Echoes of Betrayal (57 page)

“Trouble?” the man asked.

“A matter of concern,” Mahieran said.

“I will tell him,” the man said. He bowed and withdrew.

Servants had appeared by then and led them to a room with a fireplace; others came with hot sib and pastries.

“Are you all right, Father?” Beclan asked.

“My arm hurts, I’m cold, I’m stiff, and I’m hungry,” Mahieran said. “I’m also worried. Aside from that, I’m all right.”

They had been waiting only a short time—still not through with the large pot of sib—when Rothlin Mahieran opened the door.

“Father—Beclan—my lord Verrakai—I was told you were here. What’s amiss?”

“I must speak to Mikeli first, Roth,” Mahieran said.

Rothlin plucked a pastry from the tray and sat down in one of the empty chairs. “Did you send Mother ahead of you?”

“No,” Mahieran said.

“Well, past noontide, Mother sent me a note from our house here. She wanted me to arrange an audience with the king but did not say why. I sent it in, but Mikeli’s been busy with other matters. He’ll see you before he sees her, he says.”

“That’s good,” Mahieran said. “I was hoping for that.”

“Can you tell me what it’s about?”

“No, Roth, I can’t. Not until I’ve talked to the king and the Marshal-Judicar.”

“Beclan’s not … invaded …”

“No,” Dorrin said. “He is not.”

“Then—you’ll tell me later, won’t you?”

“Yes. My word on it.”

I
f I’d done what Duke Verrakai told me, none of this would have happened,” Beclan said. The Marshal-Judicar, who had asked for the tale “from the beginning,” harrumphed.

“What did she tell you to do, Beclan?” Mikeli asked. The king’s gaze did not waver.

“Gather up troops from the villages along the way back to the main house and then follow directly to Harway. But that’s not what I did. I thought I could gather more troops going a different way.”

“Why?”

Beclan flushed. “To show off, sir king. I—I wanted to bring in more than she expected.”

“I see.” Mikeli glanced at Dorrin, then at Duke Mahieran. “Were you alone when you made this decision?”

“No, sir king. My escort—two tensquads—was with me, and Sergeant Vossik said I shouldn’t.”

“Sergeant Vossik was …”

“A veteran of Phelan’s Company, sir king. He died to save me.” Beclan’s voice wavered. “I told that before.”

“I have the Royal Guard commander’s report on this,” Mikeli said. “And the reports your father has sent, as well as the letters you wrote him. And there is an oath between us, Beclan Mahieran, an oath I think must be in doubt, since you and your father and Duke Verrakai come asking immediate audience with me and the Marshal-Judicar.” He leaned forward a little, his face stern. “I warned you, Beclan Mahieran, that the oath you swore was binding as if you were of age. That false swearing was treason. Did I not?”

“Yes, sir king.”

“So tell me now, Beclan: did you swear falsely? Do you come to beg mercy for being faithless, with all these additional deaths to your name? Every one of those men now lying dead, men sent to guard you, was known to me personally. Every one had a father, a mother; some were fathers themselves. They are dead because of you, Beclan, and I tell you I will not forgive you if you are guilty of designing their deaths.”

Dorrin glanced at Beclan. Tears ran down his face, but his voice was clear as he said, “Sir king, when I gave you my oath, I swore truly,
as far as I knew. I thought Gird himself had given me the strength to resist those men, their attempt to invade me.”

“And now?”

“And now … I think … Duke Verrakai has confirmed … that something—maybe their attack, maybe Gird, maybe both—awakened some talent of my own, some innate magery I did not know I possessed. The night they attacked the cottage, I woke aware of danger. I heard a noise; I felt the same pressure I’d felt before. A sort of … of call. I took my sword and tried to sneak down the stairs, but something hit my head, and when I woke up again, it was all over.”

“That was the night the cottage was attacked, sir king,” Mahieran said. “I had met Duke Verrakai on the River Road, on her way to Vérella, and when I told her about Beclan’s situation, she insisted the precautions against attack were not enough. She convinced me. We rode for the cottage and arrived to find the attack in progress.”

“As you wrote in the report I received this morning.”

“Yes, sir king.”

“But you did not mention this … possibility.”

“No, sir king; I did not know of it until Beclan came to me this morning and told me. That courier went off last night. I was wounded in the attack, as were many of my soldiers, and Beclan had no chance to talk to me privately.”

“And
her
part in this?” The king’s glance at Dorrin was cold.

“She saved my life and Beclan’s,” Mahieran said. “If she had not insisted we go to the cottage, he might very well be invaded or dead. He was knocked unconscious, went into convulsions—and she healed him.”

“I could wish she had not been so hasty,” the king said.

“Mikeli—! Sir king—” Mahieran’s face paled.

“I do not hate Beclan, Uncle,” the king said. “But he has complicated my life, and yours, and that of the realm. If he had died of injuries inflicted by rogue Verrakaien, he would have been a tragic and heroic figure, deeply and honestly mourned. Think how many people have died on his behalf, trying to save a Mahieran from evil … and yet he is tainted, and yet he is alive. Is that fair?”

“It is not fair to blame Beclan for the deaths of those who guarded the cottage,” the Marshal-Judicar said slowly. “They were
ordered there by you, sir king. You and Duke Mahieran chose to make the lad bait—you knew trouble might come. The lad is not responsible for that.”

