“If you cannot think of anything immediately,” Raifas said quite kindly, “I understand. Your skills are new. Your education only beginning. I wished to show you the possibility, that you might consider it as you learn more. And I have my part as well. It took an entire autumn five years ago to hunt down a male great gryph, get him into fais, and keep him alive long enough to train. Firebird was my fourth try, my success.”
Success? That angry, desperate bird was a success?
“As it happens I enjoy the hunt and the battle of wills. Human subduing beast. The natural order. And the egg-civilized are not capable of the speed and maneuverability that we need for the fleet. They are too slow, too amiable. And unfortunately too easily shot out of the sky by an enemy with a powerful longbow. So my plan would required time to catch and train the gryphs in evasive flight—as you and I experienced on your first journey—before we could train them to carry and drop the molten rock on command. It is not going to happen overnight.”
He smiled and gestured toward the window. “The snow is worsening, so we shall have to postpone your tour of the pennon. And I must see to some pressing matters. I invite you to visit the music chamber—you know where it is—or indeed, anywhere else you wish to explore. There is a library in the floor above the music chamber, if you would like to peruse local archives.”
His manner, so kind and practical after his extraordinary request and explanation, left me without words as another puzzle piece slowly resolved and locked inexorably into place.
In spite of Ingras’s words—and Raifas’s readiness to engage in flirtation the previous evening, if I had wanted it—it was clear that this was no courtship. Oh, maybe Dhes-Andis was still thinking of marriage between Raifas and me. I did not know. I had no idea how such things were arranged here.
But Raifas did not see me in that regard, except maybe for idle diversion if I had agreed. He wanted me as a weapon.
o0o
Two more days I stayed, during which we took that tour.
Everywhere I saw what he wanted me to see, and what might even have existed: contented people busy with their labors among their pretty steep-roofed houses, their snow-covered terracing awaiting spring planting, and the blossoming of the neatly ordered silk trees where once wild forest had grown. The fais-controlled lizardrakes and goats and other animals were never anything but quiet and obedient.
How long would I have gone before understanding that the oddness I’d been aware of was that the palace cats had no voices, had I not seen those quiet animals? Or heard Firebird’s anguished cries choked off by a lightning bolt of correction?
Oh, yes, Firebird. The last day, as we readied to return to Icecrest, I tried to reach Firebird through my pin-hole to encounter a blast of hatred. It was mostly aimed at Raifas, but there was plenty left for all two-legs.
Overwhelming impulse caused me to ask, “May I ride Firebird back?”
Raifas hesitated, and then bowed. If there was irony in the turn of his wrist, I ignored it. The Imperial Princess Had Spoken, and right in front of the waiting servants. “No one else has successfully ridden him, as he is still undergoing education,” he began, but by then I was on Firebird’s back.
“Ah, yes,” he said, and this time the irony was out front, no mask, along with appreciation. “Lead on, O Imperial Princess.” He laughed as he vaulted onto Andisla’s harness pad.
Firebird wasn’t happy with me, either, but took off in a leap, and flapped hard into the air. Once we reached the gliding currents, I settled myself, shut my eyes, checked for scrying (none), and then reached for the great gryph.
No words here. I thought words at him anyway, because that’s what humans do, but I hoped even if the bird was only hearing bibblebibblebibble in the mental realm, I wanted my emotions to carry as I said, I will try to free you. If there is a way, I will find it.
Firebird gave a long cry.
Raifas yelled, “Tap the harness on the acanthus carving to dissuade that noise.”
“It hurts them,” I shouted back.
“Only until they learn,” he called with his usual careless cheer. “We all had to learn when we were small.”
“Is that why the palace cats are so silent?”
“No one likes yowling,” he responded. “They have excellent lives. No need for screeching.”
“Every creature deserves a voice,” I said, but under my breath.
I can’t say how much of my words reached Firebird. The emotions that reached me were so difficult for me to comprehend except for the ones all creatures share, like anger and fear of pain. But this much I got: Firebird did not believe me in the same way I was beginning to not believe me.
