Fortress in the Eye of Time (30 page)

A breath. A settling. “I don't know, sir. I don't remember all that I saw or all that I did, or where I was. I thought I was doing what I ought. But I thought you and the soldiers were behind me. I thought you were there.”

“Damn you! you knew. You knew where we were!”

“No, sir. I did not.”

“Men
die
for such mistakes, Tristen.”

“Yes, sir,” the answer came faintly.

“You damned near killed your horse, damned near killed
me
, and half the men with us. If it wasn't wizardry that carried you safe over those jumps, I should assess that mare's foals for wings.—And, damn you, don't look at me like a simpleton! You say you're not simple. You claim Mauryl for your teacher. You say there's nothing unnatural about your riding, your appearance, or your coming here. You say there was nothing unnatural in your sleep nor in your waking. What do you think me? A fool?”

“No, sir.”

Fainter still. More contrite. Cefwyn averted his eyes from that look that compelled belief. He opened the huge book and turned to the place the loose parchment marked.

“What did you seek in this book?” he asked Tristen without looking up. “What do you seek in the one Mauryl gave you?—Who
were
you before Mauryl set hand to you?”

There was no answer. He looked up and saw Tristen's face had turned quite, quite pale.

“I don't know, sir.”

“What did he send you to do?”

“I don't know, sir.”

“I want more answer than that. I want your honest, considerate opinion.”

“I know, sir. But I don't—I don't understand—what I was to do. I don't even understand—what I am. I think—I think—”

Finish it, Cefwyn thought, his own heart beating in terror, because Tristen had gone beyond what he asked, went beyond, in his wondering, what he would ever want to know of wizard-work—because there
were
answers, and there was, he suddenly realized it in the context of Tristen's vacillations between feckless acceptance and that severe, terrible self-confrontation,—there was somewhere a truth. He was Emuin's student as Tristen was Mauryl's. He had learned no wizardry but he had learned its peculiar logic. There was a reason Tristen had not read Mauryl's strange book. There was a reason Tristen had gotten onto the red mare uncertain of the reins and hours later terrified him in a hellbent rush he could not match with a better horse.

“I think,” Tristen said in a thin, small voice. “I think other men are different than I am.”

It was another of Tristen's turn-about conclusions, the sort that could tempt a man to laughter. But this one stuck in a prince's throat. This one echoed off walls of his own circumscribed world, and he thought to himself, too,—he, the Prince of Ylesuin—Other men are different than I am; while the look in Tristen's eyes mirrored his own inward fear. That, he saw facing him and, much, much worse, the look of a man who could say that honestly, the look of a man who had gone to that archive and asked for that book.

Alone. Mortally alone. He understood such fear. He had to fear Tristen's declaration for what it was, but he respected above all else the courage it took to face that surmise and seek an answer, with all it might mean.

“Tristen, certain folk say it was bandits who attacked against my banner. Certain folk say it was otherwise, a mistake, only
the movement of Amefin patrols and lost shepherds. What do you think?”

“There
was
harm meant.”

“I agree. I've set guards to protect certain people, and you will aid me best, understand, if you do not go wandering about the halls against the advice of your guards.”

“Yes, sir. I'm sorry.”

“Are you
well
, Tristen?”

“Yes, sir.”

“You said you could not recognize a lie. Now I ask you to discover the truth, truth, as you would speak to Mauryl. Say it to me or never again ask me to trust you. What did you see that frightened you?”

“Smoke. Fear. Fire. I wanted us to come
through
, sir. I wanted
you
to come through, and I thought you were behind me, I did truly think so.” There was a moment's silence. “I believe I thought so.”

“You thought you were leading me to safety.—Or, if you were only running, Tristen, I forgive it. Only say so.”

“No, sir. I thought that I was going toward safety—I believed that you were behind me, and that if I turned back…if I turned back…I don't know, sir. That's all I remember.”

“Conveniently so,” Idrys said, forgotten in his habitual stillness. Cefwyn flinched, the spell broken.

“But you did follow me, sir,” Tristen said.

