At her stunned silence, his lips twisted in a snarl that emphasized his large eyeteeth. “Are you trying to maze me?”
“No, sir!”
His voice was menacingly soft. “You were in my thoughts.”
“I wasn’t trying to attack you. I swear, Alten.” She couldn’t take her eyes from the sword point. “I, I just … wanted to see how you worked that sword form.” Spoken aloud, her reasons sounded incredibly foolish. She almost didn’t believe them herself.
Kyrkenall’s rages were a matter of record. He’d never attacked one of his own, as far as she knew, but maybe none of them had ever done something so idiotic.
She met his eyes, determined to accept what she had brought upon herself.
At last, scowling, Kyrkenall lowered Irion. Elenai was too mortified to feel much relief. How could she have been so stupid?
Kyrkenall stared at her with those eerie, pupilless eyes. His voice was brittle with anger. “Asrahn singled you out, Squire. That meant he thought you had promise. That he felt you were honorable. Does an honorable person weave someone without their permission?” He spoke as if to a child.
Of course they didn’t. “No. No, sir.”
“I might have killed you,” he said slowly. His eyes were black embers. “Only an enemy steals thoughts.”
“I’m sorry.” And she truly was. She fought the tears that threatened to further humiliate her.
He sighed in disgust. “It’s a good thing you’re so inept.”
She winced a little at that, for she’d been proud of her spell work mere moments before.
“It makes me fairly sure you’re telling the truth,” he muttered. “No veteran weaver would get her identity muddled with her subject.”
She felt a flush creep over her cheeks. Of course. He’d seen her thoughts while she focused on his.
Kyrkenall strode away and thrust the sword roughly into the cabinet. There was a solid thunk as he slammed it against the wall above the support pegs—hardly the sort of behavior one should evidence toward a weapon so revered. Desperate to change the topic, she dared to mouth a question. “Is there something wrong with Irion, Alten?”
His answer was sharp. “It’s a fine blade.” He extended a hand. “My bow, if you please.”
“Oh. Right. Sorry.” She hurried over to pass it on.
Kyrkenall took back the magnificent weapon, frowning. “I hope this was instructive to you. In more than one way. Pass on my apologies to Sareel about the glass. Tell her … oh, I don’t care. She thinks I’m crazy anyway.”
He turned halfway down the corridor. “If anyone wants to find me, tell them I’ll be at N’lahr’s.”
“Sir?”
He paused, speaking more slowly. “His tomb, Squire. I’ll be at his tomb. I didn’t make it back to raise a goblet on his birthday.”
As he started down the hall, Elenai suddenly knew she’d never see him again. He’d wandered into her life like a storm and would blow out and away into the wilds.
She remained beside the broken case, ashamed that she should conduct herself so poorly during the moment it mattered most. The tears that threatened earlier flowed freely now. She didn’t know what she should do. Shame rooted her to inaction.
Probably parade participants were on their way back to the city by now. What would she tell the others about her wholly conspicuous departure from the ranks? What should she do about this mess?
It took her longer than she’d have liked to compose herself and track down an exasperated Sareel to report that Irion’s case was broken. Judging by the caretaker’s outrage at viewing the damage, Elenai dully assumed ill consequences would follow before day’s end. She supposed she deserved whatever befell, as roundabout retribution. By the time she led Aron back to the stable and groomed him, she saw the rest of the Altenerai and squires returning with their mounts.
She wasn’t in the mood to see any of them, not even Elik, so she quickly finished up, took the long way around the stables, and retreated up the back stairs to her quarters.
When she opened the door to her room, she was startled to find two visitors already within. The stranger at her window was a slim blond woman in a khalat with red piping—Mage Auxiliary. Alten Cargen sat in profile on her mattress rubbing the fringe of beard on his chin. He was another of the five newest Altenerai, promoted under Commander Denaven after the war. She didn’t remember seeing him in the parade.
With all else that had happened, she had completely forgotten the commander was sending a magical tutor to speak with her. “Why now?” she groaned inwardly, but nonetheless saluted Cargen and the woman both, because she assumed a tutor worthy of such respect and she wasn’t certain of protocol. She hoped her eyes weren’t noticably red but resisted the urge to lower them.
“Forgive us, Squire,” the woman said kindly. “We didn’t wish to wait in the hallway.” The woman had strong, even features, with a slim nose and bright blue eyes. Something about her was familiar. “I’m Exalt M’lahna,” she said. “I believe you know my sister, Alten Gyldara.”
