18

The device that controlled the bridge was obvious as soon as one looked for it. It was mounted on the wall at about shoulder height. Mikayla pressed it, and she and Fiolon went out on the plaza to watch for Haramis’s arrival. The sun was dropping fast, and the evening breeze was springing up, but the solar cell that made up the plaza was still warm underfoot. Mikayla realized that she didn’t feel cold, even in her light indoor robe and house slippers. Fiolon, who had grabbed a short cloak on his way through the storage room, looked at her in surprise. “Aren’t you freezing?” he asked.

“No.” Mikayla shook her head. “I just realized that I seem to have adapted to colder temperatures during my time at the Temple. It’s quite cold there, but after a while I stopped noticing. I was cold when I got off the lammergeier, but we were a good deal higher than this. I’m warm enough here. Perhaps the heat from the solar cell is enough for me.”

Fiolon shaded his eyes and looked toward the approach to the bridge. “There they are,” he said.

Mikayla watched as the fronials approached the bridge and stepped onto it without so much as a quiver. “Those are the Archimage’s fronials, all right,” she remarked. “You couldn’t get an ordinary fronial on that bridge without blindfolding it and coaxing it every step of the way.” She giggled softly. “That guardswoman on the first fronial looks more nervous than it does.”

“There,” Fiolon said with satisfaction. “They’re all safely across. I’ll go retract the bridge.”

Mikayla smiled, perfectly able to understand his desire not to greet the Archimage at the moment. “I’ll go welcome her home,” she said, crossing the plaza toward the party.

The guard on the first fronial had dismounted, as had the woman bringing up the rear. “Princess Mikayla,” the guard greeted her.

Mikayla quickly racked her brain for the proper name. “Guardswoman Nella,” she said. “Be welcome to the Lady’s Tower. The servants will be out to take the fronials in a minute.” She nodded to the other woman, whom she recognized as one of the Queen’s ladies who had some skill in herb lore. “Lady Bevis, be welcome. How is the Lady?” She looked anxiously at Haramis, who seemed asleep.

“Well enough,” Lady Bevis assured her, “but it has been a long trip. She should be put to bed as soon as possible. Where is her room?”

Mikayla indicated the Tower looming above them. “About two thirds of the way up, I’m afraid.” Both Nella and Lady Bevis looked appalled.

Haramis woke and looked around, frowning as she tried to figure out where she was now. It had been a long, tiring, and confusing trip, and all she wanted was to be home in her own bed. She looked up at the Tower. “Good,” she said. “We’re home.” Then she looked around and frowned. Something was different. “What happened to the plaza? It should be white.”

“The snow melted, Lady,” Mikayla said respectfully.

“Oh.” Haramis was confused. The snow had never melted on the plaza in all the time she had been there. Probably the child had done something to it. She glared at Mikayla. “Are you planning to keep us standing here all night?” she snapped. From what she remembered of that wretched brat, she probably was.

“No, Lady,” the girl said. “We were trying to think how best to get you to your room. There are rather a lot of stairs to climb,” she added in apologetic tones.

She seems to have learned some manners at long last, Haramis thought with satisfaction. I must remember to thank Uzun.

“So call some of my servants!” she snapped.

Mikayla smiled faintly. “Yes, Lady,” she murmured, bowing her head briefly. Three lammergeiers swooped down to the plaza. One landed, but the other two hovered while Mikayla unhooked the litter from the rear fronial and passed the carrying straps to one of the great birds. Nella hesitantly followed her example with the front end of the litter, looking up at the bird with some awe. Obviously she had never been this close to one before.

The fronials just stood there, as if this were an everyday occurrence. Haramis wondered a bit at that. Certainly she had put time and effort into training each generation of fronials, but she had not realized that she had trained them quite this well.

The birds flapped their great wings in unison, carrying her smoothly toward the balcony. A few seconds later the third bird, with Mikayla on its back, swept past her to set the girl on the balcony. By the time the birds gently lowered the litter, one of Haramis’s Vispi servants was there to take an end of it. Mikayla took the other, and between them they carried it carefully to Haramis’s bedchamber, where Enya was waiting to put Haramis to bed.

Haramis stifled a sigh of relief when she was finally settled in. At last I’m home. I don’t have to move anymore; I don’t have to spend any more time being jolted over mountain paths between two fronials. I’m home. “Where’s Uzun?” she asked. “Why hasn’t he come up to see me?”

Mikayla, who had been assisting Enya, looked uncomfortable. “He’s in the study, Lady,” she said. Haramis noticed that the girl seemed to be worried about something.

“Doesn’t he know I’m back?”

“Yes, Lady,” Mikayla assured her, “and I know that he’s looking forward to seeing you when you are able to go downstairs.”

“Why doesn’t he drag his lazy body up here?” Haramis demanded fretfully. Doesn’t he realize how ill I’ve been?

