The Spirit Gate (31 page)

The evening passed without incident. In fact, Kassia found
she was soon bored by everything but the music, the food, and the conversation
about spell balls taking place between Zakarij and Joti Subutai. But when the
guests had begun to retire to their rooms and she had risen to do the same, the
king beckoned to her from the doorway that led away to his private wing. Kassia
glanced about for Zakarij; he was nowhere to be seen, and her Master was in
close conversation with Chancellor Bogorja. As greatly as she feared being
virtually alone with Zelimir, she realized she couldn’t disobey him, and so she came to him, praying Mat
would take hold of his tongue.

He did not, as she feared he would, usher her out of sight
of the great hall, but only smiled at her and took her hand and leaned his head
close to hers and asked, “Did
you enjoy the evening, Kassia?”

She could not quite bring herself to lie, and so replied, “I found the food
exquisite and the music wonderful, as always.”

His eyes crinkled humorously at the corners. “You were bored, weren’t you?”

“Your
Majesty! I—”

He pressed a finger to her lips, silencing her. “Majesty? Is that any
way to refer to your friend Mishka?” He shook his head. “You
were bored, as was I.”

She smiled. “A
little.”

“Can
you stand a little more boredom for your friend Mishka?”

“Of
course.”

“Tomorrow
I am to have a more . . . intimate gathering with the . . .” His mouth twisted wryly. “ . . .
the candidates. They will present themselves and their particular talents and
gifts and I and Chancellor Bogorja will question them most thoroughly about
their qualifications.” He lowered his head still further and looked directly into Kassia’s eyes. “I would like you to be
there to . . . to help me assess them.”

Kassia was dumbfounded. “Me? Why me?”

“You’re my friend. My
adviser. The Apprentice of a most admired Mateu and old family friend. I value
your opinion and your gifts. I think perhaps you could tell me things about my
would-be brides that even this could not.” He held up his hand, the
bespelled bracelet flashing on his at the wrist.

Kassia gazed at the presently green stone. “What has it told you
of them so far?”

“That
they are all afraid of me. Except, perhaps for that red-haired girl from
Bytomierz. I don’t
believe she’s
afraid of anything. I’m
glad you’re not
afraid of me, Kiska.” He raised her hand to his lips, then let it go to bow and slip into the
corridor beyond.

Kassia tried to flee without seeming to, her steps measured,
her heart hammering, her eyes flicking about to see if anyone had witnessed
their exchange. Someone had. Lukasha stood just inside the great main doors of
the banquet hall, observing unabashedly, while high up in the bridge-like
gallery that looked down upon the hall, a woman watched, cloaked in shadows and
deep blue velvet. Whether she was concubine or bride candidate, Kassia couldn’t see, but she
recalled that the Lombard had worn blue velvet that evening.

oOo

The following day, Kassia deliberately eschewed the finery
of the royal court for an Apprentice’s
tunic and leggings. It was a warm morning, so she pinned the sleeves up to the
elbows, bound her hair into a braid and put aside her ankle boots in favor of a
pair of soft leather slippers. She looked, to her own eyes, like no one a king
would favor. Master Lukasha would not approve, but she wanted none of the
assembled women to mark her as a dog in the manger.

The gathering was a bizarre combination of competition and
informal interview. One by one, the ladies spoke of their lives and families
and answered questions put to them by Zelimir and his assemblage of advisers,
which included Lukasha and Bogorja. While Lukasha questioned them on matters of
faith and the Chancellor inquired about what resources they would bring to the
union, Zelimir asked about their home villages or cities, their education,
their personal hopes and aspirations.

This last puzzled a number of them, who expressed the idea
(perhaps with coaching from the companions who watched from an upper gallery,
unable to intercede) that wedding their king and giving him heirs must surely
be any sane woman’s
highest aspiration.

The woman from the Teutonic Order—speaking through an interpreter—stated baldly that she
had had no higher hopes than to wed a local lord, a lord to which, Kassia
sensed, her affections were already bound. While she was pitying the girl, the
Orsini duchess, in halting Polian, expressed the desire to take vows that would
marry her to the Church. However, she said diplomatically, if God had other
plans for her, she would acquiesce.

“What
of you, Kassia Telek?”

