Sword of Shadows (15 page)

Mechnes grasped the woman’s wrist, held her hand in front of Adiana and snapped three fingers in quick succession. Pashnari’s sudden screams were silenced with another blow that sent her to the floor.

Horror contorted Adiana’s face. She struggled against the guard’s firm grip.

Mechnes took her hand in his once again. “Which finger do you value least, Mistress Adiana? Perhaps we should start with the smallest?”

“Don’t do this!” she begged. “Please, it’s all I have! The music—”

“It is not my desire to hurt you, much less put an end to that extraordinary talent of yours. But you have information I need. I would hear it now.”

“I don’t know where she is!”

Mechnes gripped her hand and wrapped his fist around her finger.

Adiana’s body shook and her eyes begged him to stop. In that moment, Mechnes was visited by an unexpected and sickening realization.

I cannot destroy this.

With one brief melody, her music had captivated him. Now he was loath to sacrifice it.

Infuriated, Mechnes struck her again.

He paced in front of Adiana, then nodded to one of the guards. “Bring me the child.”

Rishona would not be pleased to have her toy damaged, but no matter. He would deal with that when the time came.

The girl was delivered, bound hand and foot, dark of hair and with a spray of freckles across her small nose.

“Tasha!” Adiana moaned. The child responded with a muffled whimper, as his men had stuffed a rag in her mouth.

Mechnes ordered the bindings around the girl’s feet cut. Taking the child by a fistful of hair, he dragged her to the table and threw her face down upon it, ripping open the skirt to reveal her pale thighs and frail buttocks.

“Stop!” Adiana wailed. “Oh, for the love of the Gods, stop! I tell you the truth, Prince Mechnes. I don’t know where Eolyn is. I beg you, don’t hurt the child. Ask me something else, anything. I will answer whatever I can.”

The child was immobile beneath Mechnes’s grip, eyes open and alert, like a rabbit in the clutches of a wolf. Mechnes kept his gaze fixed on the girl. The desire to break something burned hard in his loins, and this little one would shatter so easily.

“Where was the maga when we attacked the
Aekelahr
?” he asked.

“In the South Woods.”

“Alone?”

“No.”

“How many were with her?”

Adiana hesitated. Mechnes grabbed the child by the hair and struck her head against the table, eliciting a cry of horror from Adiana.

“How many?” he repeated.

“Two guards and two students.”

There were more of these young magas, then. That was useful to know.

“What will she do, when she returns?” he asked.

“Do?”

“Will she try to rescue you? The girls?”

Adiana frowned.

“Answer me.”

“I…I’m not certain. I think she would fist try to…”

“Warn the King?”

Adiana looked away. Mechnes abandoned the child, strode back to Adiana, and took her by the throat. “How?”

“I don’t know.” Tears filled her eyes. “She might fly.”

He caught an image of the maga pacing in agitation, fingers lingering on a jewel around her neck, a silver web with fine crystals suspended on a simple chain.

“That.” Mechnes tightened his grip. “That object. What it is?”

“Object?” Adiana stared at him in confusion.

“The jewel she wears.”

“How did you—?”

“Tell me!”

“It was a gift.” Adiana forced each word through frantic gasps. “A gift from the King.”

“What power does it have?”

“It…binds them somehow. I don’t know. She never told me.”

Mechnes released her. Adiana wilted, coughing and wheezing.

He had recognized that jewel. It matched perfectly the description of the device used by the girl to escape that very morning.

It binds them
.
The child to the maga, the maga to the King.

“The Mage King has been informed,” he concluded. “Or at least, we must assume that is the case.”

It was disappointing news. Mechnes had planned to move his army as far north as Rhiemsaven before word of their invasion reached the King’s City. That might not be possible now, and Mechnes did not care to get bogged down in a conflict over the Pass of Aerunden.

Still, the advantage remained with the Syrnte, and there was yet time to secure the pass if they moved quickly. He nodded to his men. “Take the girl away, leave the woman with me. Send for my officers and bring me one of the Queen’s messengers.”

The guards shoved Adiana into a chair and departed.

Pashnari remained huddled on the ground, cradling her mutilated hand. Mechnes kicked her again.

“Get out,” he said.

She scurried away like a rat.