“Oh, yes. Of course. It’s an honor,” she managed, struggling a little with this soft-spoken woman’s resemblance to their blunt, open alten. The straight nose and full lips were somehow less striking upon M’lahna, as though the sculptor who’d shaped them both had stretched those features too far upon the mage. Elenai smiled to disguise her discomfort. “Would you like me to fetch you some water? I’m afraid mine isn’t that fresh.” She’d drawn it from the well yesterday evening.
“How thoughtful,” Cargen said, though he didn’t sound as if he meant it. He sat stiffly, partly turned away from her. “This isn’t a social visit, though. We need to ask you some important questions. Please, close the door behind you.”
“Forgive Cargen’s manner.” M’lahna’s voice was soothing. “He’s been in a foul mood since he looked the wrong way sparring yesterday evening.”
He frowned. A fresh bruise discolored his right cheek.
Disconcerted, Elenai reached behind her to shut the door. The space was awkwardly close.
“I’m sorry to bother you on such short notice,” M’lahna continued, “and to intrude upon your room. I’ve been looking forward to meeting you before I start your tutoring, and then this sad matter turned up. One of the other squires told us he thought you were already back, so we waited.”
Sad matter? “It’s fine.” Elenai hoped she didn’t sound as troubled as she felt. “Commander Denaven said you wished to speak with me. I’d thought it would be later this afternoon, or I’d be better prepared.”
“We’ve had to accelerate our plans,” Cargen said sardonically. His companion gave him a dark look, and he fell silent.
“We hope only to take a little of your time,” the exalt said. “Please, make yourself comfortable.”
There was no place to perch apart from the bunk and the chest at its foot, so she stood at the door. She tried to make a joke of it. “I’m afraid I don’t have much furniture.”
“Your commander speaks well of you,” M’lahna said, ignoring the levity. “And he said that you were honored yesterday, by Asrahn.”
“Yes.” Elenai was pretty sure at the moment that she was unworthy of Asrahn’s regard, or she wouldn’t have bungled things so humiliatingly with Kyrkenall.
“He took you with him to see Irion,” Cargen broke in blandly. For a panicked heartbeat, Elenai thought the Master of Squires must have heard of her conduct and conveyed his disappointment, but that didn’t quite seem right. “Did he say anything to you yesterday that was particularly memorable?”
Again with the questioning about her interaction with Asrahn and the sword. There was something important here that she didn’t really grasp. “No, not really. Alten Asrahn isn’t very talkative.”
“Wasn’t,” Cargen corrected.
Wait. Why was he speaking of Alten Asrahn in the past tense? “Your pardon?” Elenai asked.
The alten looked at her as though she were stupid. “He’s dead.”
“What?” The question leapt from her mouth, bereft of both decorum and wit.
“He was found in the river right after the parade got under way. How could you not hear?” Cargen sounded personally affronted by her ignorance.
Elenai felt the blood drain from her face. Kyrkenall’s odd behavior, the questions, the memory of Asrahn … Kyrkenall had known. How?
“I’m sorry,” M’lahna said. “We thought you knew. I thought word had been sent to the ridge.”
Elenai steadied herself against the wall. She and Kyrkenall must have left before the messenger arrived. “He’s dead? You mean he drowned?”
“That’s what it looks like,” Cargen answered readily.
The enormity of the news proved elusive, as though she were trying to clutch a fish in a dark stream. Alten Asrahn, dead! She’d worried about his absence, but realized she’d only imagined temporary troubles—secret state business, urgent personal burden, or at worst a temporary illness. Not gone forever. Asrahn was central to the primary purpose of her life, to the defense of the five realms. It was impossible to envision drills on the practice field without him there, in the sun, spear straight, calling instructions, setting them in motion, scrutinizing, correcting. Forming them into the finest warriors in all the realms, setting them well-prepared against kobalin and Naor and monstrosities dredged up from the Shifting Lands since before she was born. In a very real way he had built the Altenerai Corps, at least in its present form. He was the corps. How could it endure without him? “When? And how did it happen?”
“We’re not certain,” M’lahna went on. “Right now we’re trying to talk to the people who last saw him alive.”
“And you’re one of them,” Alten Cargen finished.
“He was fine when I saw him.” Elenai found herself hoping this was some dreadful mistake, and knowing it wasn’t. “We weren’t anywhere near the river.” Her voice failed her. She reached up to brush her cheek, where she found new tears. “Forgive me.” Damn.