Kassia, her mind occupied with trying to imagine any of
these women at Zelimir’s
side, was caught completely off guard. “Your
Majesty?”

“What
are your aspirations? Share them with us.”

Kassia glanced at the faces of the other women and saw
puzzlement, curiosity, disinterest, hostility. Good Goddess, what was he
thinking? What did her aspirations have to do with anything? She looked to
Lukasha, hoping for release, but received instead a nod of encouragement. A
tiny flame of obstinacy flared in her breast.

“I
aspire to be a Mateu, my lord.”

He smiled. “Not
to wed a king?” He didn’t
wait for an answer to that, but said, “You’ve been wed already,
haven’t you? And
borne a child to—what
was his name?”

“Shurik,
my lord. Shurik Cheslaf.”

“Shurik
Cheslaf, a potter.”

She nodded, feeling disapproval from every side. Why was he
doing this?

“What
is a Mateu that you should aspire to be one?”

“A
Mateu is dedicated to the service of Mat and Itugen and the beneficial use of
their forces—the
forces of heaven and earth.”

“So,
like the Duchess Orsini, you would go into a monastery and take vows of celibacy?”

“No,
my lord. As you know, the Mateu do not remove themselves from the world. Their
duty is
to
the world.”

Zelimir only nodded and turned his comments elsewhere.
Several of the women had cultivated talents as performers of music, verse or
dance. He requested that they perform. This they did for the next hour or so,
displaying their artistic abilities. At the end of that time, as the polite
applause died away after Fiorella Orsini’s sweet rendition of a liturgical song, Zelimir
once more turned to Kassia.

“What
talents have you, Kassia?”

If she had been caught off guard before, now she was
dumbstruck. Again, she glanced at Lukasha, but he merely inclined his head
toward the king as if to say, “Obey
him.”

“Come,
Kassia. Don’t be
intimidated by us.”

“I
am not intimidated by you, my lord,” she said without thinking how that protestation would sound.

Michal Zelimir only chuckled and gestured at her to
continue.

“I
have the ability to call upon the forces of Mat and Itugen.”

“You
can work magic,” translated Zelimir.

“Yes,
my lord.”

“Your
Master explains to me that you can perform something called a Square. Please,
demonstrate this.”

Heart pounding in her ears, Kassia turned to Lukasha. He
only smiled at her. “Please,
Majesty,” she murmured, “are
you certain you wish me to—?”

“Intimidated
or not, remember who it is that makes this request.”

She glanced at him sharply, but his eyes were kind. It was
Mishka who made this odd request. She fought down her dread and rose, choosing
a circular pattern in the tiled floor of the hall in which to perform the
spell. She picked up a crystal goblet from a tray at her right hand, moved into
the circle, and held the goblet up in her cupped hands, closing her eyes
against the invasive stares of her observers.

It took every ounce of concentration under the
circumstances, but when she once again opened her eyes, she saw her audience
through a veil of fire and water, each tiny droplet of mist blazing with the
light of its antithesis. The goblet in her hands overflowed with the mixture of
antagonistic elements, the air that bound them feeding one and repelling the
other. The blaze of liquid glory poured over her hands and cascaded to the
floor where it eddied into invisibility. Kassia’s heart exulted, but only for a moment.

Hearing their gasps and cries of surprise and fear, Kassia
was unable to look at the other women. Equally unable to look at the one who
had asked her to do this thing, she fixed her eyes on her Master. He smiled and
nodded, pleased with her performance. She did not understand why, for it seemed
to her that the room around her was disintegrating into bedlam. Desperately,
she wished to be elsewhere, anywhere, and thought longingly of Lorant, of
Shagtai’s
workshop and her own sweet son.

Suddenly, it seemed she could see him—could see them both; Beyla exclaiming and crying “Mama!” and putting out his arms to hold her, Shagtai at his workbench, turning
to see why the child had called out. His smoky eye widened, his mouth opened. A
scream rent the air.

Kassia gasped and let the spell collapse. She was once more
in the King’s
banquet hall awash in anger and fear that was not her own. She felt hands on
her—Michal’s hands—directing her
faltering steps to a place distant from the chaos into which she had surfaced.
In a moment she was in the Council Chamber, seated in a high backed chair and
Lukasha was with her, his eyes alight, his lips quivering with questions.