Enya muttered something about dinner and fled from the room, casting an anxious look at Haramis as she did so.

What’s the matter with her? Haramis wondered. Why is everyone acting so strange?

“Lady,” Mikayla said hesitantly, “have you forgotten that you turned Master Uzun into a harp? He can’t climb stairs; he can’t even move on his own.”

By the Flower, Haramis thought, I had forgotten that. But I’m not going to admit it and have them all treat me as if I were an idiot. “Well, have the servants bring him up here, then!” she snapped.

“Right now, Lady?”

“Yes, now!”

“As you wish, Lady.” Mikayla curtsied and left the room.

Can’t I get anything done here without an argument? Haramis wondered irritably.

Her question was answered sometime later when she heard voices in the hall. Enya had brought her a light supper, and Lady Bevis was sitting with her while she ate. Her bedchamber door was open, so the comments coming from the hall were clearly audible.

“I still don’t think this is a good idea.” The voice was that of a young man. Haramis didn’t recognize it.

“It is the Archimage’s specific order,” Mikayla said, in tones that suggested that she agreed with the first speaker.

“We got it up the stairs without its hitting anything.” That was the guard the King had sent with Haramis—what was her name? Oh yes, Nella, or something like that. “Why should there be a problem?”

“Harps are very delicate instruments,” the young man said. “Master Uzun hasn’t been moved from his place in the study for many years. I am afraid that subjecting him to the change in temperature and humidity involved in moving him to the Lady’s bedchamber may damage him.”

“I don’t care if it does.” That voice must be Uzun’s, Haramis realized; it had the sound of harp strings. It was followed by a sudden thud.

“Careful!” three voices snapped in unison: two human and one harp.

Nella’s voice said, “I’m sorry; nobody warned me that it talked.”

“And you’re already out of tune, Uzun,” the young man remarked. “I told you it was too cold in the hallways.”

“You can retune me when we get to the Lady’s room,” Uzun said calmly.

By now, even Haramis could tell he was out of tune. That clumsy guard must have dropped him.

“My place is with the Lady,” Uzun continued, “no matter what happens.” Haramis had a vague memory—or was it a dream?—of being in the mountains with Uzun when he was still a Nyssomu and seeing him freeze, almost to the point of death.

Three weary-looking humans dragged the harp into the room. “Here he is, Lady,” Mikayla said. “Where do you want him?”

Haramis turned her head to the right. “Next to the head of my bed,” she replied.

“But that’s right next to the heating grille,” the young man protested. “Excessive heat could crack the frame.”

“He’s been near the fire for years!” Mikayla protested.

“Near it, not directly in front of it!”

“Enough!” Haramis snapped. “I’m tired of listening to your bickering. Put him there, tune him, and leave us!”

“Yes, Lady.” Mikayla sighed. Carefully they set the harp in place.

The young man pulled a tuning key out of his belt and carefully began to retune the strings. Haramis frowned, trying to place him. He looked familiar, but she didn’t remember him as being one of her servants; in fact, she didn’t think she had human servants. But Mikayla was ordering him around as if he were one. Had Mikayla acquired more servants while Haramis had been away?

How long have I been away? I’ll ask Uzun when we’re alone.

It seemed to take forever, but finally Uzun was back in tune. “Leave us, all of you,” Haramis commanded.

Nella bowed and left the room quickly; she had been hovering by the door looking as if she wished to be elsewhere the entire time. Lady Bevis picked up Haramis’s empty tray, curtsied, and withdrew gracefully. Mikayla paused to pat the frame of the harp briefly, then started to follow Lady Bevis, but paused in the doorway, obviously waiting for the young man. He ran a hand down Uzun’s forepillar, frowned in concern, and whispered, “I’m sorry, Uzun.” Then he joined Mikayla in the doorway and they left together.

“Who is he?” Haramis asked Uzun irritably. “Has that girl been hiring more servants while I’ve been gone? How long have I been gone anyway? And has she made any progress at all in her lessons?”

“My heart rejoices in your safe return, Lady,” Master Uzun replied. “I feared I might never see you again—not that I can see you in this form—but I feared never to hear your voice again.”

“I’m glad to see you, too, oldest of my friends,” Haramis said, momentarily disarmed. “But tell me, what has been going on in my absence?”

“Not much,” Uzun replied. “I have been tutoring the Princess Mikayla in magic, and she has made good progress. She has now read every book in your library, and is quite proficient in scrying. I had her practice by checking to see how you were doing every few days.”

“So that’s how she knew to be there to extend the bridge,” Haramis mused. “And can she call the lammergeiers as well?”

“Yes, I’m fairly certain that she can.”