By the time we reached Icecrest my emotions were bleak as the winter around us. I was lying to myself now, I thought as I slid off the harness to the beautifully paved stones of the perch balcony. There was no escape.
I leaned my head against the bird’s neck, thinking: I’m sorry. I’m sorry, my pity divided between us both.
The only thing I wanted was to run to that harp. Hope is all I have left, I was thinking as Raifas said something or other in the polite court mode. If hope died, I would.
We bowed to one another—formal court mode resumed—and he gave me a slight, mocking grin as if we shared a joke. But we didn’t. The possibility of friendship, still less anything closer, had vanished when he talked so casually about the battle of wills, and the prospect of extending what he had done to Firebird to more great gryphs.
I tried to speak as I had, and to smile back, as I did not want to seem different. Still before we parted he gave me a narrow-eyed, questioning glance, but then came an imperial servant to conduct me to Dhes-Andis, and the yoke of fear tightened around me once again.
I needed to concentrate on my mask. Inside, Lhind the Thief, outside the empty shell of Princess Elenderi.
The servant opened the door to the Garden Chamber and as I passed inside my neck tightened in the familiar stress. I’d had several blissful days away from all the bowing and the fear. My respite was over.
I performed the Princess Elenderi bow, noticing several silent cats sitting about.
Dhes-Andis said, “Sit down, Elenderi. Give me your impressions of Ardam Pennon.”
I practiced my court voice as I said what I thought he wanted to hear: fine buildings, handsome castle, vast fleet in the harbor.
He listened in silence, nothing to be read in his face, one hand slowly stroking a slit-eyed cat. When I ran out of superlatives, he said, “And your real impression?” When I opened my mouth, he said slowly, “Uttering inanities is a form of lying.”
The implied warning flared my nerves and I couldn’t help jumping. Then came the anger and hate. I stilled myself. “I don’t know enough. Everything was snowy.”
“Did you practice your magic?”
“Yes. That is, I melted snow. I forgot to try taking warmth out of something, and creating ice.”
“We will assay that momentarily. Did the Most Noble Raifas explain his new idea for a tactical defense?”
Wasn’t attacking Ndai an offense? I held my breath lest the thought somehow leak out either past my mental shield (locked hard as it was) or in my demeanor. “Yes, he did. But I don’t see how molten rock could be taken out of the mountain and carried out to sea.”
“You did not consider transporting it from the mountain to a designated receptacle?”
“I don’t understand transfer magic at all,” I said. “It hurts when I transfer. I never thought about objects.”
“We shall assay that, too. But I desire you to take your mind back to Mount Dragon. Did you experience any alteration in your awareness or your magical skills?”
My instinct to hide what I had seen was so strong that I said quickly, “All I noticed was how hot it was. How much it stinks! I don’t know which hurt worse, my eyes or my lungs.”
“Enough.” He raised a hand. “Apparently your Hrethan blood does not extend to recognizing what used to be a pla
ce of power for the Snow Folk, who are doubtless part of your heritage. It could be that with more education you will awaken new skills of which you are as yet unaware—and likewise it is possible that the legends in the old records are mere story. The Sveranji were uncivilized in so many regards. Mixing truth and poetic hyperbole being one.”
I struggled so hard not to show my emotions that his eyes narrowed. “What is it? If you have a question, ask it. There is no fault in awareness of one’s own ignorance.”
“I was wondering, of what use would be any skills I’d find in the middle of a mountain of stinky molten rock?”
“Ah, discussion of strategy assumes awareness. When you demonstrate a commensurate degree of skill and focus, you will be enlightened. As well as rewarded with freedom and responsibility. Raifas,” he added, “is ambitious, and his loyalty to the good of the empire has been consistently demonstrated. His reward will be rank and power.”
“He told me he would become Prince of Ndai, if he conquered it,” I said.
