The Soul Weaver (60 page)

If the Lords' intent was merely to prevent anyone other than Gerick from inheriting the powers of D'Arnath, then why had they not forced Gerick to kill Karon at Calle Rein when they were linked and he was most vulnerable? Gerick had been Karon's acknowledged successor for four years. The power the Lords wanted was within their grasp, and it made no sense that they would put Gerick, their prize, at further risk of Karon's wrath. So, why this masquerade? All that was likely to happen from this futile exercise was that everyone would end up dead—Gerick and Ven'Dar and Karon, too, of course. Once he finished killing his dearest friend and executing his son he would be soul-dead, at the least. What would it benefit anyone . . . ?

Frantically I scanned the onlookers and confirmed that the face every instinct insisted should be present was missing from the crowd. Earth and sky, I knew!

I shoved my way past the remaining observers, until I was so close to the combatants that I could feel the rush of air as their swords sliced the air. “Karon! Stop! This is not Gerick's doing!”

Relentless, unbending, unheeding, Karon pressed the sneering Ven'Dar to the dais, laying blow after ringing blow on his opponent's sword, his powerful arms unwavering, his face like iron. Mortal enchantments flew with every strike. Ven'Dar seemed scarcely able to parry, much less mount an attack of his own. The end could be only moments away.

“Get away from here, Seri!” I heard nothing of Karon in the command, only cold fury and death. He never took his eyes from his objective. Ven'Dar's cold gaze never wavered from his Prince's face. He showed no fear. No concern. No hatred. No interest in me. Only singular determination. I knew I was right. I just didn't know how it was possible, even for a sorcerer of exceptional talent.

“I don't care what you see, Karon. I don't care what you feel. This is not Gerick. Stop and listen to me. For everything, listen to me.” I switched from the language of Avonar to the language of Leire, the language Karon and I had shared.

Ven'Dar let loose a powerful offensive that engaged Karon's full attention, then dodged a deadly stroke that split the ancient Preceptors' table with a flash of blue fire. One of the Dar'Nethi observers grabbed my arms from behind and tried to drag me away, but I shook loose and stayed close.

“Think, Karon! Someone wants Gerick dead, and Ven'Dar dead, and wants you to be responsible—for then you'll be as good as dead, too.”

Another blow and Ven'Dar staggered backward. Karon wiped the sweat from his face with a bloody sleeve, and walked slowly around the table. “The Destroyer will not escape me this time. Not like the day he murdered Gar'Dena.”

Another blow and Ven'Dar's sword clattered across the floor, and Karon had the Preceptor backed up to a toppled half of the long table. His sword point rested at the older man's heart vein. “Not this time, Dieste.”

“Do it, D'Natheil—Father,” said Gerick's voice from Ven'Dar's lips, cold, unconcerned. “It's what you've wanted for four years. She can't see what you see. You know who I am because you've been closer to me than any mundane woman, even my mother, could ever be. If you don't do it, then you'll see all of them dead, including this pitiful relic you've chosen to lick your boots.”

I would not
allow
this. “Listen to me, Karon. Once, very long ago in Martin's drawing room, you swore that you'd never seen my match when it came to solving puzzles, and that if ever you were to wager your life on a riddle, you would ask me to solve it. So. The time has come. Place your wager.”

Karon's body was alive with rage, and no more than the weight of a hair would press his sword point into Ven'Dar's flesh. But he held back.

I forced everything I believed about our son into my words . . . everything I believed about Karon's true heart . . . about our love, our family, our history . . . everything and anything that might reach him through the armor of D'Natheil's anger. “That day at the Ravien Bathhouse, why did Gar'Dena turn the knife on himself once Gerick left him? How was it even possible? Those the Lords possess are left mindless. You have seen it in Zhev'Na and here in Avonar. They can't eat; they can't pull on a boot; they can't breathe. They die. You told me the vessel died because once the Lords had used them they didn't know how to live any more. So how was Gar'Dena able to turn his knife on himself? And why would he need to do so if the very act of Gerick's withdrawal was his doom? What if Gar'Dena was not possessed by a Lord, but controlled by some other power? What would you have seen when that illusion was done? You would have seen Gar'Dena as himself again, not mindless at all, not dead, and you would have known the truth. And so Gar'Dena had to die. By the Lords will, certainly. Using Gerick's soul weaving, yes.”

