Devlin's Luck (32 page)

This did not mean that Devlin was safe. The sorcerer might merely have been injured, and was now waiting, biding his time until he could strike again. Still, it was more than he had known before.

“I thank you for this knowledge,” Devlin said.

“This is but one of the reasons I wished to see you,” Master Dreng said. “Give me your ring.”

“Why?”

“The time for questions was before you became Chosen One. Now give me your ring.”

Devlin stripped the ring off his finger and handed it to the mage. Master Dreng placed the ring in a silver bowl and set it in the center of the worktable. Then he went over to the shelves, and from a row of flasks he pulled forth a crystal bottle filled with a dark green liquid. Returning to the table, he poured the liquid into the bowl until it covered the ring.

Master Dreng held his hands outstretched over the bowl and closed his eyes. Devlin took a step backward as the mage began to chant. Green smoke rose from the bowl and curled upward to disappear among the rafters. After a few moments the chanting stopped. Master Dreng lowered his hands and opened his eyes.

Devlin stepped toward the table and peered into the bowl. The green liquid was gone and the ring lay inside, seemingly unharmed.

Master Dreng picked the ring up and handed it to him. “Put this on,” he ordered.

Devlin did as he was bid. “What did you do?”

Master Dreng smiled. “I will tell you in a moment. But first, fetch the bottle of wine from the cupboard against the wall.”

Devlin shrugged. So the mage wished to be mysterious. He would play along with this game for now. He walked over to the cabinet and reached for the bottle. As his hand approached, he felt the ring grow warm and begin to burn. He snatched his hand back, and the heat quickly faded.

“What was that?”

“The wine is poisoned,” Master Dreng said.

“Poisoned?”

“Yes. It was a test, to see if the spell worked. A man with enemies needs to beware of many threats. The ring will now warn you of poisons or drugs.”

This was a potent gift indeed. “I am in your debt,” Devlin said.

“No. The debt is not yours. As the master mage for the royal house, protecting you is one of my duties. I should have done this at once, rather than waited so long.”

Master Dreng picked up a scroll in one hand and began to toy with it idly. He turned his head slightly, his gaze fixed on a point in the distance. “I have been thinking much of my duty, and of my own failings, in these days since we spoke in the temple.”

His words made Devlin uneasy. It had not taken him long to regret his angry outburst, and to be ashamed that he had so revealed his weakness before Captain Drakken and Master Dreng. He had tried to put that memory far behind him.

But it seemed Master Dreng had not forgotten. “I have also studied much on the Geas spell.”

“There is nothing more you need to say. What is done is done,” Devlin said. True, Master Dreng had placed the loathsome Geas spell upon him, but the mage had not been the one to craft it. He had merely been doing his duty, and for that Devlin could not blame him. Any resentment he harbored was more than offset by the gift of the protection spell Master Dreng had just given him.

Master Dreng’s lips thinned. “It is only right that you have the same knowledge I do, since you are the one bespelled.”

After a long moment, Devlin nodded.

“The Geas spell acts upon your will,” Master Dreng explained. “It knows no right or wrong of its own, but it takes your own sense of justice, of righteousness you could say, and forces the Chosen One to live up to his own highest standards, without regard for mortal weaknesses.”

How could this be? The Geas had already driven Devlin to acts that he would never have even considered before. And yet Master Dreng was saying that the Geas was not controlling Devlin, but rather giving shape to something that had lain buried inside him all this time. This he did not want to believe.

“You must be wrong,” Devlin insisted. “What of those who have no conscience, no sense of justice? How does the Geas work on them?”

“It doesn’t. Those that are unfit are destroyed during the Choosing Ceremony.”

“And you have seen this happen?”

“In the five years that I have served as Royal Mage, a dozen men and women have failed the test and been destroyed,” Master Dreng said. He looked vaguely ill.

Devlin felt ill as well. No wonder few had believed he would survive the ceremony.

“We say those who fail are destroyed by the wrath of the Gods,” Master Dreng said. “But it is interesting to note that the rejections began only after the Geas spell was created.”

So it was the spell and not the power of the Gods that destroyed the unworthy. That made far more sense than believing that the Gods cared enough about the fate of the Kingdom personally to oversee the selection of the Chosen One.

“The Geas spell has one other benefit. Its power means that no other mage can seek to bespell your will.”

Devlin could not be bespelled because he had no will of his own. Not when it mattered. But he refused to believe that the spell was simply a manifestation of his own will. The Geas was an outside force that controlled him, no matter what Master Dreng might say.

Though the mage had given him a clue to controlling the spell. The Geas could not be reasoned with, but if Devlin kept his mind focused, he could try to channel its energy. Thus he had done at Long Lake, when rather than succumbing to the temptation for a suicidal attack, he had managed to control the Geas long enough to form a plan that had a chance of succeeding.

“I thank you again for your service, and I will ponder on what you have revealed,” Devlin said. The next time the Geas called him to service, he would be better prepared.

The day of the winter solstice approached. In Jorsk they called it the midwinter festival and spent weeks preparing for the celebrations.

Devlin had his own preparations to make. In the week before the solstice he ceased trying to evade his watchers, though he continued to complain about them. He declared his intention to tire them out instead, and led them on seemingly pointless treks until they had explored nearly every corner of the palace grounds and the old city. At last he found what he was looking for, although he continued his wanderings for another day to avoid arousing suspicion.

From the market he purchased a sheet of copper and a set of jeweler’s tools, which he used to hammer the copper sheet into a small bowl. He then wrapped it in a heavy woolen cloak and hid the bundle deep within the woodpile behind the kitchen.

Most of the guards were on duty for Midwinter’s Eve, but a quarter of their number had the evening free so that they could take the watch on the morrow. The lucky guards had planned a gathering in their hall, and they invited Devlin to join them should he tire of the more formal celebrations hosted by the King and courtiers.

