Fifth Quarter (19 page)

She was surprised to see he still had teeth and more surprised yet to realize he had a very pleasant smile.

"Yesterday, the Emperor rode out." Slowly, carefully, holding her gaze with his, he described the young man he'd seen. When he finished, he took a deep breath and very carefully formed the next words as Command. "Tell me who he is."

"You must mean Prince Otavas."

It wasn't the name he remembered, but the past often poured through his memories too fluid to grasp. He nodded, slowly. "Yes…" Then he turned on one bare heel and motioned for the cousins to join him.

As they came toward her, the guard suddenly became aware that an approaching wagon would have to be thoroughly inspected and rushed out to wave the startled driver to one side. Those already passing under the arch of the wall began to hurry, all at once anxious to reach their destinations. Those still on the road found a variety of unavoidable reasons to slow their pace. Those about to leave the city found equally important reasons to delay.

The tapping of his staff against the rutted cobblestones echoed within the confines of the gate and with the cousins close behind, he entered the Capital. Jostling mobs gave way before him. Behind him, now that he'd past beyond the enclosed area, the gate filled as folk surged forward from both outside the wall and in.

"I'm looking for a prince," he said to a woman wearing a bloody apron.

She snorted, her gaze sliding by the place where the cousins stood as she backed into her shop. "Try the palace, old man."

A ripple of distress followed them as they shuffled slowly into the center of the city. A crooked-backed man who sat drooling on a doorstep, one wrist secured to a post by a bit of frayed rope, screamed as they went by. The very old and the very young trembled, suddenly cold. Some would never grow warm again.

No one looked closely enough to say,
these men are dead
, for the kigh of the living would not, could not deal with what he had done. Only the cats refused to turn away and watched all three through slitted eyes, ears back, fur lifted in spiked ridges off their spines.

He knew, although he didn't know where the knowledge originated, that it would be safer not to enter the palace. Still leaning on Aver's arm, he made his slow way around the outer wall, ignored by the guards. At last, by a small gate closer to Temple Street than he'd intended to come—long before, pain had taught him to fear those who served the gods—he sent the cousins to stand a safe distance away.

As he approached the guard, he rehearsed his Command. He had neither the training nor the strength to force a compliance that ran against duty, loyalty, or love. When the guard finally turned, he smiled and locked his gaze on the questioning eyes peering out from under the edge of the crested helm.

"Tell me about Prince Otavas. Tell me everything you know."

"Do you feel it?" Eyes wide, arms folded close around her body, Karlene stared down at the city. The stone bulk of the Center, just visible over the turrets and towers of other temples, brought no comfort. "Something… Something…"

"I don't care what you think you need," Karlene pointed out, dropping his hand and heading for the door, wishing her thoughts were not so suddenly dark and terrifying, "but I'm going for one anywa…"

A small fair-haired page exploded into the room and flung herself at Karlene's legs, her whole body shaking with the violence of her sobs. "Make it go away! Make it go away!"

A darker, older girl followed close on her heels but rocked to a stop when she saw the two bards.

Karlene shot a glance over her shoulder at Gabris, but the older bard looked as astounded as she felt. Gently peeling the thin arms from around her thighs, she dropped to her knees and gathered the girl up against her heart. "Hush, child. Nothing will hurt you here. Tell me what's wrong."

But she only shook her head and continued to sob.

"She just started to cry," the older page explained, shifting from foot to foot, her hands tracing worried circles in the air. "Then she started to run. I don't know why she came here."

"Are you all right?"

"Yes, Lady Bard."

"Then go for a healer." When the girl hesitated, Karlene added, "Hurry." using just enough Voice to ensure she was obeyed. As the footsteps pounded away down the hall, she shifted her grip and Sang comfort, reassurance, safety. Gradually, she felt the tension leave the small body she held and one hand loosed its death grip on her collar. Her eyes still swimming with tears, the girl pulled far enough away to look up at Karlene's face. She was older than the bard had first assumed, at least ten or eleven although small for her age.

Not wanting to frighten her again, Karlene added a quiet question to the comfort of her Song.

To her surprise, the page swallowed, wiped her nose on the back of her wrist, and Sang an answer. Horror spilled out in a rush of discordant melody, the emotions so powerful that the lack of training made little difference.

They Sang together for a moment, the bard directing, counseling, and finally convincing the child to bring the Song to an end. The girl pressed her face into Karlene's shoulder. "Can I stay here until it stops being scary?" she sighed.

Resting her cheek against the soft cap of hair, Karlene nodded. "Of course you can." She felt Gabris touch her shoulder and turned just enough to look up at him.

"I think we've found the Emperor a tenth bard," he said softly. "Or more accurately, the tenth bard has found us."