I pressed harder. “Is this not the same thing over again? The one who controls Ven'Dar will make sure you've killed your dearest friend. But this time, something is different. As surely as the sun rises, you will also kill your son, the Soul Weaver, and your own true heart will be destroyed. And who benefits? Not Gerick. Not you. Not even the Lords who intend for Gerick to inherit your power. Before you kill this man,” I said, “ask Men'Thor, Where is his son?
Ny vah mordeste, es Men'Thor yanevo Radele?
”

Infuriated, Men'Thor lunged forward, restrained only by two of the commanders. “How dare you—?”

But Karon was not swayed. “Impossible! Radele has no skill to possess a man or to create the seeming of another soul. Only the Lords have that kind of power.” Karon's words dripped with loathing. He snarled and his shoulders tensed. Blood seeped from Ven'Dar's neck, and I had no answer but faith.

“Wait! Radele
does
have the power!” A young woman's breathless voice came from the doorway. The remaining Dar'Nethi turned as one, parting enough that I could see a disheveled Roxanne who stood panting as if she'd run a race. “The same power he used to ensorcel the King of Leire!”

Paulo stood beside her, gulping and heaving. “It's one of the rings, my lord. Roxanne says that Radele has got one of the magical rings that spins, like the one in the cave of the Source, an oculus like the ones the Lords use in Zhev'Na, but small so's it'll fit in your hand. Radele must be controlling everything.”

Before I could quite comprehend their meaning, Ven'Dar growled and twisted out from under Karon's sword, lunging for his own dropped weapon that lay but an arm's reach away. Karon was quicker. He slammed his boot into Ven'Dar's middle. When the Preceptor curled into a ball, Karon dropped his sword and grabbed the Preceptor's arms, calling two of his warriors to aid him. The Preceptor writhed and fought and spewed foam and spittle from his mouth.

“Hold him,” shouted Karon. “Ward him with the strongest bonds you can manage. No one—
no one
—is to touch his mind. And on your lives let him touch no weapon. Seri, with me!”

He ran from the room, and as I followed him, Ce'Aret and Mem'Tara rushed to Ven'Dar, who fell limp in his warders' arms.

Men'Thor had been restrained by two warriors. He squirmed and shouted, “Madman! How dare you accuse my son—?”

With a barked command, Karon called up the portal in the anteroom and vanished through it. I stepped after him, Paulo and Roxanne on my heels. Thunder exploded behind us. Over my shoulder, I glimpsed Men'Thor strike down his captors with a flash of fire.

I cried out a warning, but Karon was far ahead, already disappearing down a long stairway. Through galleries we sped, down wide staircases, past astonished servants, and into the warren of sloping, narrow passageways that looked increasingly familiar . . . the steel-banded doors . . . past four fallen warriors . . . through the iron gate and the second guardroom where other warriors lay still in pools of blood . . . From the prison chamber ahead came a scream . . . as if the victim's heart was being torn out.
Gerick.

I stood at the door of the prison chamber gaping in wonder and horror. The walls had vanished, replaced by fathomless darkness, riven by bolts of blue-and-white fire. Hanging in the center of all was a pulsing orb of lurid light, created by a small brass ring, spinning so fast that it swept every mote of light from the room and wove the light into a palm-sized universe of blinding yellow-streaked purple and gold. A particularly potent burst of lightning illuminated Radele's smiling face. The spinning ring hovered above his palm.

Another burst of blue and white shattered the darkness and struck the orb of light. At the moment of impact, Gerick jerked and screamed again. He knelt on the stone platform in the center of the guardroom, curled in a knot, his pale, trembling fingers interlaced and cradling his head. Silver bands at his neck, wrists, and ankles were chained to the eyebolts at the corners of the platform.

“Come no closer, my lord,” said the smirking Radele. “I require you to stay where you are while we work out a settlement.”