The Syrnte prince turned his attention to Adiana, who had curled into herself and was overcome with wretched sobs.

Mechnes drew close, took Adiana’s hands from her face and wiped her tears away. His rage was spent now. Indeed, he was very pleased with how everything had turned out. He had the information he needed, Rishona’s toys could yet be delivered whole, and Adiana’s exceptional music was his to enjoy.

He lifted a cup of wine to her lips. She accepted it with desperate gulps. Her fine golden hair hung ragged over bruised cheeks. The tremble on her bloodied lips was most inviting. Mechnes considered taking her by force in that moment, as had often pleased him, but it occurred to him it might be more entertaining to indulge in a game of seduction with this musician, merchant’s daughter, and whore from Selkynsen.

Adiana sputtered in the middle of a swallow and shoved the cup away. A shudder ran through her shoulders, and she sank into another round of weeping.

“You mustn’t take it so hard, Mistress Adiana,” Mechnes said, brushing a lock of hair from her face and taking her chin in hand. “That is a rare gift, the music that resides in your soul. I am most pleased you did not see fit to surrender it.”

Chapter Fourteen

A wail rose from the Queen’s chambers
, a bitter melody of loss and death that crescendoed then faded, leaving Akmael and the others who kept vigil outside burdened under a heavy silence. 

The door to Taesara’s room opened, and High Mage Rezlyn appeared. The physician’s aspect was worn. He had cleaned his hands, but blood stained his sleeves, and a grave mood clouded his aged eyes. He paused and glanced around the room, as if taking stock of those present, Taesara’s ladies and the new ambassador of Roenfyn among them.

Approaching Akmael, Rezlyn bowed and announced in subdued tones, “I believe the worst has passed, my Lord King. The Queen will recover, though she requires much rest. I am most sorry to inform you, however, that it is too late for the child.”

“Too late?” The words felt out of place somehow. Wrong.

“She bled heavily, my Lord King, and no remedy known to me was able to slow the hemorrhaging. The Prince will not be saved.”

Akmael set his jaw, channeling a surge of grief and anger deep into his core. 

Rage is not to be directed at the Gods
,
but held within and used for a greater purpose,
Tzeremond had told him once.
The Gods take from us to incite our anger. They incite our anger to unleash the our potential.

“The Queen is weak,” continued Rezlyn, “and sick with remorse. She must be confined to her bed for the coming days, until the bleeding stops.”

“And her womb?”

“Intact, thank the Gods. She will bear children again.” 

“I would see her at once.”

“As you wish, my Lord King.” Rezlyn stepped to one side.

“King Akmael, if it pleases you, I would also see my niece.” Lord Penamor, the new ambassador from Roenfyn, spoke. A lean man with a long face and sharp eyes, he had in the end been escorted from the piers by High Mage Tzetobar.

Akmael nodded. “I will advise the Queen that you are here.”

“I would prefer to accompany you now.” 

Akmael stiffened. It was an impertinent request for a newly arrived guest of his court. “You will see the Queen at her command, Lord Penamor.”

The ambassador’s lips twitched, but he indicated his acquiescence with a respectful bow. 

Inside the Queen’s chambers, Lady Sonia attended Taesara, refreshing her pallid face with a damp cloth. Noting the King’s entrance, Sonia threw a fresh coverlet over the Queen’s lap to hide the damp and soiled sheets.

At the foot of the bed, a small table had been set with midnight blue candles and burning sage. The sight brought another surge of grief. Akmael paused over the candles and sang quiet songs of passage, sending what magic he could into the Underworld, that his son’s fragile soul might enter the halls of his ancestors.

Taesara’s remorse hung over the room like a bitter mist, carrying with it the unpleasant smell of blood and salt. She hid her face behind trembling hands and refused to show her countenance even as Akmael took a place at her side. For many moments no words were exchanged between them, the silence of the room broken only by the Queen’s stifled sobs.

“Leave us,” Akmael said to Lady Sonia. The woman cast a nervous glance at the Queen, then curtsied and departed, taking the servants and other ladies with her. 

Akmael extracted Taesara’s hands from her face. They were clammy, her grip limp and without strength, her cheeks splotched as if by a fever. She directed her gaze toward some empty place in front of her.

“I am much grieved by this news,” he said.