“Your grief honors him,” the woman said. “I hope you don’t think it too obtrusive if I look at your memories about your last encounter with the alten?”
That was a troubling thought. “Why do you need to do that?”
“I want to see if there’s something you might have missed in your last interaction.”
“I suppose so.” Elenai couldn’t think of what that might be, but she was ready to assist the investigation in any way possible. Maybe they’d find something that would make sense of all this.
“I want you to relax, and I’ll ask questions. You just close your eyes and picture what happened as I talk to you.”
Elenai did as she was bade, pretending that she felt no discomfort, and as M’lahna spoke with her about Asrahn and what he’d said the day before, she relived the moments in her mind.
After a little while, as she was recalling Asrahn’s inspections of the sword, M’lahna interrupted.
“Did I see a memory of someone else using Irion?”
“That was probably Alten Kyrkenall.” Elenai opened her eyes. “He took out the sword himself today.”
Cargen’s head lifted.
M’lahna’s gaze was suddenly intent, and her magical focus came across as a kind of spiritual pressure. “What did he say?”
Elenai hesitated, but at the exalt’s sympathetic look she relented. “I upset him. He was trying out the sword, like Alten Asrahn had done, and I wanted to see how he performed the weapon form so well. I tried to observe his thoughts,” she admitted, shamefaced. “And he noticed.”
They didn’t seem at all troubled about her humiliating breach. “Go on,” M’lahna urged. “Close your eyes again and tell me what you saw.”
“Mostly Kyrkenall fighting beside Asrahn, in the past.” She imagined M’lahna peering at the same images that rose to her as she spoke, but the sorceress was so skilled she didn’t detect any sense of her. “I didn’t learn anything at all about the sword form,” she finished.
“What happened then?”
Was that a note of irritation in M’lahna’s voice?
“He schooled me in manners. I wouldn’t have weaved him without leave, normally; I was just curious.” Elenai instantly regretted adding the unnecessary justification.
“But did he say anything else about the sword, or Asrahn?” Cargen sounded testy.
“I asked him if there was something wrong with the sword, and he said no.”
M’lahna tried a final time. “You’re sure Kyrkenall didn’t say anything else, about Asrahn and the sword?”
“Well, he asked me what Alten Asrahn had said to me, yesterday. Like you.” Elenai opened her eyes.
The exalt smiled encouragingly. “I think that’s enough, Elenai. Thank you.”
“I hope it was helpful. Did you learn anything?”
Neither answered that. “Do you know where Kyrkenall is, right now?” the man asked.
“He said he was going to pay his respects at N’lahr’s tomb.”
Cargen exchanged a swift look with M’lahna, who climbed to her feet. “Thank you. You’ve been very helpful. I’ll look forward to starting our training. Tomorrow afternoon at about this time?”
“Yes,” Elenai answered hollowly. How could they be making plans? As though this were some kind of normal day. “That will be fine.”
Cargen was feeling his cheek as he stood. “We’d best get moving.”
The weaver nodded quickly. “Thank you for your assistance, Elenai.”
“Of course.” She sidled out of the way as Cargen opened the door for M’lahna.
“Farewell, Squire.” And with those words, Cargen departed. The door clicked shut behind them.
It had been such an innocuous phrase, but the words rang forcefully in her head, for it was the last thing the Master of Squires had said to her when he’d left the sword in her care. The last words she would ever hear him speak.
Her mind whirled. The tears kept flowing and she couldn’t leave off thinking about the troubled expression on Asrahn’s face when he studied the famous blade. His expression hadn’t been that different from Kyrkenall’s.
Why had both been so interested in it? For that matter, why were Cargen and M’lahna? The investigators charged with looking into the causes of Asrahn’s death seemed more worried about his interaction with the blade than the circumstances of his demise.
Come to think of it, Commander Denaven had been very interested in Asrahn’s encounter with Irion as well.
What was the connection?
Odd, wasn’t it, that Cargen’s face was heavily bruised? Why would an alten be sparring the night before the parade?
It might be that he was just blowing off steam, relieving some tension. And yet … he and M’lahna had been so curious about the sword, and then fascinated to learn of Kyrkenall’s interest, and his location.