Karon was just inside the door, trying to move closer to the stone platform. But his every forward movement caused another streak of blue lightning and another scream. Finally, with a curse, he stepped back, and the storm was stilled. “I make no settlements with the Lords of Zhev'Na or their servants.”

Gerick collapsed on the platform, shaking, his face buried in his arms.

“Oh, come now, I'm not one of the Lords. This”—Radele pointed to the magical orb spinning in his left hand—“is only a temporary device, made necessary by your infernal stubbornness. It will help us accomplish what is needed, and then . . .” He shrugged.

“You think they'll let you sever your partnership?” said Karon. “Or perhaps you believe you're more powerful than the Lords? Or more clever? Yes, that's it, isn't it? So you're a fool as well as a traitor.”

“Once the sword of D'Arnath rests in the proper hand, the opinions of those in Zhev'Na will have no more weight than the opinions of a fly . . . or the opinions of a dead coward of a prince or his demon spawn.”

“And whose hand would be the proper one to hold D'Arnath's sword?” said a calm, equable voice from behind me. A firm hand moved me aside, and a straight-backed figure in red robes strode into the room. Men'Thor—his legendary composure regained.

Radele smiled triumphantly, straightened his own back, and gave a deep bow. “Yours, of course, my father. And after yours, mine.”

Men'Thor walked slowly past Karon, assuming, correctly it seemed, that Radele would allow him to pass his barriers. When the man in red stood next to his son, he examined the spinning ring for a goodly time.

“You have made alliance with the Lords of Zhev'Na in order to make me the Heir of D'Arnath?” he said at last. He might have been discussing a gift of a new pair of boots or the talents of an untried sweeping girl.

“It was the only way. If you had seen it, Father . . . the madman Prince brought the boy sneaking across the Bridge in the middle of the night, as if to show his demon spawn the prizes awaiting him! How could I permit it? I was appalled. Furious. It happened that one of the Lords came to me that same night in the guise of a Zhid defector, thinking I was some weak-minded fool who would not recognize one of them. He said the boy was just biding his time, hoping to learn Avonar's secrets before rejoining the Lords. I could see they feared the boy would supplant them and take the powers of the Heir for himself alone. But for the time our purposes were the same, and I allowed them to think they had deceived me. That's when I bargained with them and obtained this device.”

“And today you were able, using this Zhev'Na device—this oculus—to displace Ven'Dar's soul with that of the boy?”

“The Lords own this creature's mind. They taught me how to use the oculus to reach into his corrupted soul and command him, so that he would not even remember his own deeds. And though he is no longer an immortal Lord, his soul has this ability to move into other bodies. Ask our Prince. He recognized the boy. It was no illusion.”

“But it was you all the time, controlling him, putting the words in his mouth and wielding the weapons in his hand.”

“I could not allow Ven'Dar to be named successor. He's weak. Just as you said, Father. If the Prince had only named you instead, Ven'Dar would never—”

“And in the Preceptor Gar'Dena, too, you did this thing?”

“I used the oculus to discover what secrets the Prince told the boy that night and learned of the information cache at the bathhouse. If the Prince had named you to the Preceptorate, as he should have, nothing would ever have happened to it. But we had to control the knowledge of mordemar. If the people thought the Prince could prevent enslavement, it would take them another thousand years to listen to our reasoning. It was unfortunate that Jayereth and Gar'Dena had to die.”

“And the Circle . . .”

Although there had been not the slightest change in Men'Thor's demeanor, Radele's grin began to fade. “Yes, yes. When Grandfather Ustele told you of the Circle, you said such a flimsy enchantment so close to our borders would ensure the destruction of Avonar. You said they should all be executed for treachery. So I used the oculus to learn the disposition of the Circle from the boy. I pretended to be horrified at the result. The Lords never knew the destruction of the Circle served our own purpose more than theirs. And then Grandfather said that the best thing that could possibly happen would be an attack on the Vales, to make the people wake up to their folly, to make the Prince forget the mundanes and concentrate on our own people. You agreed. So I probed the boy to see what he knew of the Vale Watch and told the Lords of it, too. You said the woman had to be silenced, to free the Prince from his bondage to the mundanes, and I knew there must be no question of the boy's succession.