C. S. Friedman - Magister 01, page 44
And so, when Colivar wove his spells, she stood silently by and did not weave her own. She allowed him to establish a portal between here and there, anchoring it to some distant sorcerous mark, and when Talesin offered her his hand, that they might step through together, she took it and went. Ethanus had trained her well enough that she understood the importance of not showing hesitation in front of another Magister, and so she stepped into the spell as casually as if Talesin had invited her for a walk along the beach instead. Never mind that he had told her Colivar was a servant of his father’s greatest enemy, so she found the whole relationship suspect. Never mind that she did not have the same confidence he did that this sorcerous portal was exactly what Colivar claimed it to be, or was going to the place he said. Magisters did not display fear of other Magisters.
The sensation of stepping through another Magister’s portal was markedly vertiginous, and for a moment she had to shut her eyes and concentrate on steadying her senses just to keep to her feet. Then, slowly, sensing solid ground beneath her once more, she opened her eyes. What she saw was not what she had expected, and for a moment she just stood there, stunned. Beside her she could feel Talesin stiffen as he did the same, and for one terrible moment she thought that Colivar had indeed betrayed them, and had brought his enemy’s son to some unknown place. Surely this could not be the ancestral home that Talesin had described to her as they had gathered their belongings, speaking of it with such longing that she knew his very soul ached to return___
But no, there was Danton’s palace ahead of them; Talesin pointed to it with a trembling hand, that ancient keep which Danton had adopted as the centerpiece of his sovereignty. (Call him Andovan, she reminded herself, tasting his true name secretly as she whispered it to herself.) Surrounding the palace, however, there should have been trees and gardens, walkways roofed in marble and roads paved with glittering stones and a vast marketplace set some distance from the palace gates, shimmering with all the vibrant colors and raucous sounds of life. Or so Andovan had told her.
It was gone. All of it.
Only a wasteland remained.
Andovan’s face was white with shock as he took it all in, his eyes wide and uncomprehending. Even Colivar looked surprised when he first saw it, though, being a Magister, he was quick to mask the emotion. Briefly Ka-mala wondered if he was aware of her standing there as he did so, if he saw her as a potential rival who might take advantage of his weakness. The thought thrilled her, even as she tried to make sense out of the scene that was laid out before them.
You will know you are truly a Magister when the others of your kind fear you, Ethanus had told her.
Against a backdrop of rugged mountains, Danton’s palace loomed gray and forbidding. The banners she had been told would be hanging from its outer wall were missing, save for a pair of red flags with a double-headed hawk flanking the main gate. Bereft of other decorations, the cold stone keep looked more like a fortress preparing for siege than a place where foreign envoys were feted. Even the few windows were tiny, narrow things, barely wide enough for an archer to take sight of an enemy through. The building’s ancient purpose had become its current purpose once more, as its owner prepared for war.
But if the starkness of the palace itself was remarkable, it paled in comparison to what lay surrounding it. To the west, where Andovan said a great forest had once stood, was only an open plain. The trees nearest the palace walls had been felled and the gardens burned, so that a black ring of devastation surrounded the keep. A fence that had once marked the outer boundary of the royal grounds seemed strangely isolated, trapped between emptiness and more emptiness, bereft of even the illusion of purpose.
Colivar had said they would arrive near a marketplace, close enough that if trouble came their way they might lose themselves in the crowd. But if ever a marketplace had existed in this place there was no sign of it now. All signs of human commerce had been uprooted, leaving only the dry, packed earth as testament to the thousands that must once have scurried back and forth across it. If Kamala had been willing to use her sorcery she might have heard the echoes of vendors long gone, servants chattering as they purchased goods for their master’s house, gossip whispered in the shadows. But she cast no spell, and so the earth was silent.
It wasn’t that she cared whether Andovan lived or died, she told herself. It was simply that this would be an inconvenient time to be caught in Transition.
“Why?” Andovan whispered hoarsely.
“Like a beast, Danton marks his territory.” Colivar’s dark eyes glittered. “What better way than this?”
Andovan turned on him; the fury in his eyes made it clear that the Magister had just gone one step too far. “Are you saying my father is a beast?”
“Perhaps not him. Perhaps someone else.” He waved a hand out toward the ravaged landscape. “What else explains this, Your Highness? What motive could a man possibly have that would cause him to lay waste to his own lands like this?”
Kamala looked up at him sharply. He knew something he was not saying, that much she could sense in him.
Andovan drew in a deep breath as he gazed out at the devastated landscape. “Defense,” he said quietly. His voice was a hollow thing. “My father often spoke of the folly of having wooded lands so close to the palace, saying that enemies could use them for cover, but my mother begged him to keep them… she said war would not come this far into the High Kingdom, and she hungered for the comfort of living things___”
His voice dropped to a whisper. “That is what he has done. All things that might give shelter to enemies have been removed. Even the crowds that unwelcome visitors might lose themselves in.” He looked pointedly at Colivar.
“She was right,” the Magister told him. “No army could get this far, not without months of bloody campaigning first. More than enough time for a Magister to level a forest, if the need arose.” He shook his head; his expression was grim. “There was no need for this. Not in any human sense.”