"Perhaps whatever it is, it's only a bardic problem. First the kigh, now this." Gabris took another swallow of the tonic the healer had left and made a face. "No one else seemed to feel that anything was wrong."

"Everyone else
denied
they felt anything," Karlene corrected. "Not the same thing."

Karlene crossed quickly to his side. Her would-be suitor looked incredibly young and very much in need of comfort. "What is it, Highness? What's wrong?"

He shrugged, shoulders jerking up and down as though he'd forgotten how to manage his body. "I, I just thought you should know that Verika's baby died this afternoon."

"Died?" Verika's baby, born in early spring, hadn't yet lived two full quarters. And now he never would.

"I was there, Karlene, in the garden by the wall. He started to cry. His nurse picked him up and she screamed and I took him." He swallowed and closed his eyes, lower lip trembling.

Without a second thought, Karlene gathered the prince into her arms. He clung to her, the way the page had and under her Song of grieving she heard him say, "He was so cold…"

She kept Singing as Gabris hurried from the room, his own health forgotten. The Empress had just lost a grandchild and would need him beside her. Karlene kept Singing as a faint keening could be heard drifting through the halls of the palace. She kept Singing even though she thought she heard the keening echoed in the city outside the palace walls.

Whatever it was, it wasn't just a bardic problem.

Karlene finished tuning her quitara and tucked it carefully between the layers of padded felt in her instrument case. For the last two days the palace had been mourning the loss of the youngest member of the Imperial Family. She needed to get out, away from the sorrow that filled the halls and chambers like a heavy fog.

"I don't think this is the right time to go to a tavern." Fatigue had flattened Gabris' voice, disapproval flattened it further still.

Her fingers closed around a stiff buckle. She kept her eyes on her hands. "I don't think this is the right time to sit around doing nothing. Someone, somewhere, has to know what's going on."

"And why do you think that someone will come to you?"

Finally, she turned to face him. "I
can't
just sit around and do nothing. And besides, the prince wasn't the only infant to die. It's important that the palace know what the city thinks just now: Are they grieving? Are they too angry to grieve? I can bring that back with me."

Gabris sighed. He didn't have the energy to argue. "Perhaps you're right."

"You know I'm right." Slinging the instrument case on her back, she started for the door. Gabris moved to block her way.

"Too angry to grieve?" he asked gently.

Karlene bit her lip and blinked back a rush of tears. "Too angry to think straight," she admitted and wondered if he'd stop her because of it. He could. Gabris was senior and could order her to remain in the palace. She wondered if she'd listen.

He stepped aside, his expression a clear indication that he'd been following the path of her thoughts. But all he said was, "I hope you find what you're looking for."

No one noticed the teenage girl in the leather neck brace who watched the palace. Hidden by more than mere shadow, Kait stood and stared unblinkingly at a small gate. When it opened, she stepped back into the shelter of a deep alcove, remembering what he had told her.

"The bard may be able to see you. Hide."

Kait had seen the bard once, singing in a marketplace, just like any of a hundred street performers who sang or juggled or danced in the Capital every day. Death had taken the memory of how the song had touched her and left only a bitter awareness that it had.

Her fingers scratched at the brace. "
Leave it on
," he'd said, so she did.

A tall woman with a pale blonde braid drawing a line of moonlight down her back, slipped out through the open gate and strode quickly away from the wall. She carried a padded case, half again as tall as she was.

"The bard isn't important. Let the bard go."

Kait waited. A fly crawled over her face. She ignored it until it danced across the surface of one eye, obscuring her vision, then she brushed it away. He'd told her to watch carefully.

The gate opened again.

"The guard told me that the prince sometimes follows the bard. If she leaves the palace and anyone follows her, you are to follow him. Find out where they are going and then come for me."

She turned and shuffled after the heavily cloaked figure who trailed the bard. While those who passed her in the dusk would not, could not, acknowledge what they saw, she walked without a circle of death surrounding her. Hers was only one young kigh— young enough to adapt.

"
You're the only one who can do this. I'm counting on you, Kait
." Although she couldn't feel his touch, he'd cupped her face in his hands and gently kissed her brow. She could almost remember wanting someone else to do that. Before she'd died.

She forced the body she wore to move a little faster. She wouldn't let him down.

The Iron Dog was nearly full of quiet, morose drinkers. A dice game in the corner proceeded by rote, the ivory cubes thrown because in that tavern at that time they were always thrown. Singing softly, Karlene made her way unnoticed to a bench by the empty fireplace and settled her quitara on her lap. If asked,, she suspected that both tavernkeeper and patrons would insist that they had no desire for music. So she didn't ask.

During her time in the Capital, she'd learned that the Dog, tucked just back of the markets and mews, attracted those whose business depended on knowing the temper of the city. If the information she searched for existed at all, she'd find it here.