The king and Marshal-Judicar exchanged stares. “Well, then,” the king said finally. “Not those, perhaps, but the men he had with him—”

“His disobeying Duke Verrakai is his fault,” the Marshal-Judicar said. “He should have listened to his sergeant, yes. In my view, since he admits his fault, their deaths are sufficient punishment for that. He will carry that burden the rest of his life. As for whether he gave his oath in good faith, I know he was tested, at the time of his oath, and found to be truthful in his account of what happened. As he had never shown signs of magery before, it seems reasonable to me that he might think Gird had given him the power to resist evil. It is what we all pray for, after all.”

“And yet he has magery
now
, and that is against the Code of Gird and the laws of Tsaia. His magery taints the whole house, including me.”

“Not without a Bill of Attainder, sir king,” the Marshal-Judicar said. “And your Judicar-General would say the same. Gird himself did not approve of attainder; it’s preserved here as a concession. There is no such thing in Fintha. Beclan’s magery—assuming it’s magery and not in fact Gird’s power lent him—is his responsibility. Certainly he cannot succeed to the throne and must be removed from the list. And whether he can succeed to his father’s title, should something happen to Rothlin—”

“I don’t want it,” Beclan said. “Um … sir king. Sir.”

“Don’t be ridiculous, Beclan,” Mahieran said. “This is not about what you want, but about what’s best for the crown and the realm.”

“Duke Verrakai,” the king said, looking at Dorrin with slightly less hostility than before. “You believe his magery is innate and not implanted by those rogue Verrakaien?”

“I do,” Dorrin said.

“Do you detect any such in me or Duke Mahieran?”

“I do not, sir king, but I detected none in Beclan before. I wasn’t really looking for it, though, and a very small power might not be noticed.”

“What do you think awakened it?”

“Sir king, he prayed to Gird in his shock and grief and fear—I think it likely Gird used what innate powers he had and strengthened them at need.”

“But Gird hated magery. He would not use it—”

“That’s not quite true, sir king,” the Marshal-Judicar said. “The oldest writings we have—some discovered in the far west only a year or two ago—show that Gird hoped magelords and non-mage could live together in peace. Gird was a practical man; I can believe Gird might waken Beclan’s powers.”

“And you agree,” the king said, looking at Dorrin. “But you are not Girdish.”

“No, sir king. Yet I have lived most of my life here, in this realm, and honor Gird as another of the great saints, as Falkians do.”

The king sighed. “You must know, Duke Verrakai, that many distrust and dislike you both for your family background and your use of magery.”

“I know that, yes, sir king.”

“It has made me question my decision to make you Constable—even to create you a duke. It seemed best at the time, but—now—with what happened to the Serrostin lad and Beclan—”

“It’s not her fault,” Beclan said. “It was mine.”

“Is this what she taught you, to interrupt your king?”

“No, sir king, but—”

“In other circumstances, your squires’ defense of you would bear more weight,” the king said, ignoring Beclan. “Now it seems it might be some effect of magery.”

“I cannot prove it is not,” Dorrin said. “But if you want to test my word with a relic—”

“You would submit to that? You are Falkian!”

“Yes, but Falk and Gird agree on honesty,” Dorrin said. “And I know there is a Field of Falk here. If you want certainty, get a Captain and a Marshal.”

“Do you Falkians test truth with relics?”

“No,” Dorrin said. “The ruby can be used, though.” She touched hers. “However, you might consider its light under mage control, and you will not so consider a relic of Gird’s day.”

The king looked at Mahieran. “Find us a Captain of Falk, Uncle.
And you, Marshal-Judicar—will the relic in the palace grange be sufficient?”

“Yes, of course.”

“Then we will put them both to the test.”

T
hough Dorrin understood the reasoning, she still found it annoying to be tested in front of all the peers then in Vérella, as well as the king and the Marshal-Judicar. Her three fellow dukes, a handful of counts, one baron … most of them looking decidedly unfriendly. The Captain of Falk, whom she had not met before, greeted her warmly.

The test itself went as she had expected: the Girdish relic and Falk’s ruby both indicated she was telling the truth about everything she was asked. The king, prompted by the peers observing, asked if she had put any geas on the squires; the Marshal-Judicar was more interested in her adherence to the law.

When the test was over, Mikeli sat back and heaved a very dramatic sigh and tented his fingers. “Well,” he said to the assembled peers. “Beclan’s situation is a problem, but it is not, by all the tests, Duke Verrakai’s fault. From now on, I expect you all to speak the truth of that, whatever your opinions of her otherwise and whatever gossip you may hear. You may go; I need to speak with Duke Verrakai privately.”

They shuffled out. Mahieran said, “Do you want me to leave?”

“No. This is family business as well as crown business. I want Marshal-Judicar Oktar to stay as well, as there are legalities involving both the Code of Gird and Tsaian law.” He looked at Beclan. “Beclan—cousin—you know you cannot remain in the succession. Your very presence in the Mahieran family compromises your brother Rothlin’s place in the succession as well—even your father’s. Yes, we all think your magery came through your mother, and your mother is now confined to the city house until her active magery can be proven or disproven. But you, as a Mahieran, imperil the realm.”

Beclan looked at his father, at the Marshal-Judicar, and then back at Mikeli. “Sir king, I—I don’t want to harm you or the realm.”

“I believe you,” Mikeli said.

“I agree,” Oktar said. “On both, sir king: that his being a Mahieran, more than his having mage power, imperils the realm and that he had no such intention.”

“Intention or no, the results—the dangers—are the same. You must be cast out, Beclan,” Mikeli said. “I’m sorry—it is not fair, if your heart is true as I think it is, but so it must be.”

“But what will I do?” Beclan asked. “How can I live—I don’t know—”