40: THE EMPEROR’S SON
Jorat Dominion, Quuros Empire. Three days since I was reminded of how glad I am Khaeriel’s on our side
“Virgins are ‘valuable’?” Kihrin’s expression darkened. “I don’t like the sound of that.”
Janel shrugged. “It’s not what you’re thinking.” She paused. “Assuming what you’re thinking is sexual.”
“Well … I…” Kihrin cleared his throat. “Glad to hear it.”
Ninavis winked at him.
“So you think Kaen’s right about Morios and the prophecy?” Kihrin asked, ignoring the previous conversation.
“I do, yes. And you and I are both twenty,” Janel said. “And since I’m the lion…”
“I’m the hawk. Because House D’Mon’s symbol is a hawk. Right.” Kihrin laughed. “And given that timing, the prophecies say Morios is about to wake up and go for a stroll.”
“I hate prophecies,” Janel said. “Have I mentioned how I truly hate prophecies?”
“Ah, and even worse when they come true,” Dorna said. “Dark times ahead for all.”
They all lapsed into a long, pregnant silence.
“I’ll just, uh…” Qown pointed down at his book.
“Oh, right. Yes, please,” Kihrin said.
Qown’s Turn. The Ice Demesne, Yor, Quur.
When Brother Qown woke up the next morning, he found he had gone to sleep still sitting at the library table, drooling onto his hand. He rubbed his eyes and blinked several times, then remembered what he’d spent the previous night doing. His rumbling stomach reminded him that he hadn’t eaten in over twenty-four hours.
Qown was beginning to see how someone might kill themselves using that artifact.
“You’ve been hard at work,” a deep voice said.
Brother Qown blinked and looked over to see a tall, broad-shouldered man searching the book stacks. The dark-skinned, bald man dressed in a pure deep black that failed to match the darkness of his eyes.
“You’re a D’Lorus royal,” Brother Qown said, quite without thinking.
“And you’re a Vishai priest. If we can track down a morgage and a fancy bar, we’ll have the beginnings of a joke.” He tilted his head. “I’m Thurvishar. I don’t think you should leave that just sitting around, although I hear they’re hard to steal.”
Brother Qown blinked and realized Worldhearth sat openly on the table, a few breaths away from his fingers. He snatched up the rock and told himself he needed to find some better way of carrying it. A necklace like Senera had, perhaps.
“Do you, uh…” Brother Qown cleared his throat. “You don’t know where I might be able to find some food, do you?”
“I’ll assume by food you mean something a priest of Vishai from Eamithon might find palatable, which won’t be anything here in Yor.”
“I can cook. I’d be happy to make my own food if I just had the ingredients…”
“You’ll also find those hard to gather. But follow me. I happen to know the location of a seldom-used kitchen.” He paused. “Don’t worry about your gaesh. This isn’t an escape attempt. I’ll make sure Relos Var knows where you’re going.”
“Oh good.” Then Brother Qown paused. “Where are we going?”
“Shadrag Gor.”
It didn’t occur to Brother Qown until he’d almost finished baking a batch of sag bread and had an eggplant curry simmering away that he should have been suspicious of Thurvishar D’Lorus’s hospitality. Worse, since Thurvishar D’Lorus had remained in the room with him, the wizard seemed to recognize the very moment when Qown realized his mistake.
“No one would call you paranoid,” Thurvishar commented. “Honestly, it’s a bit refreshing.”
“Oh, I didn’t … I mean…”
“No nefarious tricks,” Thurvishar promised. “On occasion, I like talking to people whose primary interests don’t include new and interesting ways to conquer the world.”
Brother Qown chuckled. “I thought you might be trying to … I don’t know. I mean, your family does have a certain reputation.”
“Do we?” said a man at the doorway. “I hadn’t noticed.”
The newcomer also wore black, but his pale skin suggested a long illness, and his was a thinner build than Thurvishar’s. His black eyes still looked like holes through the world.
Something about him made Brother Qown’s skin crawl.
“Is dinner almost ready? I’m so very hungry.” The newcomer looked over Brother Qown the way a starving man looks at dessert.
“He’s Relos Var’s,” Thurvishar protested.
“Var won’t notice.”
“I rather think he would with this one.”
The other man sighed. “Yes, you’re right. One day, I’m going to have to do something about him. In the meantime, I’ll be in my study. Don’t disturb me.”
As the other man left the room, Thurvishar exhaled.
Brother Qown also felt relief steal over him, although he didn’t know what fate he’d avoided.
“I take it this isn’t quite as safe a place as you led me to believe,” Qown said at last.
“He never comes into the kitchen, usually. I thought this was the last place he’d look.” Thurvishar looked chagrined.
“Who was that?”
“Better you don’t know. Else I would have to ask Relos Var to add it to your list of subjects not to be discussed, and neither of us want that.”
The two men stared at each other for a long minute.