Dhes-Andis didn’t flicker at the word conquer. “And so he shall. I am convinced he will govern that fractious group of islands far better than their idiosyncratic witch-queen could ever hope to, and bring the benefit to us. Come. Let us see what you can do.”
He seemed pleased at how well I managed fire, and how easily I adapted that to taking heat out of something. I turned a bucket of boiling water to ice, and then took the heat out of a roll sitting on a plate.
When he asked me to remove the heat from a rootling in a small pot, I said, “Won’t it kill the plant? This is not like a stone spell, which slows down life.”
“Do you object to killing the equivalent of a weed that someone would pull out of her vegetable garden?”
I allowed as how that would not bother me, but still queasiness lurched in my middle when the magic snapped greenish and the plant shattered at a tick of his fingernail against it. His subsequent praise worsened my sense that I had lost some kind of contest, and I was glad when he dismissed me at last—with a reminder that the Chosen had put forward several entertainments which they hoped I would grace.
Sure they did, I thought as I escaped. They hoped I would grace it about as much as they hoped for a knock on the head.
I returned to the Princess Elenderi suite because I did not want to be seen rushing straight to the music room. There they all were, bowing like wheat in the wind, and the choking sense of falsity tightened another notch.
When Kal straightened, that familiarity in his face struck me anew, and this time I recognized what I had failed to see, or couldn’t bear to see: how much his eyes were shaped like mine.
Not that they were completely the same. Far more strongly the shape of his eyes and the line of his jaw resembled that of Emperor Jardis Dhes-Andis.
I had begun to like Kal until then, but that thought was so horrible that I could scarcely wait to get out of there.
And so uncertain had I become that even though I had been eager to return to the harp, when I sat down at last—mindful of what Raifas had said so carelessly, about my supposed skill being overheard, which meant I was being listened to at the very least—I yawned and stretched and shook my fingers, worried as always that the magic on the harp was some kind of nefarious trap.
As soon as I touched the harp strings the magically caused skill flowed back, and with it the loving warmth that caused my breath to hitch in my chest. I had forgotten the depth of that love, had begun to diminish and to question it.
In spite of my doubts and distrust, she was there.
And though my thought had been wordless, still came an answer: I will always be here, sleeping and waking, until you are safe. I sensed you had gone away from Skyreach Mountain?
Ardam Pennon, I answered, with quick images that were half-inadvertent.
The equally wordless flow of comfort flowed from her, carrying enough of regret and sorrow that I cried out mournfully, I nearly seduced Raifas, I am so lonely.
That is a normal human response, she said, a trickle of humor sparkling in the colors of warmth, and I thought I breathed in a faint scent of rose. The problem comes in mistaking one kind of love for another.
Still, I will not make that error again. I lost my attraction for him when I discovered—
And I halted, the mental wall shuttering. I still couldn’t trust that I wasn’t being tricked, that Dhes-Andis wasn’t using this truly insidious method to control me from inside out.
So I put forth a cautious question: Why would Dhes-Andis ask me about the fire mountain?
Before our cousins the Snow Folk fled to Summer Islands long ago, they lived on the mountaintops among the Sveranji. But as the Djurans advanced northwards, they used their fais magic to force the Sveranji shape-changers into their beast shapes, and took their homes and isles.
And the mountain? I asked.
It is the gateway to a sister world where their other shapes dwelt, one of great magic. The reason Danis and I left Sveran Djur was because he discovered his half-brother Jardis desires access to that gate in order to fais the great drake there, who is said to be thousands of years old, and possessed of powerful magic. Such as immortality.
Another puzzle piece locked into place, and with its appearance fell away the last of my distrust. Mother, I said, for the first time.
TWENTY-FIVE
She did not respond in words. Maybe she couldn’t. But the overwhelming flow of love, without condition or expectation, choked me up so much my hands fell away from the strings.
I was not alone.
Pelan stood within arm’s reach, wiping away tears, and at her shoulder, Ilhas, a young fellow of maybe twenty.