Surely not. As an unthinkable explanation clicked into place, she found herself opening her storage chest and grabbing the wineskin N’lahr had given her long years before. It was empty, but she wanted it anyway. She splashed stale water from her pitcher into the bowl then rubbed her face vigorously before leaving her room. She supposed she should change from her parade armor and best boots, but didn’t turn back.
It might all be innocent coincidence. She found herself striding for the stables nonetheless. Even if there were nothing strange underway, it would do no harm to ride out and talk to Kyrkenall. She would simply go to N’lahr’s tomb and tell him what had happened. She could apologize again and offer condolences for the loss. After all, Kyrkenall had squired with Asrahn, too. And, she recalled, they had fought together at both of the Battles of Kanesh. Clearly he had been upset by the sudden death. But how had Kyrkenall known for sure? And what if her fears were real … and she had told them right where to find him! She quickened her steps.
Her horse was reluctant to leave, as if he knew he’d already completed the assigned work that day. But no one challenged her exit from the stables or the palace complex; she was an upper-ranked squire, and she was off duty.
She rode too slowly, the streets packed with visitors despite grumbling gray clouds crowding one upon the other overhead. A few heavy heralding drops met exposed skin.
She thought she’d feel better when she left the north wall behind and pushed on into the country, but as the skies rumbled more insistently she worried she was already too late. She kicked the horse into a gallop.
Aron was one of the Penarda geldings, bred for endurance, but even he was winded after the tense ride and the push up the switchback path to the cemetery. Elenai left him on the track, puffing and lowering his head to a patch of clover near a willow. She hurried through the somber monuments. Thunder rolled on as she noted between looming tombs that clouds draped the distant city in blotted shadows.
“Alten? Alten Kyrkenall?” Her voice rose, but only the wind answered. A shifting noise surprised her on the left, but she discovered only a dun horse—another Penarda—staring at her with upturned ears. Kyrkenall’s mount. The mare considered her with an almost human interest before she returned to cropping grass alongside Alten Kerwyn’s tomb. The animal snorted at a distant flash of lightning but didn’t leave off eating. Elenai guessed that meant all was well. The rain began a broken patter against the homes of the dead.
Elenai walked farther down the narrow path toward N’lahr’s tomb and saw a light shining within. The stone door stood unlocked and open. Only someone with an Altenerai sapphire could access a military crypt, so Kyrkenall must be nearby.
She called again and leaned in, seeing a sarcophagus ringed by benches built into the surrounding three walls. But there was no one except the still stone form carved upon the marble casket lid. In the stark lamplight, under storm and doubt, the image of the dead general struck her as sinister and unworldly. The lantern in the corner rested near seven wine bottles, most of them quite dusty.
But there was no Kyrkenall. She stepped out and looked to the right. “Alten?”
“What are you doing here?”
The question came just behind her ear, and it wasn’t Kyrkenall. She whirled, hand falling to her hilt … and then she found another voice within her mind, holding her hand in place, suggesting she move forward. This confused her, and while she wrestled with contrary impulses her body obeyed.
The questioner proved to be Cargen, and beside him stood an unfamiliar man, strikingly well-built and handsome save for two prominent front teeth. He was dressed in one of the Mage Auxiliary khalats with its red piping along cuff, sleeves, and shoulders. An exalt. His fingers were raised, and twitched almost as though he pulled at some unseen thread. He was practicing his magecraft on her.
Cargen nervously looked to left and right as the sorcerer marched her out to the little clear spot nearer the tomb of Kerwyn.
“What are you doing here?” he demanded again.
She hesitated, realizing she was once more in command of her own senses, though she felt the mage’s presence hovering at the back of her thoughts like a light hand upon her shoulder. “Looking for Alten Kyrkenall.”
Cargen’s frown was lopsided on his scoffing face. “Obviously. Why?”
She wasn’t sure how to answer, then gasped, feeling lightheaded as the sense of the other presence upon her thoughts pressed harder.
“She feels fear,” the stranger said in a deep, even voice. “For herself. She thinks she’s betrayed Kyrkenall. Thinks you might be involved in Asrahn’s death.” The sorcerer’s tone changed, growing suddenly waspish. “I warned you to stay out of sight until you healed. M’lahna could have handled it on her own.”
Cargen scowled at him, then at her. “You shouldn’t have come, girl. Disappearing Kyrkenall is easy. Explaining you is another matter.”