Brother Qown turned back to the stove. “Well, thank you for bringing me here. I’m sure the house servants back in Yor wouldn’t have let me anywhere near the kitchen stoves, and even if they did, they wouldn’t have any good vegetables.”
“Plus, there are other advantages,” Thurvishar added.
Brother Qown paused. “What do you mean?”
“We’re both educated men. You must know where we are.”
Brother Qown swallowed. “I’ve heard stories, but sometimes stories are just … stories.”
“Not here. Shadrag Gor doesn’t sit in time correctly. Something happened here. Something that damaged the way this place exists in the universe. So time moves very fast here. It suits my master, since it allows him time to do his research without interruption. You can spend months, weeks, days here, which appear to others as minutes or seconds. And if one sought a way to better study a Cornerstone, this might be a very good place to start.”
“I don’t know—” But Brother Qown paused. If time moved so quickly here, it meant his attempts to scry the outside world would be like watching still paintings. Convenient, since his largest problem had been how quickly the world proceeded at its own pace. “Huh.”
“The offer is open,” Thurvishar said. “You’d have to be in my company at all times, though. It wouldn’t be safe for you to come here by yourself.”
“Well, that doesn’t sound so terrible.” He mentally slapped himself. That hadn’t come out at all the way he’d meant it to. “I mean, if Relos Var approves, of course. It would be a way to learn much quicker, so I can’t see why he’d object. I would ask you a favor, though.”
“Name it.”
“Find a way to check on Janel? I worry about her. This … this can’t be easy on her.”
“Possibly not, but she’s made of metal.” Thurvishar nodded. “Still, I’d be happy to look in on her.”
“Thank you.” With that, Brother Qown set about finishing the meal.
Thurvishar had been right; studying the artifact proved much easier when he didn’t have to worry about everything moving. He could even take a break, go make himself tea, and return to his observations while his subject only moved the most minute amount.
Thurvishar proved to be an excellent study partner too. He was quiet, kept to himself, and rarely interrupted, usually because he’d returned from the kitchen with tea or that thick black coffee so popular in Khorvesh. The lighthouse proved livable and secure, and although Brother Qown knew he’d have to return to Yor for baths and sleeping, it felt very much like being back at the library at the Temple of Light.
He quickly learned Relos Var had been wrong about the stone being drawn to fire. In fact, Worldhearth focused on heat, and it didn’t matter if the object in question burned at all. The difficulty lay in the fact objects only stood out by temperature in comparison to their surroundings. Two objects of the same temperature appeared as mingled, inseparable. So although he could target people by their body heat, it meant hopping from person to person, one by one. Finding the right person could take weeks.
But not everyone existed at the same temperature.
He fine-tuned the control, which allowed him to search for people who ran hotter than those around them. This included Janel, at that very moment eating breakfast, and Relos Var, who ran much hotter, so much so Qown suspected he could locate the man anywhere. Indeed, Relos Var ran so hot either he existed in a state of permanent spontaneous combustion or … he wasn’t human at all.
Qown had no idea what it meant.
Several others in the palace emitted similar heat spikes. The old woman who trained the bears ran hotter than anyone but Relos Var, as did, curiously, a polar bear cub.
Brother Qown had no explanation for the heat differences, but he noted them all down for later usage. If nothing else, knowing this made it easier to find those people later—important information indeed.
But in using the stone to hone his abilities, he made two more surprising discoveries. He first discovered that Worldhearth allowed him to cast spells through whatever heat source he scried.
Brother Qown learned this when he attempted to divine Senera’s house. He’d used a lucky guess, based on what he’d deduced about the cottage’s location. If nothing else, he thought her likely to keep a few warm coals in the fireplace. Except when he scried the location, it proved too dark to see. Without thinking, he waved his hand to cast a light spell.
Which showed up inside Senera’s cottage.
As a consequence of that first discovery, Qown made his second: Relos Var was using Senera’s cottage to meet with his vané friend, because at that very second they were paused, frozen in the act of walking through the front door.
Brother Qown shut off the light and ripped his mind away from the divination, back to the lighthouse. He leaned back in his chair, rapid-pulsed from fear. Would they have seen the light? If they did see it, would they know what it meant?
“Are you all right?” Thurvishar asked him.
Brother Qown started to tell him and then shut his mouth, afraid his confession might violate the gaesh. “How much do you know about the vané?” he asked instead.
“Uh … powerful? Immortal? Only, do you mean the Kirpis vané or the Manol vané? The Kirpis vané were ignobly defeated by us, and the Manol vané returned the favor tenfold. Neither likes Quur very much, and who can blame them?”
“They all look very different from one another, don’t they? I mean, you can tell who someone is just through their appearance, yes? They have cloud-curl hair in every possible color?”
“Mostly. But I think we can assume there is some repetition in their aspects. Did you see someone in particular?”