“Forgive me, my Lord King.” Her voice was surprisingly steady given the tremor in her shoulders.

“There is nothing to forgive. It was I who permitted you to ride. You are not to carry this burden, nor will we speak of it again.”

She blinked and nodded, but did not meet his gaze. 

“High Mage Rezlyn has assured me you suffered no injury and will soon be able bear more children.”

“If it please my Lord King.” She bit her lip, choked back a sob. “Then it will be so.”

“It would please me.” Akmael brought her listless fingers to his lips. In truth, he doubted his own words. Taesara’s bed was a place of stark duty and little pleasure. “I cannot linger, my Queen. Moehn may be under siege, and I must speak with Mage Corey to see what else he has learned from the girl.”

Taesara withdrew her hand and looked at him, her expression sad and uncertain. “Stay with me a little while longer.”

“High Mage Rezlyn will see you are well cared for.”

She swallowed, drew an unsteady breath, and took his hand once more. “My Lord King, do you not think it is curious how the girl arrived in that moment and precisely that place?”

Akmael thought this comment puzzling. “We are uncertain how it came about. The device should have taken her to Maga Eolyn.”

“Yet she appeared in front of me and sent my horse, a creature that has always been gentle in nature, into panic.”

Akmael withdrew from Taesara’s touch. “Speak plainly, Taesara. What is your concern?”

She pursed her lips and held her silence for a moment. “Forgive me, my Lord King, for what I am about to say. I am a woman of discretion, but I am not without ears. I have heard the rumors of your youth, how you once meant something to that woman, the witch from Moehn.”

“Taesara, it is not your place—”

“I know, my Lord King. I have never questioned the events of the past, nor have I ever doubted your loyalty to me, my house, and my people. But that witch is dangerous. I cannot help but suspect my illness in Moehn was her doing, and the loss of this child as well.”

“Impossible.” Anger marked Akmael’s tone.

“There was witchcraft at work today. I am certain of it.”

“A maga of Moisehén would not put her powers to such foul use.”

“I grew up listening to stories of your magas. They declared war against your father and brought this kingdom to near ruin. It would be a little thing for them to kill a prince.”

Akmael rose, infuriated. “Enough of these accusations.”

“My Lord King, I only want—”

“You want nothing but to deny your own failure, Taesara. I intended to relieve you of the burden of that guilt, as I thought the pain of our loss was punishment enough. But my mercy has been ill-received.”

“Please, my Lord King!” A sob broke through her words. “Do not speak such cruelties. Remember that I bore our first child without difficulty. I am neither weak nor unskilled as a rider. You must at least consider—”

“I will consider none of this foolishness.”

“I speak only out of concern for our future, the future of our sons, of your kingdom!”

He took hold of her arm, his grip so harsh she cried out. “You accuse an innocent woman and a mere child of high treason. Maga Eolyn and her students are faithful servants of the Crown. If you ever utter such lies again, you will suffer far worse than my wrath.”

He released her as suddenly as he had taken hold of her.

Taesara collapsed into a fit of tears, but her distress only magnified his distaste. Without further word, he abandoned her.

In the antechamber, a steward waited with word from Mage Corey, who was requesting an immediate audience. Akmael gave instructions to have the mage wait for him in the Council room, along with Sir Drostan.

Lord Penamor stepped forward with yet another petition to see the Queen, but Akmael denied his request and informed High Mage Rezlyn that Taesara was not to receive any
visitors except
by his leave.

When Akmael arrived at the Council room, Corey and Drostan stood at the long oak table, maps of the eastern territories laid out before them. The bright and breezy morning had given away to a stifling afternoon heat. Though the southern windows were flung open, perspiration beaded everyone’s brow, the faint smell of sweat a silent herald of battles to come. 

“My Lord King,” Corey greeted Akmael with a respectful bow, his expression one of pronounced concern, his tone deferential. “What news of your son?”

“The Prince is lost.” Akmael’s voice was terse, his heart already hardened.

Corey studied him a moment, brow furrowed. “I am most grieved to hear it. And the Queen?”

“She will recover soon enough.”

“May the Gods make it so,” Sir Drostan said quietly.

The King acknowledged their condolences with a brief nod. “What have you gathered from the girl, Mage Corey?”