She saw what happened from the corner of her eye. An object sprouted suddenly from the exalt’s mouth with an explosion of red and white she realized were teeth and blood. The mage’s presence in her mind fell away as he dropped, choking, clawing at the black-feathered shaft that transfixed his face. Elenai was too shocked to understand exactly what she was seeing until Cargen drew his blade and shouted a warning: “Kyrkenall’s here!”
Elenai stepped back and pulled her own sword. She meant only to defend herself, but as Cargen closed she realized he’d seen it as a challenge.
“You’re no match for me,” he promised.
“You might be wrong.” She was surprised by the sound of her own bravado.
She parried his first strike without thinking, worried then about what Alten Tretton had once told them—it’s usually the warrior who strikes first who wins. But where could she strike, when her opponent wore the vaunted Altenerai armor? He was open only at the calf and the wrist and the head. His neck was partly shielded by the high stiff collar.
“I’m stronger than you, Squire. My armor’s better, my blade is finer, and I can outlast you.”
She narrowed her eyes and tapped her fingers along the hilt, bringing to mind the little mask of a terror-stricken face hung from the necklace beneath her uniform. She hadn’t learned to properly cast without a focusing agent, so wore several useful talismans at all times.
She sent him fear.
Cargen’s sapphire ring lit, and he smirked. “You think to distract me with a feeble weaving?”
From close at hand came a scream of agony, and from almost behind the alten, in the darkness, a cackle of mad laughter. As Kyrkenall was said to laugh. But it didn’t sound merry or gallant as the sagas had it, not in the least.
Elenai twisted to the side as Cargen thrust, and what would have been a killing blow to her throat hit her armored shoulder. She struck as he pulled away, driving the point of her sword into his hand.
Cargen dropped his blade, and she grinned, as much in relief as pride. The alten advanced anyway, kicking up with one foot to drive her sword arm back.
Used to sparring exercises, her instinct was to raise a hand to block a second kick before she realized she wasn’t in the practice yards. They weren’t switching into hand-to-hand exercises. She had a sword, and should use it.
This realization came the same moment Cargen hopped to his other foot and lashed out to clip her chin with his boot. She staggered back, blinking away darkness and stars. There was pain, too, but it was the dizziness she couldn’t ignore. He pounced on his dropped sword and grabbed it with his off hand.
“Now…” Cargen said, then yelped and tripped over a long black stick.
Not a stick, she understood, but an arrow protruding through his right boot. The alten spun to confront a swift-moving figure behind him, but staggered awkwardly on his wounded leg.
His opponent was Kyrkenall, who parried a weak blade strike with a careless flick of his recurved ebon bow. The archer stepped in close and drove the palm of his hand into Cargen’s bruised cheekbone. Cargen fell over his opponent’s extended foot and sprawled face upward on the graveyard soil even as water rushed in earnest from dark skies.
Kyrkenall tossed the beautiful bow aside and it landed only a foot or two to Elenai’s left, close enough for her to glimpse the immaculately carved warriors struggling on its surface. He freed his sword, a long slim arc of blue steel, and suspended it over Cargen’s throat.
The alten spoke in a strange, singsongy way. If this was one of the famed, spontaneous verses she’d heard so much about, Elenai decided it was more chilling than inspiring. “The battle’s over, and the Gods retire. None fled, all dead, save you. The liar.”
Though wincing in pain, a deadly weapon held to him, Cargen’s face screwed up contentiously where he lay. “I’m no liar.”
Kyrkenall’s tone was taut with contempt. “You put the lie to all you profess to serve.”
Elenai thought herself unnoticed until Kyrkenall called to her, though he didn’t look back. “Squire, are you wounded?”
She briefly thought of saying something jaunty, but she was still breathless, and a little stunned. “I’m all right,” she managed. Her voice sounded tinny and far off, even to her. “Alten Asrahn is dead.”
“Yes,” he said darkly. “We spoke earlier of etiquette, Squire. Now’s not the time. Put your skills to use as I put him to the question. You, liar, remove your ring.”
“I’d die before doing so,” Cargen asserted.
Kyrkenall’s answer was startlingly venomous as he hissed, “So would Asrahn. I spoke with the guard who found him. He told me Asrahn had no ring.” He cut the air inches from Cargen’s ear. “He was a hero—you’re nothing but a puffed-up bootlicker unfit to muck his stalls.” His voice rose, fury barely checked. “Now, take off the ring or I’ll cut off your rutting hand!” As Kyrkenall’s volume pitched, Cargen fumbled with his ring and dropped it onto the wet soil.
