The Silence of Medair (24 page)

"And now, perhaps, we might consider not talking about Avahn's guest as if she were not present?" Mylar said, his voice cutting effortlessly into the brewing dispute.  He smiled at Medair as she turned toward him.  "A name is a powerful thing, Kel ar Corleaux.  I don't believe I've ever met one who shares yours, for all its notoriety.  I'm glad to see that today's bearers do not always dishonour the legends of the past."

"Kind words," Medair replied.  She didn't like being called a legend of the past.

"I asked Lathan to play 'Lady of the Hills' for you, Medair," Avahn said, abandoning more provoking topics.  "It's very bad form not to know your Telsen."

"
I can think of a more appropriate song
," Adlenkar said in an audible undertone to Surreive.  The Keris smiled thinly.

Restraining any number of statements regarding her familiarity with Telsen, Medair wondered if she had the patience to sit at this table of White Snakes.  She was in no mood to make polite conversation or parry questions and incomprehensible insults.  She no longer wore the uniform and obligations of a Herald.  Her actions were her own and reflected on no-one.  She could choose to offend whomever she liked.

The attractive prospect of a quiet meal alone in her room receded as the man who had been plucking aimlessly at the triband produced a more focused sequence of notes.  A murmur of recognition ran through the dining hall, followed by an obedient hush.  Then Lathan began to sing, sweet and grave.

It was "Faran's Lament".  Telsen had never been satisfied with the melody and had forever been making alterations.  Medair hadn't quite understood what he found to be lacking, and listened as raptly as the rest of the diners.  Lathan's sombre voice transformed the melancholy ballad into something sublimely haunting.  The triband was an Ibisian instrument, but could have been designed for Telsen's intricate style.  He would have been pleased.

A soft storm of Ibisian "applause" rose as the final notes died away.  Ibis-lar did not clap their hands, but would instead say "
ahlau
" as a mark of approval, several times if truly impressed.  It did, as Jorlaise had once said, sound a little like they were all sneezing.

Avahn looked to her for approval, as if Lathan were a favoured protégé.  "He's remarkable," Medair said, sincerely.

"A true child of Telsen," Avahn agreed, unwittingly replacing Medair's pleasure with a whole host of ambiguous and conflicting feelings.  Did Avahn mean that the Ibisian musician was literally a descendent of Telsen, or merely following his artistic lead?  She speculated on the identity of the possible mother of Telsen's child while Lathan continued to play.  The music was more cheerful, wholly unfamiliar, and she did not pay it a great deal of attention.  Avahn was probably disappointed to find her not captivated, but he made no attempt to coax her out of her distraction.  Servitors came from table to table during the short pauses between each piece, and there would be a brief clatter of noise before Lathan launched into another song.

A difference, a marked tension in the hush which greeted the fourth song, woke Medair from thoughts of paternity.  She looked up, and discovered the trio of Kerine on the other side of the table were all watching her with an air of...expectation.  A glance at Avahn found him troubled, clear gaze also fixed on her.

She shifted her attention to the rest of the room, and saw that the High Table was still empty of royal presence.  Then she focused on the words now being woven into the complex melody.  It was another Telsen – she recognised his style from long familiarity, though the piece was new to her.  A ballad of unrequited love, it seemed, poignant and starkly beautiful.  Quite possibly one of his best, a masterwork, but she could not see–

They were all watching, and so all had the pleasure of observing the sudden stillness, the widened eyes, disbelief, chagrin, dismay and anger which marched in careless progression across her face.  When she reached the point of fury, she remembered herself enough to shut down all expression.

A song of unrequited love.  A tale of a man in pursuit of an elusive woman, as unforgettable as the song with which he had immortalised her.

I found the words, laid bare my soul
.

To the lady fair
.

Now I stumble lost, heart echoing
;

In the Silence of Medair
.