“I don’t know,” Brother Qown admitted. “Does the vané queen have blue hair?”
“Does the vané queen…? You do ask the most interesting questions. One moment, I think I have the answer.” Thurvishar approached a bookshelf in the study, coming back a moment later with a very thin book labeled Royalty of the High Races. “Let’s see … the current queen is Miyane, and yes, she does indeed have blue hair. Cloud curl, but that’s hardly a surprise, since she’s half–Kirpis vané.” He raised an eyebrow. “Why?”
Qown winced. “I can’t tell you.”
“Understood. Well, if you’ve found Queen Miyane, I’m sure someone will want to know, if only because of her husband, King Kelanis. He’s new, so no one knows much about him.”
Brother Qown bit his lip. “Would you mind taking me back to the palace? I should, uh … check on a few things.”
If he hurried, he might even make it back in time to hear Relos Var and the vané queen’s discussion.
“Did you notice a flash?” the woman’s voice asked.
Relos Var frowned as he entered the cottage, gesturing to light various candles around the room. “I did, but I’m not sure…” He paused, looking around as he studied the area. “No one’s here. I suppose it might have been cloud lightning in the distance.”
“I think this may have been an unfortunate idea,” the woman said and turned to leave.
“It’s fine,” he reassured. “You’re not breaking any laws. Or even any rules.”
“If I were,” she answered, “please be assured you and I would not be having any kind of conversation at all.” She gestured. “What is this place?”
“One of my students uses it as a retreat. She’s away on business, so this is very safe from prying eyes.”1
The vané woman swallowed and looked away, her expression unhappy. She appeared to be a young woman—except the tension around her eyes and mouth made her seem older. “Have you found him?”
“Please, sit down. Would you prefer coffee, tea? There’s brandy, if you’d rather.”
She pulled out a chair and sat down. “Have you found him?”
He hesitated as he sat down himself. “Yes.”
She exhaled in relief.
“I can’t retrieve him from his current location. But rest assured he’s safe and with people who will treat him well.”
Her eyes flashed open again, hot with building rage.
Relos Var lifted a hand. “This may work out in our favor. This way we avoid the shuffling required to keep my various ‘friends’ from running into each other. I should send Khaemezra a thank-you gift.”
“Khaemezra!” The woman’s expression could’ve murdered gods.
“Yes.” He smiled. “Aren’t the betrayals we suffer from family just the worst?”
Her angry expression broke, and she chuckled. “That would be one way of putting it. So she has my—” She paused and winced, pressing her lips together.
Brother Qown felt himself startle. He wondered if she hesitated from caution or if she’d been prevented from voicing her thoughts. He’d become sensitive to such nuances.
Relos Var’s expression turned sympathetic. “I’m so sorry. I never wanted it to turn out this way for you.”
“I blame myself for thinking the gods were even interested in finding a different solution. But no … Every other race has suffered. Why stop now with the job unfinished?” She inhaled to calm herself. “Speaking of unfinished business, do you have Valathea?”
Relos smiled and ducked his head. “I do. Although it wasn’t easy to get her away from the Devoran priests, let me tell you.”
She shook her head. “I don’t understand what they thought they’d accomplish by kidnapping her.”
“To be fair, I don’t think they understood either. They only knew she was important. Anyway, that’s the other reason I wanted us to meet here.” He walked over to a storage cupboard and pulled out a cloth-wrapped triangle, which he set on the main table and unwrapped.
Qown blinked in surprise. It was a harp.
The style looked old but elegant, double-strung, made from fine and beautiful old woods. The blue-haired woman stood as Relos Var brought it over and raised a hand to stroke the harp’s neck.
“Valathea,” she murmured. “It is good to see you again, my queen.”
“If I may be so bold, Your Majesty, why didn’t you just take her before? I mean, you had her right there with you for months.”
“Relos … I’m not allowed to steal from the family. However, no one told me I was obligated to return what someone else had already stolen.”
“What will you do with her?” Relos Var asked.
“For the moment, leave her with you,” she answered. “There’s no place I could put her where I would be assured of her safety. When they took her I almost … well … it turned out I could be hurt worse than I already had been, but it took some effort.” She reached down and took his hands. “Promise you won’t hurt him, Relos.”
“Your Majesty, please believe me when I say hurting your son isn’t part of my plans. He’s far too important.” Relos Var smiled. “He’s going to help us destroy Quur. We need him.”
She took the assurance like a drowning person reaching for land, inhaled, and nodded. She leaned down and kissed Relos Var on the cheek. “Thank you.”
With that, she stood and inscribed a gate—carving runes in the air, using them to return to wherever she spent her days. The Manol, Brother Qown supposed.
But because he had stayed a moment longer, he was also there when Relos Var leaned back in his chair, snarling silently as he looked off into the distance. The wizard crushed the metal goblet in his hand into a small, dense ball before tossing the whole thing in the fire.