes
were fierce. "But also to grieve. Will you permit me that?"