“She seems to have outgrown that case of the sulks she developed after Fiolon left.…” Haramis’s voice trailed off as she suddenly realized who the young man was. “That was Fiolon, wasn’t it?” she demanded. “What is he doing back here?”

“You may remember,” Uzun said hesitantly, “that right before you took ill, Lord Fiolon inadvertently caused it to snow at the Citadel.”

“Yes, I do remember that.” It was all coming back to Haramis now. “They were bonded together, and Mikayla was playing with weather magic—and by now, I suppose they’re permanently bonded! How could you let this happen?” she demanded furiously.

“Mikayla is still a virgin,” Uzun said firmly, “and I’m fairly sure that Fiolon is as well. Their bond is emotional, not physical, and had been well established for about five years before your ill-advised attempt to sever it.”

Haramis gasped. No one had dared speak to her so in almost two hundreds.

“The bond was reestablished within ten hours,” Uzun continued, “but from the descriptions both children gave of the pain involved it was clear that it did not involve the lower centers at all. I don’t think you could have severed it permanently without their full cooperation then, and now I’m quite sure you can’t. You’ve been gone over a year and a half, and I’ve been training both of them.”

“You’ve been training that boy?” Haramis exclaimed in horror. “Have you lost your mind? Do you want another Orogastus running loose?”

“Lord Fiolon is nothing at all like Orogastus,” Uzun said firmly. “And a child, which is what he was then, with a little knowledge of weather magic and no control over it is very dangerous. He needed to be trained, for the safety of everyone around him, and for the sake of the land.”

“And so you took it upon yourself to train him, in my home, without my consent.”

“Is this not my home as well?” Uzun said quietly. “And you were in no condition to give your consent; at first you did not even remember that either Fiolon or Mikayla existed. I did as I thought best, for them, and for the land. And now he is trained, and nothing can change what is.”

“Perhaps you are right,” Haramis said grudgingly. “But he can’t stay here. It isn’t proper. He should not have been living here unchaperoned with the Princess Mikayla all this time.”

“It’s not as if it were generally known,” Uzun pointed out. “I’ll bet no one at the Citadel even missed him. And now that you’re here, they’re not unchaperoned.”

“He’s a distraction to her studies,” Haramis said firmly. “He leaves tomorrow, and this time I’ll summon a lammergeier and send him back to Var!”

“You can summon the lammergeiers again?” Uzun said. “That is good news. When you were first ill, they could not bespeak you at all, and we were quite concerned about that.”

“We?” Haramis asked. She wasn’t sure she could summon a lammergeier now, but she wasn’t going to admit it.

“Fiolon, Mikayla, and I,” Uzun replied. “We didn’t see any need to tell the servants just how ill you were.”

Since Haramis couldn’t really remember exactly how ill she had been, she was just as glad to hear that her servants had not been gossiping about her health. She suddenly realized that she was very tired. “I’m going to sleep now, Uzun. Good night.”

“Good night, Lady,” she heard him reply as she fell asleep. “Pleasant dreams.”

The next morning Haramis summoned Mikayla and Fiolon and announced her intention of sending Fiolon away at once.

“But, Lady,” Mikayla protested. “I need him to help me transfer Master Uzun to his new body. The spells are too complex for one person, and the process is long and complicated.”

“New body?” Haramis asked.

Mikayla looked at Uzun. “You didn’t tell her?”

“What body I’m in isn’t important as long as I’m with her,” Uzun said quietly.

Fiolon ran his hands over the harp’s frame. “You won’t last more than half a year in this form if you stay here in this room,” he said in a tone of professional appraisal.

“I’m sure I’ll be up and about soon,” Haramis said, “and we’ll be able to move him back to the study.”

“All that does is buy him more time,” Fiolon said firmly.

“And it’s very upsetting for him to be blind and immobile,” Mikayla said. “He found it particularly distressing when you were ill at the Citadel and he couldn’t even scry to see how you were. He had to depend on us to do it for him, and he couldn’t even see what we saw—all he knew was what we could describe for him. He was really miserable.”

“It wasn’t that bad,” Uzun said.

“Stop trying to spare her feelings,” Mikayla snapped. “That wasn’t what you were saying last year.”

Uzun would always try to spare my feelings, Haramis remembered. He always used to talk about dying in my service as his highest goal in life.

“Where did you get a new body?” she asked. “And what is it like?”

“It’s Nyssomu in form, made of painted wood, with articulated joints,” Mikayla replied. “He Who Causes to Live at the Temple of Meret made it. It looks as much like Uzun’s old body as we could manage.”

Haramis felt her head beginning to ache. “I’ve never heard of the Temple of Meret. What is it?”

“It’s on the north side of Mount Gidris, opposite where you found your Talisman,” Fiolon said helpfully.

“Meret is a sort of Labornoki earth goddess,” Mikayla said. “Mount Gidris is considered to be part of her body, and the River Noku is her blood, with which she nourishes the land.”

