Guardians of the Desert (Children of the Desert) (21 page)

“Lord Oruen,” Alyea said carefully as the doors clunked shut behind her. She found herself acutely aware of the two King’s Guards standing behind her, on the inside of those doors. During the conference with the desert lords, she’d practically forgotten their presence. But of course the king would never be truly alone, not even in his bedchamber.

She bit her lip and yanked her mind away from that train of thought.

Oruen regarded her with an openly bemused expression, his long fingers worrying at a piece of embroidery on his royal robes. Alyea smiled a little; the palace seamstresses were probably throwing fits over his clothes-wrecking nervous habits on a daily basis.

“What in all the seventeen hells do I do with you now?” he said.

Abruptly, her muddled thoughts clicked into a sharp, unemotional focus.

“I don’t see that there’s much you
can
do at the moment,” she said. “Or ought to do. Lord Oruen.”

He grimaced. “Alyea, drop that nonsense,” he said impatiently. “You’ve known me—”

“And bedded you. Yes. But that’s not relevant any more, Lord Oruen.”

His thin eyebrows rose. He sat back on his throne and studied her with a new intensity. “You’re actually serious about this.”

“I’ve gone through the trials,” she said. “All three of them. I’ve had to kill a man. Pieas Sessin, as it happened, but it was almost Chacerly. Gods know he deserved it, from what he told me.” She watched the skin around Oruen’s dark eyes tighten. “Chac owes his life to Lord Scratha,” she added, and let him have a moment to appreciate the irony in that situation. “I owe
my
life to Deiq. I’ve met with desert lords in Conclave, and been formally invested as a full desert lord; I’ve been to the teyanain fortress as an honored guest. I won’t even
start
on some of the other things that happened. Yes. I’m serious.”

He listened quietly, his forehead furrowing deeper as she spoke.

“I see,” he said. “I thought the trials took years. I assumed the title was simply . . . an expedient courtesy.”

She shook her head and turned, raising the back of her shirt to show him the mark of the first trial burned into the flesh of her lower back. At his grunt, she turned back to face him.

“Not just courtesy,” she said.

“I see that.” His face had become grave and drawn. “This is a rather large complication for me, Alyea.”

“It hasn’t simplified my life a whole lot, either.”

“Hnnph.” He snorted near-laughter, then sobered again. “What do you plan to do now?”

“I’m leaving as soon as this hunt is settled. Tomorrow morning, I hope. Deiq, Idisio, and I are headed north.”

“
North?
” He leaned forward, staring at her with unabashed bewilderment and deep concern.

“North,” she said firmly. “Idisio’s taken on the job of King’s Researcher that you initially gave to Scratha, since Lord Scratha is now bound to his fortress and can’t leave the area.”

Oruen sat back, scowling. “I knew he’d returned, and called a Conclave; but he can’t leave the area? I can see there’s quite a bit of news that hasn’t been sent to me. I thought I had better sources than that.”

“I hope you didn’t count on Micru and Chac as those sources,” she said. He flinched, and she grinned, feeling supremely smug at knowing more than he did for once. “They’ve both gone back to the desert Families that bought them long ago: Chac to Darden, Micru to Sessin.”

He sat very still, his jaw muscles taut. “I wondered why I hadn’t heard from them,” he murmured, and rubbed a hand over his face, grimacing. “
Damn
it. I should have known that.”

“They’re both very good,” Alyea said, allowing a moment’s pity for a plot gone badly wrong. “I only found out by chance and a lucky guess or two.”

One of the guards by the door coughed quietly. Oruen glanced past Alyea and held up a finger in a gesture for the man to wait a moment.

“I have to open the court now,” Oruen said, looking at Alyea again, “but I’ll arrange time this afternoon for you to sit and tell me about this new development with Scratha, and about your journey.” He reached for a thin bell-rope beside the throne. “Maybe even share some tea, how’s that sound?”

His tone annoyed her; he sounded indulgent, as though speaking to a pet or a child. Deciding it was time to establish their new respective places, she shook her head. “No, Lord Oruen.”

His hand paused, fingers just touching the cord. He frowned at her. “What now?”

She took a breath and kept her voice steady. “Would you address Lord Eredion that way? Offer tea like a treat for a child? I’m not under your authority any longer.” She wasn’t, actually, at all sure of that; but it seemed to follow from what Deiq had said about the king now treating her as an equal.

He dropped his hand from the cord and regarded her with a cold expression she’d never seen directed at her before.

“What Family do you serve?” he asked in clipped tones.

“Peysimun.”

“Peysimun isn’t a desert family; it’s a northern one, and under my authority.”

