The Black Queen (Book 6) (42 page)

“You call it Rugad, but is it?”

She shrugged. “It’s a construct, with his memories and his personality. As far as I can tell, it’s him.”

Coulter was silent for a moment. Then he said, “You have a way you want me to help?”

“I want you to remove it. Can you?”

He didn’t know. He supposed he could. According to Scavenger, Enchanters could do anything any other Fey could. But Coulter didn’t know if any other Fey could remove this thing.

“I can try,” he said, beginning to get a picture of what he could do. “But I’ll need a place to put the construct, some place away from Arianna so that when I destroy it, it won’t go back to her.”

“Will Sebastian do?”

“No,” Coulter said. “She’s Linked to him. Maybe a Fey lamp would do it. I’d need the help of a Lamplighter.”

“Of course,” Seger said.

“And we need to do something about Sebastian. You said you can remove the voice. I think it would be best if you worked on him, while I worked on her. That way, if information does cross their Link, Rugad will not know that we’re coming for him in both places until it’s too late.”

Seger looked relieved. “I was wondering how to get around that.”

Coulter closed his eyes. He could imagine this, and if he could imagine it, he could do it. “Sebastian will have to shatter as you remove that voice. It’s the only way to get the threads out of his stone. Can you put him back together?”

“Yes,” she said, “I know someone who has done it twice. He should be able to do it again.”

“Good,” Coulter said. “Let’s not tell Ari I’m here. That might tip off Rugad. Let’s just pick a point and do this.”

“I’ll be ready tonight,” Seger said. “How about you?”

Coulter nodded. “That gives me a chance to sleep and think about it.” He took a deep breath. “If we fail—”

“Then we’ll have to think of something else.” She squeezed his arm. “It’s always better to expect success.”

“Perhaps,” Coulter said. But he had learned a long time ago that Rugad was a master at turning success into failure. Only Rugad wasn’t ready this time. He wasn’t prepared to meet with opposition. Surprise usually defeated the Fey. Coulter hoped it would this time too.

TWENTY-TWO

CON STOOD OUTSIDE the remains of the Tabernacle, staring at the once magnificent towers. They were hollow wrecks now, damaged by a fire decades ago, then looted and finally destroyed by squatters. During Rugad’s brief reign as ruler of Blue Isle, the Fey had completely defaced the building, destroying everything except its outer shell.

The magnificence of the shell remained. From a distance, it was still possible to see how the Tabernacle had once been the twin to the palace across the bridge. Twin seats of power, separated by the Cardidas.

Those days were gone, and Con knew they couldn’t come back, not now that the Blue Isle’s royal family had Fey blood in it. But the Tabernacle shouldn’t be a ruined husk. It could still be a center for New Rocaanism, or so Con had argued to Queen Arianna not three months before.

He had had similar meetings with her countless times, and every time she had been gracious as she refused him. This time he had brought his secret weapon, Sebastian. Sebastian, in his halting voice, had reminded her how much they owed Con and how trustworthy he was.

Con could never be the kind of Rocaanist he wanted, not any longer. He had killed too many people—in battle, true enough, but still, it went against all he had ever been taught. And he had gone on a pilgrimage to Constant—a town that, like him, had been named for King Constantine. There he had been permitted to go into the Vault and read the Words. He didn’t know if they had inspired or disillusioned him. What they had shown him was how linked Rocaanism and Fey magick was. They were two sides of the same coin.

He had accepted that. He had accepted many things. He even wore Fey clothing now, the breeches and jerkin instead of his Aud’s robes. The old trappings of the religion were gone. They had to create new symbols, and new ways of doing things. The only thing he kept was the small filigree sword around his neck. He wore it constantly, to remind himself of who he was and what he believed.

Con had used the changes when he spoke with Arianna this last time. He had pointed out that Rocaanism would never die, and that Arianna—as the hereditary leader of Blue Isle, with the blood of its religious leader, the Roca, running through her veins—should control the direction Rocaanism was taking, that she could prevent the use of the Secrets that killed not just Fey, but could, in the wrong hands, be turned against anyone with magickal powers. And then he reminded her that the mastermind behind New Rocaanism was Matthias, the man who had killed her mother. Wouldn’t it be better, Con had asked, if the people who revived Rocaanism were her people, people she could trust, people who understood the link between Fey and Islander?

Sebastian had then spoken up, reminding Arianna of the times Con had saved his life. Arianna had seemed irritated at that as if she didn’t need to be reminded (and, in all fairness, she probably didn’t), and for the first time had appeared to consider Con’s suggestions. When she asked him how he would prevent Rocaanism from turning into a Fey-hating religion, he had said simply, “We allow Fey to join.”

She had looked at him as if he had found the key to all the world’s mysteries, and then she had smiled at him. “If you swear to me that the Fey will be involved in all levels of the religion, including the upper levels, that one day a Fey—or someone like me—can become Rocaan, then I will help you.”

He swore that to her, and he meant to make good on it. It was, in all truthfulness, the only way he believed the religion could work. Belief in God was not limited to a single race. Any race could believe and, Con thought, if any race could believe, then any race could worship as well.

And she had given him permission to rebuild the Tabernacle. She hadn’t provided funds or workers, telling him that the church had to provide. And he believed it would.

He had begun the difficult process of raising funds, and found that he needed more than that. What he was learning was that a lot of Islanders had little money to give, but they had time and skills. He needed the money to get the materials, but one of his assistants, another former Aud, decided they could barter for materials as well. Con liked that. It meant that one day this project would get done.