“What
did you do, Kiska? What spell was that?”

She shook her head, uncomprehending. “It was the Squared spell. The one I showed you.
Why? What happened? What did I do that frightened everyone so?”

Lukasha laughed. “You
really don’t
know, child? While you were in the heart of your marvelous ball of fiery water,
your form . . . shimmered as if you were made of light. And then,
before the eyes of all, you seemed to disappear.”

oOo

After Kassia’s
display, the numbers of the bride candidates dwindled. The Teutonic woman was
soon gone. So were several candidates from the darughas, whose experience (or
that of their guardians) did not run to seeing a shai mishandle a Squared
spell. Well, perhaps
mishandle
was too strong a term. Kassia was aware,
if no one else was, how close she had come to discovering her own travel spell.
Or had she discovered it? She had seen the work of Pater Honorius, had read its
alien characters. Even if she had no conscious realization of their
significance, did that necessarily mean she could not have absorbed it in some
other way?

After frightening away half of his would-be brides, Kassia
hoped Zelimir might be encouraged to send her back to Lorant, but he seemed
more inclined than ever to seek her out. She knew, beyond any doubt, that a
request for her to stay in Tabor could not be long in coming. Her uneasiness
was quelled somewhat by the splendor and revelry of Solstice Fest, but with
every entertainment they laughed at together, with every gleaming firework they
shared, with every dance he escorted her to perform, Kassia knew Mishka had not
lost his attraction to her. She could see it in his eyes, hear it in his voice.
The occasional waves of response she felt continued to disturb her, for it was
a strange, unwilling attraction she felt, and she was afraid of how it might
affect her life and her son’s.

In the end it was Master Lukasha who saved her from her
misery. Directly after the Solstice celebration, he bid Kassia and Zakarij pack
up their things and be ready to travel at daybreak. He told Zelimir of his
plans only after Kassia had retired for the night, and reminded him that
distance and time alone would prove whether he truly loved her or only imagined
that he did.

The were at the stables just at daybreak. The air was cool,
but promising warmth, and Kassia savored for a moment the smells of horse and
hay and nearby river. She would have gladly saddled her own animal, but there
were royal servants to do it for her, and so she wandered to the stable’s rear court to gaze
up toward the palace cesia. She could see only the topmost branches of the Tree
from where she stood and closed her eyes to recall the velvety grass, the
stately sentinel cedars, the gleaming white columns. She did not suppose that
she would ever see them or their master again. It was a sad thought, but did
not break her heart.

“Kiska.”

The voice was not Master Lukasha’s and only one other living man called her that.
Heart plummeting, Kassia turned to face her king. She smiled. “Mishka,” she called him. “I
didn’t expect you
to rise so early just to see us off.”

His teeth gleamed white in the dark frame of beard. “To see you off.” He took her hands in his, his face sobering. “There is something unresolved between us. You know
it. You are shai. You must have felt something of my . . .
dilemma.”

She nodded, not daring to look at him. He put a hand beneath
her chin and lifted her face to his ambush. Her eyes were captive.

“I
have wanted to ask you a question these past days. I know it is not a fair
request, but I have wanted to ask anyway. Your Master has pledged me not to be
hasty in this. He has counseled me to patience, to open-mindedness. He thinks
perhaps among the women left here at court—” His smile returned briefly. “—the ones you didn’t scare away—I will find one to
whom I may give my love as well as my station and title. I have little hope of
that, but I have agreed to judge them with an open mind if not an open heart.
At the very least, I think it might be to their advantage if you’re not around for me
to compare them to.”

“The
way you did the other day?” she asked baldly. “I
never could bring myself to ask you why you insisted I participate in that. I
terrified them. As you must have intended.”

He had the good graces to look a little shame-faced. “Yes, well. I suppose I
hoped they’d
realize that they couldn’t
compete with you, or that they’d
be insulted that I so obviously favored a woman who had borne a son to a
village potter, or barring that, that they’d flee screaming back to their homelands in abject
fear.” He met her severe look with a shrug. “I can’t
have a coward as a wife, Kassia. How would it look for the Queen of Polia to be
cowering behind her throne instead of sitting upon it?”