Devlin was carefully noncommittal in his responses, giving no hint as to his real plans.

On that day, he practiced with the bow and sword as if it were simply another day. Then, as he had done for the past week, he went into the Guard Hall and took off his heavy outer clothes, hanging them up on a rack with the others. Devlin entered the large common room and spoke for a moment to Lieutenant Didrik, while Behra, his watcher, took a seat near the door. When Devlin headed to the necessary, Behra made no move to follow him. No doubt he expected that Devlin would emerge after he had washed up, as had been his pattern before.

But this day was different. His luck held, for the washroom was empty, and Devlin went straight to the window. He opened it, and after seeing there was no one around, simply climbed through and out into the courtyard. The cold spurred him on as he made his way to the kitchen courtyard and retrieved the bundle. Donning the cloak and pulling the hood over his head, he became anonymous, just another laborer hurrying to finish his tasks in time to enjoy the festival.

Devlin kept his head low, but the guards at the eastern gate scarcely glanced at him as he joined the jostling servants heading to join family and friends at their celebrations. He traveled with the crowd until he was certain he could no longer be seen by the guards at the gate. Then he turned, making his way to the old city. From time to time he glanced behind him, but he saw no sign that he was being followed.

He reached the temple garden just before sunset. Swiftly he climbed over the low stone wall and dropped lightly down on the other side. As he had seen earlier, the snow in the garden was unmarked. There was little reason to fear that he would be disturbed.

He made his way to the center of the garden, the snow crunching softly underfoot. There, in the center was an oak tree, sacred to Mother Teá. Kneeling before the oak tree, he scraped away the snow until he reached bare earth, and cleared a space, where he then sat.

This was not his country. It was not his earth. But he had earth, and an oak tree and the open sky above him. It would have to serve. And though the Jorskians knew it not, he was certain that the dead walked here on this night, as they did in Duncaer.

From within his coat he removed the copper bowl and set it in his lap. Loosening his cloak, he pulled his left arm out, and then ripped the shirtsleeve off it, leaving his arm bare.

With his right hand he took the dagger from his belt.

“Haakon, Lord of the Sunset Realm, I, Devlin, son of Kameron and Talaith, once called Devlin of the Gifted Hands, greet my dead. May the burdens they carry be lighter for my remembrance.”

Devlin raised the knife. “Cormack, I remember thee,” he said. Holding the knife firmly, he made a shallow cut along the inside of his upper arm, and let the blood drip into the copper bowl.

As the blood dripped, he remembered his elder brother and his generous spirit. Though five years separated the two, Cormack had never complained when his younger brother insisted on following him, trying to do everything that his elder could do. Cormack had led, and Devlin had followed him, but now Cormack was gone and Devlin could not follow.

“Bevan, son of Cormack and Agneta, I remember thee,” Devlin said, making a second cut parallel to the first. He thought of nine-year-old Bevan, the eldest of Cormack’s children, and the one who most closely shared his father’s spirit. Bevan had been so proud when he was old enough to help his father as he labored. And now Bevan, too, was gone.

“Lyssa, daughter of my heart, daughter of Cerrie my joy, I remember thee,” he said, as tears welled up. He blinked them back fiercely, and his hand trembled only slightly as he made the third cut. He could not give in to his grief. Not yet. But Lyssa had been just a baby. A gift from the Gods that he had not deserved and so they had taken her from him.

“Cerrie, daughter of Ishabel and Duncan, Cerrie the proud, Cerrie the bold, Cerrie of the fierce temper, I remember thee on this day, as I do every day,” he said. He drew the final cut, his knife biting deeply into his arm.

Returning the dagger to his belt, he rhythmically squeezed his upper arm, forcing all four cuts to bleed until the bowl was half-filled. Then he placed the bowl on the ground before him, and bent forward until his forehead was pressed to the ground. He held the position for a long moment, then he straightened up.

“Know that you are remembered and be at peace. Lord Haakon, I call upon you as witness. These four are innocent. I alone bear the guilt for their deaths. As kin, I claim the burden of their sins. What they left undone in their lives, I will make right with mine. Let it be so,” he prayed, as the last rays of the sun disappeared below the horizon.

Only then did he bandage his arm with the torn short-sleeve and shrug back on his cloak, pulling the hood over his head.

The ground was chill beneath him, and cold seeped up into his bones as he contemplated the blood offering before him. The tears he had not given in to before now fell freely, running down his face and freezing where they fell on his cloak. He grieved quietly, for there was no sound great enough to express his pain.

“And we will meet a-gain,” Stephen sang, drawing the last syllable out while his fingers strummed the final chords on his harp.

There was a round of enthusiastic applause from the several dozen guards who were lucky enough not to be on duty and their friends, who had gathered in the hall to celebrate the midwinter festival. Stephen smiled, well pleased that he had accepted the guards’ invitation to join them for the celebration. He’d had offers to play in more prestigious venues, but since his return to the city he’d grown quite fond of the guards and they of him. And their honest enthusiasm was a far cry from playing for jaded nobles.

Stephen looked to his left, and caught the eye of Jenna the drummer and Thornke the fiddler, who had joined him. They were both members of the Guard, but were fairly talented for occasional musicians.

“Shall we try ‘Winter’s Heart’?” he asked, naming a popular dance.

The other two nodded, and as he began strumming the opening bars of the melody they joined in. Scanning the crowded room, he saw a ripple moving among the dancers. A ripple that was heading in his direction. As the dancers parted, he realized they were making way for Captain Drakken. Unlike the revelers, she was in uniform, and Stephen had a suspicion he knew the reason she was heading in his direction.