But right now, it seemed overwhelming. He was standing on what had once been a beautiful tile courtyard, filled with images from the religion’s history. Most of the tiles were gone, destroyed by time or weather or thieves. The outer walls remained, but everything, from the torch holders to the door, were gone. Over the years, plants had crept up the walls and along the demolished tile. Their branches were budding now, and if he didn’t clear them away soon, they might completely block the entrance.

He still couldn’t bear to go inside. He had done so once, saw the magnificent staircase that now led nowhere, the blackened crumble that had been the walls to the audience room, the corridor where he used to stare at the portraits of all the Rocaans, now gone. So many people had died here, hideously, and there were still remnants of that as well, a bit of cloth here, a half-burned copy of the Words there.

Looters had been through the place countless times, and nothing of worth was left. Just the memories, and the overwhelming feeling that even with all the help he was gathering, he would never be able to rebuild.

“Are you Con?” a voice asked behind him.

He jumped. He couldn’t help himself. He turned, and saw a Fey in Domestics robes standing at the edge of the courtyard, looking at the destroyed tile with distaste. She was young. Con wasn’t even sure she knew what this place had been.

“Yes,” he said.

“You’re wanted at the palace.”

He sighed. So Arianna had changed her mind. She had probably gotten reports that he was here—which was why he had put off coming here in the first place—and she wanted to tell him she had talked to her advisors and they had told her it wasn’t a good idea after all.

“Tell Arianna that I still plan to go through with this.”

The Fey put her hands behind her back. The expression on her narrow face was one of barely contained disdain. “The Black Queen did not send for you.”

That surprised him. Now the Fey had his full attention. He turned, mimicking her posture, with his hands behind his back. He stood straight, even though he was considerably shorter than she was. He found, in dealing with Fey, that standing with his shoulders back at least got their attention. They still saw shortness as a sign of inferiority, and he always had to work against that.

“Then who wants me?” he asked. Sebastian had never summoned him, and Sebastian seemed to be the only other person in the palace who would need to contact him. Sebastian always came to him.

“An Islander named Coulter and a Healer named Seger. They ask on behalf of Sebastian.”

Coulter? The boy who had traveled with Arianna, and then left the palace so suddenly all those years ago? Con barely remembered him, remembered only that Sebastian had treated him like a brother, and Coulter had been cold to him. Only Coulter wouldn’t be a boy now. He was older than Con, significantly older. Con hadn’t seen him in a long, long time.

And Con knew Seger well. She always went out of her way to greet him when he did come to the palace. She had never forgotten the way he had treated Sebastian. And, even though she needed a verbal reminder now and then, Arianna hadn’t either.

“What’s this about?” Con asked.

“It is a matter of some urgency,” she said. “They tell me I cannot bring you without your sword.”

He felt a chill. He hadn’t picked up that sword in a long time. He had plucked it off the wall in the palace when he was fighting the Fey, and discovered that the sword had the ability to slice through anything quickly and with complete precision. It had other powers as well, and had, more than once, saved Sebastian’s life. Arianna had given the sword to Con after she became Black Queen, saying that it belonged in his hand and at his side. He kept it in a prominent place, but never carried it, seeing as a symbol of his religion’s failure to do things as the Roca had wanted, through peaceful means instead of warlike ones.

“What’s happened?” he asked.

“I cannot tell you. I must simply escort you to the palace, and make sure you have your sword.”

He nodded. “The sword is in my quarters,” he said.

“Then we shall go there.” She looked at the Tabernacle and wrinkled her long nose. Con turned, and saw it as she did, a ruined hulk dominating the city’s south side.

“I’m going to rebuild it,” he said.

“You should tear it down,” she said. “Not even the walls will hold up under new construction. There is nothing of worth left.”

“It has history,” he said.

“But is it a worthwhile history?” She turned and walked back to the road, waiting for him there.

He stared at the Tabernacle again. Perhaps she was right. After all he had learned about his religion, all the misunderstandings and miscalculations, perhaps what he would be saving would be the memory of something that nearly caused the destruction of Blue Isle.

Maybe. Or maybe he was saving a part of his own people’s identity, their need to believe.

Whatever he was doing, it would wait. Seger and Sebastian needed him. And his sword. He shuddered. He knew from that small detail that whatever they needed him for wasn’t good.

TWENTY-THREE

ONLY THE SHAMAN KNEW the quickest ways in and out of the Eccrasian Mountains. It had taken Gift and his party nearly a week to get to Protectors Village five years before; now it took him and Xihu three days to get out.

They had traveled through a crack in the mountains—not a valley, really, but a place that looked as if one giant mountain had split down the middle. Perhaps it had. Gift didn’t know the entire history of this place. Over the years, Shaman had worn a path through the area, complete with stairs in the trickier parts. The trek was short partly because of the Domestic spells that enabled travelers to walk quickly without getting exhausted.

Gift and Xihu covered more ground rapidly than he had ever covered in his life, and he had once walked half the width of Blue Isle. The weather had cooperated. It was as if the mountains approved of his departure.

He didn’t. His entire body longed to returned to the Place of Power and, if he could admit it to himself, the Black Throne. The longing increased the farther away he got until, on their short rest stops, he dreamed of it.

The dreams were not of the Throne as he had experienced it. They were of a place filled with Fey, a place that was warm and inviting and beautiful. The Throne itself was a glittering obsidian, and it beckoned him, inviting him to sit, to be part of it, to be part of the excitement that filled the room. In each dream, he drew closer to the Throne, and in each dream, his hesitations about sitting there grew fainter and fainter.

When he was awake, the dreams horrified him, but he longed for them as well. He wasn’t certain what was happening to him. He could only hope that once he was out of the mountains, the longing would disappear.