That Telsen had taken her name and rewritten their brief relationship, Medair might have eventually been able to forgive.  But he had not stopped there.  Instead, he had used his talent as a song-smith to depict a time of war, where 'Medair' seemed to be enacting a role far more risky than what she knew personally of Heralds.  The song made Telsen out to be constantly worrying about Medair's safety, not to mention jealously convinced that she'd started a romance with someone else.

The refrain altered slightly with each repetition, but always closed with the phrase 'the Silence of Medair'.  The final line saw the singer standing on the walls of a besieged city, staring vainly south, waiting for a woman who had become the only hope of victory.  This was truly Telsen's masterwork.  She could almost see him, on Shield Wall perhaps, gazing towards distant mountains, straining to catch some glimpse of a lone woman returning from a quest of endless peril, to hear the voice of the Horn of Farak lifted in triumph, but hearing only...

"The Silence of Medair," Surreive said.  Medair was staring blindly at her plate.  "Undying hope.  I believe that song might well have become an anthem for those who take her name, if only it had been set to a simpler tune."

"A little too melancholy, surely," murmured Mylar.

"A little too close to the bone, you mean," put in Adlenkar.  "It hints too broadly at the truth."

"What truth is that?" Medair asked, around the hurt and anger in her throat.

The Ibisian lordling looked surprised.  "Why, that they were lovers of course."

Medair shook her head, uncomprehending.  "Telsen had many lovers.  What does that matter?"

"Not Telsen."  Adlenkar's eyes were wide and curious.  "The Herald and the
Niadril
Kier."

Medair stopped breathing, sat helplessly as the words forced themselves upon her consciousness.  Herald.  Kier.  But it wasn't just the words, it was the tone, it was the 'of course'.

"You truly believe that, don't you?" she managed, her voice a strangled whisper.  "You're not even trying to be provoking.  You speak as if repeating established fact."

"And so I do," Adlenkar said, eyeing her now as if he suspected some infirmity of the mind.

"A theory, Adlenkar," admonished Mylar.  "One of many.  No proof at all, no way to judge."

"A popular theory," Surreive offered, in an idle, dangerous voice.  "Tell me something, Medair ar Corleaux.  Ileaha has assured me, in one of her futile attempts at peacemaking, that you have repudiated any association with Medarists, that you have not taken your name as a banner of war.  Why, then, does this old, tired saga cost you so much?  Why do you look at me with hate in your eyes?"

"Is that what you see?" Medair asked, in a too-high voice, knowing herself to be on the edge of hysteria.  "Hate?"

"Medair?"  Avahn, fatally, reached a hand to touch her arm and she jerked from his fingers.  Her chair clattered backwards onto the floor and the hall fell into interested silence.  Dozens of White Snakes were watching the scene play out, enjoying this Farakkian interloper being overset in their conquered domain.  Medair gulped back a harsh breath, and closed her hands into fists, not allowing them to send her scurrying wholly defeated from the hall.

"That is," she said, slowly, "the first time anyone has suggested to me that your
Niadril
Kier was without honour.  It is a point I believe I shall have to ponder further."

Medair took another heavy breath, in the shocked hush which followed this piece of heresy.  Then, head held high, she walked with a ragged assumption of calm from the hall, through the tower, all the way back to the room which had been given to her.  She locked the door firmly behind her, lay down on the bed, and allowed herself to weep.

-oOo-

The view of the city from the balcony had eventually proven more of an attraction than snuffling into her pillow.  She stood leaning on the cool stone, sheltered by night, thinking about everything but the distant past.  Everything but–

Biting her lip, she shied away from the thought, but there was no escaping what she had heard that evening.  Stupid over-reaction on her part, really.  It was not as if it had never been suggested before.  Two years of war, endless games of marrat with Kier Ieskar.  More than one person among the beleaguered defenders, not knowing of constant attendants, not knowing the laws which governed the Kier, had made suggestions.  But none of them had actually believed it!