“Now, Squire,” Kyrkenall directed.
Elenai began to wonder if he actually knew her name. But she reached out with a thread of intent, bending her senses so that she might see the prone man’s thoughts.
“Why’d you kill him?” Kyrkenall demanded.
Cargen didn’t answer. The images swirled and she perceived him in argument with M’lahna. “They had to silence him,” Elenai said, aghast. “He drowned when he tried to escape—”
Kyrkenall’s tone was cutting. “You took his ring, mazed him, and threw him in the river, didn’t you?”
The reply was shrill. “I answer only to the commander—”
Kyrkenall cut him off with a shout. “Where’s the real sword?”
The sudden shift sent the visions swirling. A memory swam up before her.
“You getting anything, Squire?” Kyrkenall demanded over the din of rain.
“Images only—”
An electric surge of sorcerous energy coursed through her, the like of which she’d never felt before. And there was a voice. Elenai didn’t hear it, exactly, but its command vibrated through to the very core of her being. She was told to drop, and she knew that she must, and so she slumped without question, and as the voice told her to lay still and sleep she started to do this, too. Except that her hand contacted something hard that sent a shock wave through the enveloping tide of weariness.
Her fingers had landed upon the great black bow, Arzhun, and at the touch clarity came to her. She clutched the warm and stiff arch, as a drowning woman clasps for timber in the water, and she lay listening while her senses settled. She was lying in damp earth, water pouring from the skies and into heretofore dry areas of her body.
Kyrkenall had frozen rigidly in place as the weaver M’lahna crept up beside Cargen, now awkwardly pawing the mud for his ring. She wore soft leather boots and a hooded rain cloak over her red-trimmed khalat. She carried no weapon but for a glittering shapeless stone held in one hand, a mix of moonlight and silver and diamonds and all shining beautiful things that had ever been.
“You’re just as deadly as the tales say,” she purred to Kyrkenall. Her face was contorted into a mockery of a smile.
Cargen sat up fully and fought with shaking fingers to slide his ring back into place.
“And as reckless,” she continued.
“And as handsome,” Kyrkenall offered through gritted teeth, straining. He didn’t move. Elenai doubted he could.
“You’re broken, Alten,” the exalt continued. “I truly regretted having to kill Asrahn, but you … you’re an arrogant, contemptuous rules breaker. If you weren’t a war hero you’d already have been drummed out of the corps. While you’re wandering around trading your fame for drinks and sex we’re risking our lives, our very sanity, to restore the realms.”
Kyrkenall’s response dripped with sarcasm. “‘Restoring the realms’?”
She answered with lofty irritation. “A glory seeker like you can’t understand the quiet sacrifices of those brave enough to secure real peace, real order. When the Goddess is restored, there’ll be no more Naor or kobalin or storms that eat our borders. We’ll live in a true paradise. And they’ll be no need to tolerate anyone like you.”
Elenai sensed the pressure from the mage increase.
“But you heroes need,” Kyrkenall managed, “a little murder or two, to help things along. Sounds righteous.”
Elenai didn’t know why the bow protected her from the full force of M’lahna’s weaving, nor did she understand why she felt such an immense attraction to the shining thing in the mage’s hand. Examining it with her magical sight, she discovered that M’lahna had projected all of her spell-threads through the object before they intersected with Kyrkenall. That transition strengthened each of them. Prior to encounter with the gleaming stone they were thin gold threads. After, and as they reached for the archer, they were transformed into blinding beams of energy.
If the stone enhanced the exalt’s magic, it was reasonable to assume it would do the same with Elenai’s. She cast a line of energy toward it. She was jolted to full clarity the moment her energies interacted with the thing, and exulted in the sense of capability and power that swept through her.
Magic was a complex and challenging endeavor, requiring vast expenditures from tiny reserves. Elenai had always likened throwing a spell to running laps. Weaving several in succession was like sprinting miles.
But touching this object gave access to a store of limitless magical energy with little endurance loss. Despite her fear, a smile touched her lips. She felt among the talismans hung from her necklace. Each was a small silver mask carved with an exaggerated emotion. Fear, fatigue, confusion, bravery, sorrow, joy. Elenai found the wide, downturned mouth of fear just as M’lahna somehow sensed her intrusion.
She saw the shock on the woman’s face and sent her fear. The exalt twisted her head as if shaking it to stay awake, then countered with another command to sleep. A wave of somnolence rushed against Elenai and set her blinking.