I gulped back my own tears, fighting against the vertigo of change in focus, and squashing down the questions I wanted so badly to ask. But I’d find my mother again, I reminded myself. I had to protect the connection.
The two bowed deeply, I bowed back, and Pelan said impulsively (for a Chosen), “I beg Your Imperial Serenity’s pardon for my presumption, but oh, why have you not played to us? You are so skilled, and these melodies! So refined, so elevating to the higher senses! That lament you were just now performing was so very beautiful. Is it Hrethan music?”
“Yes,” I said, though I had no idea. Only a scrap of melody lingered in my mind, expressive of longing. “I play merely as recreation and contemplation,” I said to end the dangerous subject, and glanced up at Ilhas. “Why are you here?”
“If you will forgive me, Your Imperial Serenity, I would remind you that this is the hour Ilhas and I always come here.”
So the room wasn’t completely abandoned, as I’d first thought. I’d never encountered them because I had mostly come first thing in the morning.
“Well, then,” I said, determined to shift attention away from me and my supposed skills. “I love to listen. May I remain, or do you also play for your own contemplation?”
“I would be honored to play to Your Imperial Serenity,” Ilhas said with genuine-sounding emotion behind the courtly cadence.
“As would I,” Pelan put in.
I moved away from my place, and held my breath as Pelan self-consciously took my place and touched her fingers to the harp. But she clearly felt nothing unusual, and ran her hands along the strings to warm up her fingers as Ilhas took up a woodwind.
And so the two commenced a duet. I sat on a nearby cushion, my hands together in the prescribed form, and while Pelan pricked and strummed with far more skill than I had with ordinary instruments, though not half as well as Thianra, I sifted the Blue Lady’s . . . Mother’s . . . words.
First and most formidable, that about the ancient dragon who dwelt in that place in and yet not in the molten rock of Mount Dragon. An ageless and magical being, it was the reason I’d been sent to Ardam Pennon. Those questions on my return made it clear that the Evil Emperor had an interest extending beyond the possibility of scooping lava to throw at other ships.
Raifas was not the only one who wanted me as a w
eapon.
Another puzzle piece slid into place. A big one, one of the biggest, but I still did not have it all yet.
I tried to fight back the rush of fear and anxiety by reasserting my mask. I had to remember that I was Lhind the Spy, and though I had a few tricks I knew nothing at all of mysterious mountains.
The two finished their song. Before they began another they talked a little about Djuran music: imperial triads, songs of the seasons, traditions.
Apparently it was acceptable for Chosen to perform for one another in trios—one on strings, one on winds, and one maintaining the counterpoint on either cymbals or sticks or little hand drums—but Pelan and Ilhas had not found a third. I suspected it was because they ranked lowest in the Chosen hierarchy. If Amney or Darus (or Raifas, who had admitted his indifference to music) had taken up an instrument, there would be trio concerts every day, and this room would be in constant use.
When the time chimes rang in the distance we parted with mutual bows, and they said they hoped to be honored by my presence at the Most Noble Darus’s dance.
What dance?
Chith was waiting to recite a list of invitations. Some were for excursions in floats to this or that island if we were graced with a sunbloom, but the preponderance were for dances. As I counted them up—one for every night for several days—I thought, Raifas has been talking.
So it was in a belligerent spirit that I got ready for the first dance. Remembering what Raifas had said about symbols, for the first time I looked at the clothing in my wardrobe, sorting for embroidery, weave, and color messages.
I wanted to choose the spikiest spikes, except I didn’t have any. Anyway it seemed a bad idea to suddenly declare war on them through their symbols. Everybody knew Princess Elenderi for an ignorant boor.
The boor didn’t matter. The ignorance was going, but I didn’t want them to know that. I passed over the beautiful butterfly one—I still didn’t know what those signified—and chose white-silver silk with crimson poppies and gray-blue long-legged cranes in flight.