“They use blood magic?” Haramis asked sharply.

“Only symbolically,” Mikayla assured her.

“I still don’t like it,” Haramis said. “You are not to do anything with this until I have had a chance to study it. And you don’t need Fiolon; if I determine that this idea has merit, I shall do the ritual myself.”

Both young people looked appalled.

“But you don’t know the ritual!” Mikayla protested. “It took me months to learn even the simple daily rituals of the Goddess Meret.”

“I’m really concerned about the structural integrity of the harp,” Fiolon added.

“It need not concern you,” Haramis informed him coldly. “You are going to Var, today. Go and pack whatever you can carry on a lammergeier.” Fiolon didn’t move; he and Mikayla both stared at Haramis in astonishment. “Go!” Haramis repeated.

Fiolon looked at Mikayla, shrugged, and left the room.

“You can’t send him to Var!” Mikayla protested. “He hasn’t been there since he was a small child. His home is here in Ruwenda.”

“Where he keeps sniffing around you as if you were in heat!” Haramis snapped. “I intend to send him as far away as possible; I won’t have him distracting you further from your studies.”

“I learn better when he and I study together,” Mikayla pointed out. “And we are not being unchaste, and your accusations are idiotic! Did Uzun not explain that to you—or did you not understand him?” Clearly the girl was furious, but Haramis couldn’t imagine why.

“He is obviously a bad influence on you,” Haramis said coldly. “Your manners become atrocious as soon as he becomes the subject of conversation.”

“I happen to care about him,” Mikayla said. “We have been best friends ever since we were small children. We were planning to marry, until you came along and spoiled that, but you can’t expect my feelings for him to change just because you say I can’t marry him.”

“I expect your feelings for him to change when he’s far enough away from you,” Haramis informed her. “That’s why I’m sending him to Var—obviously the Citadel isn’t far enough away.”

“How are you going to get him to Var?” Mikayla asked.

“She can summon a lammergeier,” Uzun said. “She told me so last night.”

“She was mistaken, Uzun,” Mikayla said gently. “They still can’t reach her; I asked them this morning.”

“Then you will summon one for me,” Haramis told her. “If you can talk to them.”

“I can talk to them,” Mikayla said. “Who do you think had them carry you up here yesterday? But what makes you think I’ll help you send Fiolon away?”

“You seem to be forgetting, girl, that this is my home,” Haramis pointed out.

“Isn’t it also Uzun’s home?” Mikayla asked. “He invited Fiolon to stay here.”

“Yes, he told me that he wished to train Fiolon for a time,” Haramis said, “but I believe that training is finished now, is it not, Uzun?”

“He’s not an inadvertent danger to himself and others anymore,” Uzun admitted, sounding reluctant.

Fiolon returned, carrying a small backpack and dressed for cold weather. “I’m ready to go to Var,” he announced.

“She can’t send you,” Mikayla told him smugly. Haramis wished that she were strong enough to smack the girl. “She still can’t talk to the lammergeiers.”

“You can,” Fiolon pointed out.

“Why should I?”

“Because I’m asking you,” he said gently. “Don’t be so worried, Mika; I’ll be fine. I’m still the king’s nephew, whatever else I may be.” He drew her aside, held her gently with his hands on her shoulders, and spoke quietly to her for several minutes. Haramis strained unsuccessfully to hear what he was saying, and she couldn’t see Mikayla’s reaction because the girl’s back was toward her. Fiolon’s face gave nothing away until his last words. Apparently Mikayla had agreed to summon a lammergeier for him, for he smiled at her.

Haramis felt a stab of envy; she couldn’t recall that anyone had ever looked at her like that. There was so much love and acceptance in his face that Haramis was astonished. How can he care so much for that sulky, stubborn, little brat?

Fiolon bent and kissed Mikayla lightly on the forehead. “You’re not losing me, you know,” he said. “You’ll still see me in your mirror.”

Whatever does he mean by that? Haramis wondered.

Mikayla clung to him, shaking, and buried her face in his shoulder. Fiolon wrapped his arms around her and held her until she composed herself. Then he released her and bowed to Haramis. “I thank you for your hospitality, Lady,” he said politely.

“I wish you a safe journey,” Haramis responded automatically.

Mikayla didn’t turn or speak as she left the room with Fiolon, but a few minutes later Haramis heard the rush of wings as a lammergeier landed on the balcony, followed shortly by the sounds of the bird’s departure.

Mikayla did not return to Haramis’s room. When Haramis asked where she was, Enya informed her that Mikayla had locked herself into her bedchamber and was not answering anyone who came to her door.

Haramis sighed. “She’s probably sulking again. Just leave her alone until she surfaces. No doubt she’ll come out when she gets hungry.” I swear by the Flower, the fronials are easier to train.