“And you fell straightway into a sleep no man could break,” Idrys said coldly. “Is this wizardry? Or what is it?”

“I—” Tristen shook his head, and there was—there was—Cefwyn would swear he detected guilt, or subterfuge in that look; and if this was guilt, the other things were either lies or hedgings of the truth.

“Did you dream?” he asked, and Tristen looked at him like a trapped deer.

“No, sir.”

“What did you do? The
truth
, Tristen. As you told me before. Trust me now or never trust me. You have no choice.”

“There were names. There were too many names. I grew tired. I slept. I sleep when there are too many names.”

“Names of what?”

“Althalen. Emwy. Other names. I might know them if you said them, m'lord. I can think. I can try to think of them.”

“Did this dusty book tell you anything?”

“Not yet, sir.”

“You didn't read it.”

“I hadn't time, sir.”

Cefwyn leaned back and bit his lip, flicked a glance to Idrys.

“Be rid of him,” Idrys said. “At least confine him until Emuin returns. Neither you nor I can deal with something Mauryl Gestaurien had his hand in. This Shaping is no hedge-magician's amusement. Be rid of it.”

“Damn you, Idrys!” He saw Tristen's face gone ashen. “Tristen.”

“Sir?”

“Would you do me harm?”

“No, sir, in no way would I.”

“Go back to your rooms across the hall. Do not leave them on any account. I'll have your belongings delivered to you.”

“Yes, m'lord Prince.”

“This evening…” Cefwyn said, impelled to soften his order, which was arrest and confinement. And he had not intended to agree with Idrys' cursed advice, nor at all to appear to—but it seemed the only safety for Tristen and for the Crown and the peace. “This evening I shall expect you at dinner, if you will accord me the pleasure.”

“Sir.” Tristen rose from his chair, seeming reassured. Idrys saw him to the door with complete if cold courtesy.

Then Idrys came back to stand in front of the table, arms folded, impossible to ignore.

“Do not give him that book, m'lord Prince. Don't send it to him.”

“You are a useful man to me, Idrys, but do nothing to harm him.
Nothing
.—And
whose
man are you?”

“Where it regards your safety,…yours, of course.—What says that book, my lord Prince?”

“Blast you,—must
none
come near me but you?”

There was a moment's silence. Idrys drew a long and quiet breath while Cefwyn tried to catch his.

“You suffer strange attractions, my lord Prince, mindfully stubborn attractions toward those things which are most likely to harm you.”

“You suspect everything and everyone that comes close to me! You and Emuin—”

“Orien and Tarien, my lord?”

“Damn you!” He looked aside, feeling a burning in his eyes he cared not to show to Idrys.

“My lord Prince,” Idrys said, coming to lean too familiarly against his chair back, “the last of the Sihhë kings died at Althalen at the hand of your grandfather. That is what he will read in that book.”

Cefwyn swept the parchment aside from the place it marked, and smoothed the heavy page. The letters swam before his eyes, a script that cast back to the Galasite foundations of
all
writings, a history once safely remote from his present-day concerns.

“The Marhanen,” said Idrys, “were not kings then; they were trusted chamberlains to the long line of Sihhë halflings in Althalen. As your grandfather was to Elfwyn. Perhaps our innocent lad would like you to resume that post to him.”

“Push me no further, Idrys. I warn you.”

“I warn
you
, m'lord Prince. Not so long ago, not so long ago that cursed place sank in ashes: men are still living who remember. Emuin for one.
He
was at Althalen. Ask him.
Mauryl
was certainly there to open the gates to your grandfather and make him King; and for that pretty treachery, your grandfather appointed Mauryl only the ruins of Ynefel and banned his arms from civilized precincts. A fine jest, was it not? And for all these years the woods have grown over Althalen and cloaked all the bloody Marhanen sins.”

Cefwyn looked up sharply. “Speak so freely to my father, Idrys.”

“Murder has been done for far lesser things than thrones. Most dangerous when the possessors of thrones forget how they came by them. Your father, like your grandfather, decreed death for bearing the Sihhë arms or practicing the old arts.”