Kyrkenall struck while the exalt’s attention wavered.
M’lahna cried out when the sword was driven through her wrist but not when the same silvery blue weapon crossed her neck a heartbeat later. She dropped, a hideous mess that had been a beautiful living creature. The shining object tumbled to earth with her dead hand and her fingers twitched in the mud.
Elenai clambered to her feet, the black bow, Arzhun, clutched unnecessarily tight.
The archer advanced on Cargen, who’d been fumbling with a bandage. He struggled in alarm to fully rise on his good leg, trying to grasp the hilt of a knife at his belt. He fell back to the mud the moment Kyrkenall’s sword came again to his throat.
“This seems familiar, doesn’t it?” Kyrkenall followed the injured man down with the point of his blade. He might have meant to appear playful, but to Elenai’s mind he sounded merciless. He raised his voice. “You all right back there, Squire?”
“I am,” she answered with a shaking voice. She actually thought she was going to throw up.
“Did you pull anything out of his memory when I asked about Irion?”
“A tower on a cliff edge, in the snow,” she answered. “Skies behind. There was a flag flying—”
“Red and white?” Kyrkenall suggested.
He was right. “Yes.”
Cargen sneered. “That’s not where the sword is.”
“You forget I already know you’re a liar.”
“We’ll hunt you down.”
Kyrkenall laughed.
“You’ll get nothing more from me.”
“There’s not much else I want. Except perhaps to carry a message. Tell your leaders I’ll expose them. That whatever they build, I will tear down. That whomever they slay, I shall avenge. Tell them…” He smiled terrifyingly. “You know what? I’ll just leave them a fucking note.”
Kyrkenall drove the sword through Cargen’s throat. As the alten fell back, there were two bright arcs of blood in swift succession, mingling with the downpour.
The sight of it set Elenai retching. She hadn’t recalled eating quite so much rice as came up. Amid the changed, impossible world, she seized upon the peculiar detail that so many of the grains remained intact.
She found herself kneeling in the mud and vomited again, and she was still there, contemplating the mess, when Kyrkenall splashed up to her. His boots stopped just outside the disgusting rain-splattered pool.
“Elenai, isn’t it?” he asked; then at her weak nod, continued conversationally, “That was you, wasn’t it? Interfering with the woman’s weaving?”
She nodded weakly.
“So you see the fundamental flaw with bringing those cursed hearthstones into a battle—no good when there’s an opposing weaver nearby. Nice timing, though.”
“What,” she said, her voice a croaking parody of itself, “is a hearthstone?”
“You’re better off not knowing.”
She blinked up at him and discovered he was wiping his rain-bathed sword, carefully, on a scrap of cloth. He then sheathed the blade and bent down. She thought at first he meant to offer his hand and planned to say she was too weak to stand, but he instead lifted his bow and inspected it.
“Do you know,” he continued, as if they were simply having an exchange over dinner and weren’t surrounded by twisted bodies, “in the old days, N’lahr or Decrin or Kalandra were always there to pull me out of the fire. Or Asrahn,” he added, his voice shaken for a brief moment. “That would have been it for me if you weren’t here.”
She eventually managed to climb to her feet and discovered Kyrkenall was watching her. There was pity in his voice. “You shouldn’t have come.”
“I wanted to warn you,” she objected. “They came to question me. I told them where you were.”
“Of course you did.”
She wasn’t sure she’d heard him clearly until he offered a thin smile and an explanation. “I made sure a few knew where I was going, and then it was just a matter of waiting. Although I hadn’t expected them to bring a hearthstone.” Kyrkenall studied the sapphire ring glowing on his finger until it winked out.
She could only stare at him. “You used me to draw them out?”
He smirked. “Why did you fear for me?”
“I just … How did you know Alten Asrahn was dead?”
“Nothing would keep him from his proper place. Nothing. Duty was everything to Asrahn.” His hand tightened again into a fist. She saw it was shaking, and watched him stare at it until it stilled.
“How’d you know Cargen was behind it?”
“I didn’t until he came to kill me.”
She shook her head. It was all too much. Kyrkenall bent and began rummaging through the garments of the deceased.
“What are you going to do now?”
“First, I’m going to drag these four into N’lahr’s tomb. That might slow things down for a day or two. If the rain comes hard it might even conceal the tracks.”
She involuntarily gasped at the profane suggestion. “You’re going to put them with N’lahr?”