The wind shifted, coming to them from across the battered landscape. The ash was fresh enough that the smell of burning still lingered on the wind… and something else.
“What is that?” Kamala said.
It was a musky scent, strangely sweet, like nothing she had ever smelled before. Not an unpleasant odor, but strangely disturbing. She could see Colivar start as the breeze brought it to him, and something flickered in the back of his eyes that might be fear. It was a strangely naked expression, as if for a moment all the strength of the Magister’s power had been stripped from him, and with it all his confidence. A second later the expression was gone, but the image of it had been seared into her brain.
“They are here,” Colivar whispered.
Andovan seemed about to speak, but instead a fit of coughing suddenly overcame him. More and more violent it became, until at last he was driven to his knees, shaking from the force of it. Kamala knelt by his side, feeling utterly helpless in her inability to help him. Any power she used to heal him would only make things worse.
Colivar simply watched, curious but unmoved.
Doubling over, Andovan vomited upon the packed earth, not once but again and again, until the fluid that he spewed up no longer had any substance to it, save a strange and vile smell. “What is that?” he gasped, as the fit of coughing subsided at last and he was able to breath.
“Your ancestral enemy,” Colivar answered. “Legend says that hatred of them is writ deep in the blood of the Protectors. Apparently not even Danton’s seed could dilute it enough to matter.”
“Then my mother—” He could not complete the thought.
He nodded. “Go to her. Give her strength. Tell her Danton’s alliance with these creatures must be severed, or the whole of the High Kingdom will soon look like… this.” A sweeping gesture encompassed the wasteland before them. “And worse. Much worse. Remember the Dark Ages. They could come again.”
Andovan nodded. With effort—and Kamala’s assistance—he got to his feet. He wiped a sleeve across his mouth, and spat a few last drops of bile onto the ground. “I know my duty, Colivar.” He held out a hand to Kamala. “Come. I will need your protection.”
She took his hand.
“She cannot shield you once you are inside,” Colivar warned. “Kostas will be alert to the faintest whisper of sorcery within his domain.”
“Then she can protect me on the way,” Andovan said.
He did not correct Colivar’s assumption, Kamala noted. Did not point out to him that his companion was a witch, not a sorcerer. No doubt he was distracted enough not to take note of the fine distinction, or believe that it mattered. But she knew that it did, and she wondered if by not responding to it she was revealing more about herself to Colivar than she should.
Too much to think about now. Deal first with the task ahead, later with this Magister.
“Lianna.”
It took Kamala a minute to remember that was her name. When she did she turned back to Colivar.
“I believe this is yours.” He held out a folded square of fabric. Golden silk. The dark eyes were fixed on her as she took it, as if seeking to take the very measure of her soul.
Startled, she realized it was one of the scarves that Ravi had given her, back in Gansang. One of many precious gifts that she had never worn.
Her heart skipped a beat in her chest. She did her best not to let her surprise show, but knew from the expression in those piercing dark eyes that she had failed, and that for one brief moment he had read her like a book.
“Your mistake,” she said stiffly. “It is not mine.”
“Indeed,” he said quietly. “My apologies, then.” He tucked the scarf into his doublet without looking at it, his dark eyes never leaving her own. “I shall have to seek its true owner some other time.”
Cold, those eyes were so cold. Human beings did not have eyes like that.
Shivering inwardly, she turned to follow Andovan across the devastated landscape, toward whatever secret entrance he believed would give them access to the palace.
Chapter Thirty-Nine
Gwynofer awakened slowly, not quite sure where she was. She had dreamed so many things in the last few hours, all of them with such frightening intensity, that for a moment it was hard to tell if this was yet another dream, or if sleep was fading at last and she was returning to… where?
Trembling, she remembered seeing a sky filled with black-winged Souleaters, a land burned black by sorcery, and strange lizardlike creatures that slithered in the shadows of the palace, leaving trails of slime upon the ancient tapestries. Would that they were only nightmares! But at least one of those images was more than a dream, so who could say how much of the rest might turn out to be likewise? These days she could not rule anything out.
It was a week now since Kostas’ sorcery had ignited the royal forest, sending clouds of black smoke high into the heavens for days on end. On the last day the wind had turned toward the palace, as if to admonish those who had sanctioned the destruction, and hot ash had rained down upon the turrets and parapets. It had gathered in gray drifts against the outer walls and gusted in through the narrow windows, and no matter how many servants Gwynofar sent to sweep it away there was always more of it somewhere, waiting to blow in. Kostas could have turned the wind away, but why should he? He clearly took delight in her despair, and no doubt watched from the shadows with pleasure as she stood upon the roof that last day, when the smoke finally cleared, weeping at the sight of the devastation. The forest had been Andovan’s favorite refuge, and therefore she had loved it for his sake… and like all the things she loved, it must therefore be uprooted or befouled by that creature, for that was his chosen sport.