“Yet employed Emuin!”

“What says the book, my lord Prince?”

“Blast your impudence!”

“It serves you.
What says the book, my lord?
”

Cefwyn covered the page with his outspread palm, stayed a moment until the swimming letters became clear again and his breathing steadied.

“I have need of Emuin.”

“Now,
now
, you are sensible, my lord Prince.”

He whirled on Idrys, making the chair turn. “But likewise you shall wait for his advice, hear me, Idrys. You will lay no hand on Tristen!”

“My lord Prince.” Idrys stood back, implacable. “For your own safety—”

“For
yours
, do not exceed my orders.”

“Do you know, my lord,
why
Emuin made such haste to escape Henas'amef? Do you know
why
he retreated out of Amefel before this Shaping of Mauryl's asked him too close questions?”

“You make far too sinister a design. He has gone to retreat to consider.”

“To consider what, my prince? Your messages?”

“He will come back, damn you, when he has thought this matter through…”

“My lord,
I
have thought on this. I have thought long and hard on this: if Mauryl could summon something out of the last hour of Althalen, think you that of the two thousand men who died there, it would have been some humble spitboy out of the kitchens? This Shaping is deadly. Mauryl was no true friend to the Marhanens, nor to the Elwynim, either. He served the Sihhë until he turned on them, out of some quarrel
with his fellow wizards. He killed his own king. He locked himself ever after in Ynefel, brooding on gods only know what resentments or what purposes; and dying, sends you
this
, this Shaping with lordly graces? Ask his
name
, m'lord. I urge you ask his name.”

“He does not know his name.”

“One can guess.”

Cefwyn pressed his lips together, the sweat started on his brow. He wiped at it. “You suppose. You suppose, Idrys.”

“A Sihhë, my lord. What worse could he send you?”

He had no answer for that.

“No stableboy,” Idrys said. “No scullion.”

“Then why for a halfling king? Why not the first five Sihhë lords—those of full blood?”

“Why not, indeed, my lord Prince? A good question.”

Cefwyn left the chair in temper and went to look out the window at something less troubling. At pigeons walking on the sill.

“They still burn straw men in this district,” Idrys said. “You see the old symbols on boundary stones, to the priests' abhorrence.”

“I have seen them. I have had your reports, master crow. I do listen.”

“Read the chronicle, m'lord Prince. The Sihhë were gentle lords. Some of the latest, at least. Barrakkêth's blood ran thin at the last. They ate no children. They went to straw men and not captives for their observances…”

“They never ate children. That's a Quinalt story.”

“But were they always straw men, at festival?”

“None of us know. Histories may lie. My grandfather was not immune to the malady, you know.”

“Elfwyn, was, they say, a very gentle sort. Dead at Althalen—as were they all. Last Sihhë king.—Last of the witch-lords.”

“Then no hazard to us. A gentle man. You say so.”

“One doubts he even blamed Mauryl for his death. And perhaps he was the only one of that line Mauryl would regret.”

“If he were Elfwyn, if he
were
Elfwyn—”

“It was Elfwyn's younger brother Mauryl wanted dead. So did Emuin, and all that circle. So I'm told. They insisted the youngest Sihhë prince was a black wizard, whatever that means, if not a sorcerer. And of course Mauryl and his circle had no wizardly ambitions, themselves, whatever makes wizards ambitious. But the child prince died in the fall of Althalen, and so did Elfwyn and all the Sihhë who could claim the name, since the wizards could come by Marhanen help
and
arms no less bloodily. Marhanen ambition was satisfied with the crown. The Elwynim councillors drew off to shape a Regency until the Sihhë should rise from their smoky grave, I suppose, and sit on the throne of Elwynor. I wonder what satisfied Mauryl. A tower in the woods?”

“Who knows what Mauryl wished or wanted?” Cefwyn retorted. “One supposes he got it, since he left us in peace.”

“But, if one believes the Elwynim,—”

“One has no reason to believe the Elwynim.”