Angus Wells - The Kingdoms 02 (51 page)

           
“For Ashar’s sake, then!” moaned the
Galichian. “For our master’s sake, Taws.”

           
The pressure eased a fraction and
Hattim felt the heat lessen. He tried to draw himself up, but still he was
held, poised before the flames, aware that if Taws let loose his grip he would
plunge backward into the fire.

           
“Do you feel the heat?” the mage
demanded, an awful satisfaction in his voice. “It is as nothing to what you can
suffer should you fail our master; should you fail me.”

           
“I have not failed you!” Hattim
moaned. “In Ashar’s name, I did everything you told me.”

           
“And brought me unwelcome news of
Kedryn Caitin,” Taws husked. “You say he sought to enter the Beltrevan?”

           
“Aye,” Hattim whimpered,
incomprehension adding to his terror. “To regain his sight, they said.”

           
Abruptly he was snatched forward,
lifted and flung across the room. He crashed against a chair, overturning it,
unaware of the pain that burst in his shoulder at the impact, huddling close to
tears, frightened eyes turned toward the mage. Taws stepped toward him again
and he scrabbled away, crablike, over the carpet. Taws halted and gestured for
him to rise. Hattim climbed awkwardly to his feet, rubbing at his neck, his
aching shoulder. He did not dare to speak for there burned in the ensanguined
orbs so terrible a rage he was afraid any words of his might bring down that
threatened fate.

           
“So, we know not whether Kedryn
lives, or is dead. ” The voice was softer now, a little less sibilant, musing
almost. “But if dead, surely I would have known. Even here I should have known.
Or not? Had he slain him, could even his power reach so far?”

           
He paused and Hattim took a
tentative step back, seeking to put distance between himself and the woman who
was now Taws. A knocking sounded at the chamber’s door and he gasped, awareness
of the outside world intruding on his private terror. Taws turned at the sound,
the red glow fading from his eyes, their color returning to Sister Thera’s
natural green. He motioned at Hattim and the Lord of Ust-Galich swallowed,
fighting to make his voice normal as he went to the door and called, “What is
it?”

           
“My Lord?” He recognized the lisping
tone of Mejas Celeruna. “Are you well? A servant reported a noise.”

           
Hattim looked to the door, thinking
that perhaps palace guardsmen were also present, that if he cried for help they
might enter before Taws had a chance to slay him, that in the ensuing confusion
he might escape the mage’s presence. And even as the thought flitted across his
panic-stricken mind he knew it was useless: he was bound to Taws now, to Ashar,
and he could not escape the fate he had chosen.

           
“I stumbled,” he answered. “No harm
is done. A little too much wine. Leave me.”

           
“As you wish, Lord Hattim,” Celeruna
called. “Sleep well.” “Aye,” Hattim responded.

           
When he faced Taws again the mage
had calmed, become once more the Sister, blue-robed and seemingly harmless. Had
I summoned guards, Hattim thought, what would they have seen? Sister Thera, no
more. And if I denounced Sister Thera, if I told them she is possessed by the
Messenger, what fate for me then? Condemnation as an apostate? Vilification?
The loss of all my dreams? Execution, even?

           
“You see it,” Taws said, menacingly
soft. “You are in my web and you cannot wriggle loose.”

           
Hattim licked his lips, smoothing
his rumpled shirt, seeking to regain some measure of dignity. “I chose it,” he
said hoarsely. “I chose to serve Ashar.”

           
“Indeed,” the mage agreed with a
horrid equanimity, “and so you are committed to a path from which there is no
turning back. Remember that always.”

           
Hattim nodded.

           
“The matter of Kedryn remains,” Taws
continued. “If our master has slain him, then so be it. If not . . . Well,
mayhap the tribes will kill him.”

           
“They proclaimed him hef-Alador,”
Hattim ventured, “and swore peace.”

           
Taws grunted. “Then mayhap he will
succeed in regaining his sight. If so, he is a greater threat.”

           
He paused and Hattim found the
courage to ask, “Is he truly the . . .” He broke off, afraid to complete the
sentence.

           
“The
Chosen
One?” Taws spat the words as if they pained
his borrowed lips. “These blue-gowned bitches believe him so, and mayhap he is,
but that matters little. He has been out of this game too long and our hand is
too strong. We proceed as I have planned.”

           
“What if he does live?” Hattim asked
nervously.

           
“Then he will come south into the
trap we set,” Taws promised. “He will find you in control of Andurel; his
parents bait in our snare. Chosen One or not, he will be but one man against my
power and the might of your army. This candidate the lordlings presented, he
will obey you?”

           
“Chadyn Hymet?” Hattim felt a return
of fear, his eyes flickering nervously. “He bears no great love for me.”

           
“I did not ask that,” Taws snapped.
“Will he obey you?”

           
“In the matter of Kedryn?” Hattim
hesitated. “I am not sure. He is loyal to the Kingdoms.”

           
“Then he must not have command,”
Taws declared. “He must die.”

           
“You will kill him?” asked Hattim.

           
“When will they announce his
ascendancy?” Taws countered.

           
“At the moment of my wedding to
Ashrivelle,” Hattim answered. “The proclamation that declares me rightful heir
will also declare Chadyn Hymet Lord of Ust-Galich in my place. I agreed to that
as you told me to agree to all their suggestions. I am to inform him on the
morrow,”

           
Taws nodded. “Then it must be before
your wedding.”