Only her courtyard was safe from him. Even the ash had not fallen thickly there. Merian had said that was because the bulk of the palace blocked the wind, but Gwynofar preferred to believe that the gods wished to keep this one place sacrosanct. So that there remained one place where she could still find peace, unfouled by Kostas’ sorcery.
Now, raising her head up from the needle-strewn earth, she realized she was in that very place. Exhaustion must have overtaken her during her devotions, she thought. Either that, or perhaps she had chosen to rest her head upon the ground for a few moments and shut her eyes, trusting this was the one place in the palace where Kostas would not—perhaps could not—intrude. And then sleep had claimed her, the border between waking nightmare and dreaming nightmare so subtle that she never sensed the moment she passed from one to the other.
How far she had fallen, since the days when she had reigned as High Queen beside Danton’s throne! These days the rancid odor in the palace was so overwhelming that she could barely stand to remain indoors. Instead she must flee to this place several times a day just to be able to breathe clean air, or Kostas’ foulness would surely suffocate her. She could not explain ail that to Danton, of course. He would have labeled the whole thing lunacy—or even worse, witchery—and it would have driven yet one more wedge between them. As if they needed anything more.
She rose from the ground unsteadily, brushing dried pine needles from her mourning gown. She wondered if she should call for her maidservant to pick the mess out of her hair as well. But Merian was half mad with worry about her these days, so much so that Gwynofar almost felt guilty letting her see her in this state. Better to brush the dirt and debris out herself, before the woman saw her.
She had barely drawn a lock of golden hair forward over her shoulder and begun to pick at it when suddenly she heard a twig snap behind her. Her heart skipped a beat. The sound came from a far corner of the courtyard, where the blue pines were crowded so closely together that the sunlight hardly reached the ground; she could not see through the tangled branches to make out the source of the noise. Who would come to this place without announcing himself, and why?
There was no good answer to that question.
Heart pounding, she looked about herself for something which she could use for self-defense, and finally picked up a fallen branch that lay nearby. Her hand was shaking as she hefted it, knowing even as she did so that the effort was futile. It had been too many years since she and Rhys had sported in the meadows as children, waging mock battles with weapons fashioned out of broom handles as they pretended to be Guardians routing out the last defenders of some demonic stronghold. But at least she did not look quite as helpless holding it; perhaps that would be worth something.
Then a figure stepped out from the shadows, and a lean, pale hand pushed back the edge of the woolen hood it was wearing, that she might see its face.
Her legs suddenly grew weak beneath her. The makeshift weapon dropped from her fingers.
“Andovan?” she whispered in disbelief.
For a moment she thought it might be a ghost that stood before her, and not a real man at all. The visitor was pale and drawn, his cheeks hollow, his frame far thinner than Andovan’s had ever been. So she moved forward slowly, and raised a hand up to touch his cheek. His skin was dry and taut beneath her fingertips, but it was real. He was real.
“Andovan…” She could say no more; a mixture of joy and pain too terrible to bear choked off all words. He said nothing, simply took her in his arms and held her tightly. Despite the terrible wasting disease that had sapped his strength his embrace was strong and sure, and it gave comfort to her, body and soul.
Gwynofar wept. From joy, from fear, from sheer emotional exhaustion. She wept for Andovan’s death, for the misery of her mourning, and for everything which had followed that loss. She wept for all the nights she had prayed to her gods and seemingly gone unanswered. For all the indignities Kostas had forced her to endure, and the silence with which she had borne them. For the fact that she was High Queen, and being such, might not weep freely, except in such company as this.
At last, emptied of misery, she drew back from him. She looked away for a moment as she wiped her eyes dry, allowing him a moment of privacy to do the same if he required it. Men were not so public about their tears as women were. Then, finally she looked into his eyes— blue, so very blue, like the color of the rivers in the far north when the ice cracked in springtime—and whispered in wonder, “You are not dead.”
“No.” His smile was so tender it nearly broke her heart. “Not yet, anyway.”
“Does Danton know?”
His mouth tightened. “Not yet.”
“Then how… how is it you are here? Surely the guards must have seen you…”
“I used the same tunnels I did when I was a boy. Remember? You and Father would search the palace for me, but I knew all the ancient ways: servants’ passages, forgotten spaces between the walls, tunnels carved out in the days when siege threatened…” His fleeting smile reminded her of those days, and of the young prince who would rather play in the woods than attend to his lessons. How her heart ached to be reminded of that time!
“Everything is still the same as it was. Though not quite as spacious as I remembered it.” His voice dropped to a whisper. “No one has seen me here save you.”
“You faked your death.” Her voice caught in her throat; she had to fight to get the words out. “Why, Andovan? Why do such a thing?”
A shadow passed briefly across his face. For a moment he turned away from her, as if he could not meet her eyes while he spoke. “Because I could not bear to die in bed,” he said at last. “Because if there was a cause for my condition I wanted to seek it out, and if I could not find it… then it would be better to die on the road, I thought, fighting my fate, than swaddled in blankets like a helpless infant.”
She shut her eyes and tried to make sense of it all. “Then the note you left—”
“That was truly mine, yes. And I meant every word.”
“But the body…”
“Not mine, obviously. Though it had that seeming.”