“If I interpret her testimony correctly, it would seem Moehn has been taken by a band of Syrnte raiders. They destroyed the school, burned the town, and camped outside what remains of the walls.”

The useless walls of Moehn
, Akmael thought bitterly.

“They must have come from the east.” Akmael drew forth one of the maps. “Here, around the flank of the Paramen Mountains. An ancient trade route, perhaps. Or a path known only to foresters.”

“They would not have required many men to take Moehn,” Drostan said, “but they may be poised to open the path into a proper road.”

“Mage Corey, what of Maga Eolyn?” Akmael asked. “Does the girl know anything of her whereabouts?”

“Eolyn departed for the South Woods a few days before the attack, accompanied by Sir Borten, Delric and two of her students. The night the
Aekelahr
was taken, she had not yet returned.”

Akmael expressed his relief with a slow exhale. There was hope, then. No one knew the South Woods better or could find safer refuge within its corridors than Eolyn. “How many men among the Syrnte?”

“Impossible to tell,” Corey said. “If I were to believe the child, I would say thousands. But she has never seen an army, and did not—I think—see this one very well. What appeared an infinite horde to her may be no more than a few hundred men.”

“It would be unwise to assume she’s exaggerating,” Drostan said. “The rebel Ernan amassed a formidable army in the forests of East Selen, man by man and weapon by weapon over many months. We have always thought his followers passed unnoticed in small groups through the western territories, but they may have had other routes of entry about which we were never informed.”

Akmael cast an acerbic glance at Mage Corey. “What do you say, having known that failed movement all too well?” 

Corey set his jaw under the King’s challenge, his silver green eyes calm as a serpent in the summer sun. “Their routes of entry were just as I informed you, my Lord King. Ernan’s men came from Galia across the Sea of Rabeln, and Khelia’s warriors descended from the Paramen Mountains into Selkynsen. Both travelled along the northern hills of the Taeschel range to meet Ernan in East Selen. Additional rebels were gathered from the peasant classes of Moisehén, and when Ernan forged his alliance with Selen, he called upon the levies of those treacherous lords.”

“And the Syrnte?” Drostan prompted.

The mage let go an impatient breath. “The Syrnte were always enigmatic participants in Ernan’s movement. Rishona and Tahmir, for the most part, worked on their own, intent upon their pact of vengeance against Tzeremond, with only a handful of guards at their disposal. But Ernan was promised a hundred or so Syrnte cavalry, which at the time I departed his company had not yet appeared. Nor, as the King well knows, did these mounted soldiers materialize during the Battle of Aerunden. It was never revealed to me how Rishona and Tahmir’s men were expected to enter the kingdom unnoticed, and until this day I had assumed they never did.”

Akmael studied his cousin in contempt, frustrated once more by the capriciousness of the Gods, who had seen fit to take away so fine and straightforward an advisor as Tzeremond and leave this man—who never once lied and yet had proven a master of deception—as the highest ranking mage of the kingdom.

“Mage Corey,” Akmael said, “when we finish here, you will accompany Sir Drostan to speak with our mage warriors. You will tell them all you know of the Syrnte and the magic at their command. If I should discover at any time that you have withheld information of importance, I will have you drawn and quartered, and your remains thrown to the wolves.”

The mage bowed, apparently undaunted by the threat. “As you wish, my Lord King.” 

“Drostan, once you have what you need from Corey, you are to depart immediately for Rhiemsaven with a hundred men, twenty mage warriors among them. Travel light and fast. The Pass of Aerunden must be secured with all haste.” 

“I will see it done, my Lord King.”

“I will assemble the rest of the army and depart in three days’ time. By the grace of the Gods, you will have enforcements before you meet the Syrnte in battle.

“Yes, my Lord King.”

“That is all for now.”

Drostan bowed to take his leave.

“If I may be so bold, my Lord King,” Corey said, causing Drostan to pause in his tracks. “The device that brought the child here. Is it still in your possession?”

“Yes.”

“I would counsel you not to use it.” 

Akmael studied the mage, remembering their meeting on the eve of Ernan’s rebellion, when Corey was bound and beaten, deep inside the dungeons of Vortingen. Even then, his swollen and discolored face had failed to diminish the imperturbable authority with which he always spoke.