           
“How?” Hattim wondered.

           
“No magic can be used,” said Taws,
“lest Kyrie’s bitches sense it. You are to summon him here. Then when he comes,
you will toast his good fortune with cups I shall prepare for you. He will not
survive that.”

           
“Poison?” Hattim frowned. “What if
the Sisters provide a remedy? Or detect it?”

           
An obscene chuckle tittered from
Sister Thera's lips as Taws shook his head. “They will not. There is no remedy,
and the potion I shall prepare will leave no trace. All who drink will
suffer—and the vintner will be blamed for his tainted wine.”

           
“All?” Hattim asked warily.

           
“Aye.” Taws laughed again, the sound
ugly. “
Suffer
, not die, That fate I
shall reserve for Chadyn Hymet alone—the others shall have a remedy. ”

           
“If Hymet dies,” Hattim said,
confident that Taws would have the answer ready, “then some other of Darr’s
choosing will be selected. ”

           
“What you will drink will not act
immediately.” Taws confirmed the Galichian’s certainty. “It will curdle slowly
and he will die scant hours before the ceremony. There will be no time to
select another. The rest will suffer a little, but survive—after all, am I not
a Sister Hospitaler?”

           
Hattim nodded, wondering if there
was any eventuality for which the mage was not prepared. Had he truly thought
Taws afraid of Kedryn? How could he be when he was so powerful? Chosen One or
not, Kedryn must surely fall before such might.

           
“Sleep now,” Taws suggested. “There
is business to be done ere long, and you must ready yourself for your wedding.”

           
“Aye.” Hattim smiled as his
confidence returned, watching the blue-robed figure turn and walk to the door
that connected their chambers. “Our master’s business.”

           
The door closed behind Taws and
Hattim Sethiyan filled a last cup with wine, drinking deep before he went into
his bedroom, the ache in his shoulder forgotten as he thought of his ascendancy
and the power it would bring him.

           
He slept well and long, waking to
winter sunlight and the announcement that the Princess Ashrivelle waited in the
antechamber, eager to decide the day of their marriage now that all was settled
favorably. He rose, bidding the servant comb his hair as he set rings on his
fingers and fastened a pendant in his pierced ear. He dressed modestly in a shirt
of plain gold and dark green breeks, boots of pale green and a tunic of white,
admiring his reflection before he went out to greet his betrothed.

           
Ashrivelle ignored the servants
setting breakfast for Hattim as she flung her arms about his neck and pressed
her lips to his mouth.

           
“I have seen my father and he has
told me all is agreed,” she declared gaily, “so we may set the time.”

           
“As soon as possible,” Hattim said,
smiling. “I would make you my wife today if I were able.”

           
Ashrivelle affected a pretty frown.
“It cannot be so soon,” she giggled, “for there is much to prepare. But in five
days’ time?”

           
“So be it,” Hattim agreed. “In five
days’ time.”

           
From the corner of his eye he saw
the face of Sister Thera move from the slightly opened door between their
chambers and knew that Taws was gone to prepare his poison.

           
“I cannot believe him dead.”

           
Yrla turned from the window of
Sister Bethany’s chamber, the sun striking blue light from her raven hair. Her
face was concerned, yet determined, her voice fierce.

           
“Did winter not cut us off from
Estrevan I might be in better position to answer you,” Bethany said, “but all
our communications are limited by this weather, so I can do little save join
you in prayer. ”

           
“He is the Chosen One, is he not?”
Yrla spread the wide skirt of her russet gown as she sat, smoothing the folds
across her legs, her gray eyes intent on the face of the Paramount Sister. “Do
you believe the Lady would let him die?”

           
“It may not be a question of
let”
Bethany
answered. “I intend no hurt—and I share
your fervent hope—but the Beltrevan
is
Ashar’s
domain and it may be that the mad god succeeded.”

           
“No!” Yrla said. “I will not
believe that.”

           
“Because he is your son?”
Bethany
asked gently, “or because of something
else?”

           
“I feel ...” Yrla paused, marshaling
her thoughts, seeking to impose logic on feelings she knew she must admit might
be no more than maternal optimism, a natural reluctance to admit Kedryn’s
death. “I feel that some pattern unfolds.”

           
“Kedryn and Wynett?”
Bethany
nodded. “It is possible. I had thought of
that myself—even hoped it, though it would lose the Sisterhood a devotee likely
to become Paramount Sister of Estrevan itself. But then you brought this news
from the
Fedyn
Pass.
”

           
“They found no bodies,” Yrla said
doggedly.

           
“But Gann Resyth saw a rocky tomb.”
Bethany
sighed, smoothing strands of white hair
from her stem brow. “And no word has come down the Idre.”

           
“It is too soon,” Yrla said,
continuing when
Bethany
frowned a question, “If they survived the avalanche they had still to
find the Drott Gathering, and then to seek the aid of the shamans. To enter the
underworld and find the shade of the warrior. To return—to High Fort, now that
the
Fedyn
Pass
is sealed. To come down the Idre. It is too
soon to know.”

           
“And too soon to hope he might
appear before the wedding,”
Bethany
murmured, her tone provoking a sharp glance from Yrla.