“He would have thought it was funny.”
“Wait—you said four. There’re only three here.”
“There’s another alten I killed around back. Surely you heard the scream. K’narr shifted at the last moment.” Kyrkenall sounded a little irked that the dead man had spoiled his shot.
Not Alten K’narr. He had always been so nice, so … well, gallant. If he had been involved, could that mean that other Altenerai were as well?
“Alten, what’s going on?”
“I really can’t say.”
“Can’t, or won’t?”
“I’m not as mysterious as you might suppose—I don’t know.”
“Why would Alten Cargen and these people kill Alten Asrahn?”
Kyrkenall paused with his hand in Cargen’s side pouch. “Apparently, it’s about the sword. Asrahn didn’t think it was the right one. He told me about it last night. And this lot killed him for it. And would have killed us as well.”
“But why’s the sword so important to them?”
He looked at her as though she were foolish. “It’s the sword, isn’t it? The one fashioned for the killing of kings. Rialla told N’lahr he’d kill Mazakan with it, and supposedly even Mazakan’s been frightened of it ever since.”
That added an extra piece of information to what Elenai had always been told about the sword’s power to thwart the Naor leader. And she thought the name of Rialla sounded familiar, but she couldn’t place it. He must have seen the confusion in her look.
“Everyone pretends the prophecy was really about the sword, not about the sword and N’lahr. They weren’t there. I heard what was said.” He shook his head. “It’s no good without him to use it. Now why anyone would kill Asrahn for questioning its authenticity or what they’re doing with the real sword, and how it links up with that nonsense about making a paradise I just can’t guess. Yet.”
“Is the sword on display a copy, then?”
“I think so. My bow and my sword were altered by the same weaver who helped forge Irion, and the sword in the hall feels different from both. I can only guess because I never wielded it. I’m deferring to Asrahn on that. Varama might be able to tell us more, but that would require a ride back in to Darassus, and I don’t think I’ll be returning anytime soon.”
“Why?”
He laughed without humor. “You think it ends here?”
Stupid. With a moment’s more reflection she realized that without knowing which of the remaining Altenerai were involved, Kyrkenall might step right into a trap if he returned to the palace. “Do you know who’s behind it, Alten?”
Kyrkenall’s lips twisted. “I’d say the queen. She was always a big one for secrets. And the Mage Auxiliary is pretty clearly involved. They’re the queen’s pets. I don’t think it was just these two. I wouldn’t be surprised if our dear commander’s in on it, maybe all the new Altenerai. I hope none of the old guard,” he muttered.
“I think Commander Denaven might know something about it, sir,” she said slowly. “He was asking me about the sword today. I think he wanted to know if I’d been told anything by Asrahn.”
“Right. So he is involved. Deciding if he needed to kill you.”
He sounded so matter-of-fact. She tried to imitate the same manner. “I suppose so. I can’t believe he’d agree to killing Asrahn, though. Asrahn was … Asrahn trained him. He was loyal to the queen and the realms.” As her voice grew raw with emotion, she fell silent.
“Asrahn was loyal to the code, to the laws,” Kyrkenall corrected. “And Denaven’s always been an ass,” he added.
She wasn’t sure how to respond to that. Hadn’t Denaven and Kyrkenall been friends? Could the commander of the Altenerai really be involved in murder? She was at a loss. “So … what do we do?”
“I’m afraid you can’t return to Darassus.”
She hadn’t quite reasoned that yet, though she knew the truth of it as he said the words.
He explained, pointedly as if expecting protest, “They’ll find the bodies, sooner or later. And then they’ll look into all the doings connected with this group. And their successors will question all those that these questioned. They would come to you, and weave your thoughts, and learn what you’d seen, then kill you.”
It wasn’t easy to accept. So much had changed in but a single day.
She turned from him and considered the city even as a lightning bolt forked in the distance, lighting the gilded domes. The city, she thought, looked rather like the tombs that lay behind her. “What am I to do?”
“For now? Ride with me.”
Despite the horror, and the confusion, she felt her heart lighten. To her knowledge, no one had ever squired with Kyrkenall, probably the most enigmatic champion in five realms. “Where are we going? To that tower?”
“Aye,” Kyrkenall said darkly. “I’m going to rip that sword out of the Chasm Tower and carry it against them. I’ll avenge Asrahn and stop their conspiracy if I have to carve open a thousand of them to do it.”