To question a Herald's honour was no small thing.  To
suggest–!  Jennet had knocked down that fool Soven, when he had asked Medair if it were true that Ibisians had blue spines, and even that had only been provocation, not accusation.  Medair was an Imperial Herald.  One of the Emperor's Mouths, as the Dukes had been his Hands.  A Herald spoke the Emperor's words, acted as the Emperor's ears, was unmolested even in the midst of battle.  A position of great trust, attained by a rare few.  Medair had served Palladium with all her heart, and now, it seemed, people believed she had gone to the enemy's bed.  'A popular theory', even among Ibisians.

Ieskar had been compelling.  Brilliant.  Frighteningly observant.  An attractive, willowy young man whose pale eyes could cut you to the core.  Medair had hated him.  Loathed him for destroying her world.  She had no idea how she would have felt, if she had known him as other than invader.  It was impossible to divorce the person from his deeds.

It was probable, she supposed, that he had liked her.  He had after all commanded her company.  She had long refused to think of it that way, to think of him as a man at all.  Had he known of that 'popular theory', or had it only grown in force after his death?  Had he ever heard that song?  She could not understand how it was that the Ibisians tolerated its subject.  Not only did it depict them as the enemy, and close on the hope of rescue, but it suggested that their revered
Niadril
Kier had done something which broke their precious laws and was also incredibly dishonourable.  Seduce the Herald of the enemy?  Had they
forgotten
that he was forbidden any touch?

But what Adlenkar had claimed might not have been how the song was regarded at the time.  She could not imagine any of the Ibisians who had fled Sar-Ibis even momentarily believing that Kier Ieskar would cast off the restrictions which bound him, however obsolete those laws had become with the destruction of Sar-Ibis.

Today – it was only a song, and a 'popular theory', established by long centuries of speculation by people who no longer lived to the strictest rule of Ibisian culture.  Who laughed over their meals, and said pettish things and looked directly at strangers.  Did Surreive and Adlenkar even understand what they had suggested?

And, she had to remember, the Heraldic tradition of the Palladian Empire had died after the invasion, its codes superseded by Ibisian practices.  A Herald whose actions among the enemy were anything but formal and correct was behaving unprofessionally.  A Herald who went to the bed of the enemy's leader might as well fight at his side.  Treason.  Did time really obscure the situation that greatly?  Could they not see what they had been suggesting, what reflection this would be on the morals of both involved?  How utterly impossible it would have been?

"Kel."

Medair turned her head to consider Cor-Ibis.  The light of the mageglow which had been set in the hallway limned him with a faint blue aura.  An outline of a man with a soft, cool voice.

"Keridahl."

Joining her in shadow, he handed her the satchel.

"I give to you my thanks, Kel, and those of my Kier," he said formally.

Medair ran her hands briefly over the familiar leather.  Did she regret that the Ibisians had not inadvertently destroyed it?  Probably not.  It was hers, after all.  All that she had left.

"It would be a kindness, Kel, if you did not leave Athere without speaking to Avahn.  He believes he has wronged you."

"He did ask Lathan to play it, then."

"At my instigation."

So calmly said.  She responded in kind.  "Were you pleased with the result, Keridahl?"

"A miscalculation on my part.  I had assumed that the song was so famed that no-one could have escaped hearing it."

"Infamous," Medair muttered.

"Even so.  Although it is not without merit to have Surreive forced to regret one of her games, I cannot say I am pleased with the results of our experiment.  It has merely raised more questions, with no prospect of answers."

"You have my sympathy, Keridahl."  Medair shook her head, wishing he would go, then straightened, and looked at the milk and midnight face inclined courteously towards her.  "I pose no threat to Palladium, am in league with none of her enemies.  I will take no part in the coming war and, leaving with the dawn, will never see any of you again.  You have a love of mystery, it seems, for you continue to attempt to solve mine.  I will not tell you my past and I doubt your current theories tally at all closely with the truth.  Leave it be, Keridahl."