“Not any longer,” she said, unwavering. “It’s an unusual situation, I’ll admit. But I
am
a desert lord, and I’ve chosen to serve Peysimun Family, which makes us independent by default. I won’t swear my family back over to you, Lord Oruen. And if you refuse to accept our independence, I’ll move the Family holdings to the south. You’ll lose us as allies, not to mention the tax revenue.”

It was complete bluff, and she had no idea if she was right or even how to accomplish any such thing; but Oruen took it seriously. He scowled and said, “I’d have the right to declare against you—”

“You don’t want to start an internal war right now, Lord Oruen!” she said sharply, her stomach tight with sudden panic. “The city’s too unstable yet.”

“I also don’t want you to declare your own little kingdom within my borders!”

She said nothing for a moment, thinking that over, then said, “I’ve been told I’ll be expected to host a number of visitors once things settle out. Regularly. Mainly desert lords, if I understand correctly. It would probably be nice to have one central location for visiting southerners of importance to go, one that knows how to host them with full courtesy and won’t send you complaints about them disrupting business or frightening the locals.”

He stared at her, his expression one of almost comical astonishment.

“The south,” she said evenly, “turned out to be
very
different from what we’re used to here, Lord Oruen. I’m in a perfect position to act as liaison between the worlds; but I have to stand as an independent Family to do it.”

He nodded slowly. “I’ll consider it.”

She drew a breath, steadying herself, and said, “There’s no other sane option.”

“And in a matter of tendays you go from a flitterbug to being leader of a major political entity?” he demanded, suddenly angry again; she realized she should have retreated and left him to think it over, to accept it with a certain amount of grace instead of forcing his hand. “If you’re relying on Deiq’s support to pull this nonsense off, you’d best think twice. He’s more dangerous an ally than a viper, and with fewer morals. With him by your side, you’ll find yourself with more enemies than friends, Alyea; so walk carefully!”

She drew a deep breath, her temper beginning to rise in response to his; but he wasn’t finished.

“The only
possible
reason I can see for you to take leave of your senses and take up with
him
is that he’s worked his way into your—”

“Stop,” she said harshly. “Just
stop
.” Her hands shook. She fisted them tightly at her sides, more aware than ever of the guards behind her—and of Deiq’s absence.

You have to be so very careful now . . .
But why did everyone assume Deiq was keeping her that kind of company? It was beginning to aggravate her past bearing.

“It’s an obvious assumption,” Oruen pressed, unwilling to let it drop. “Do you even
know
his reputation? Or has he charmed you into thinking he loves you alone? He’s apparently very good at that—”

“Oruen, please,
stop!
I don’t want to hurt you!”

He blinked and sat forward, staring at her. “You don’t want to—
what?
”

“My cousin Kam almost died last night when he made me angry,” she said, forcing the words from a dry mouth. “He accused me of the same thing. And I . . . hit him. Deiq caught my hand just in time . . . but it still. . . .” She shook her head. “Deiq’s interference stopped me from killing him. But Deiq isn’t here right now, and I’m
afraid
of getting angry without him to hold me back.”

She drew a deep, shaky breath and strained to slow her heartbeat from its furious hammering.

He sat back, all the way into the depths of his throne this time, and regarded her silently, his face puckered with worry. To his credit, he didn’t look at his guards once, although she could sense that they’d moved much closer behind her.

“I’ve been told that a desert lord’s anger can kill,” Oruen murmured at last. “Without even a physical blow involved.”

“Yes.”

“It’s really not an empty title, then.”

“No.”

Close behind her, one of the guards coughed. The small sound seemed disproportionately loud in the taut silence, but Oruen’s gaze never left Alyea’s face, and no hint of a smile crossed his face.

“This is making my guards very uncomfortable,” he noted. “I’d like to continue this conversation later, however. Perhaps after tonight’s celebration?”

“Celebration? I thought we were hunting—”

Oruen’s tone lost some of its tautness as the talk moved back onto safer ground. “There are plenty of people handling the tath-shinn problem already. And your mother sent me an invitation to a ‘small welcome-home dinner’ at Peysimun Mansion. I suspect she’s already invited two dozen other notables, and you
are
the guest of honor; you can’t duck out of the dinner completely. She’d have your head on a platter, and rightly so.”

“Oh,
gods
,” Alyea said in real dismay, covering her mouth with one hand. “I’d forgotten about that—You’re attending?”

“I had intended to, as a courtesy to you,” he said. “Would you rather I didn’t?”

“Yes, I’d rather,” she said passionately. “My mother’s already insufferable. Make some polite excuse,
please
. I’ll have to go—you’re right, I can’t avoid that—but I’ll return to my Palace apartment afterwards, and I’ll come back to speak with you tomorrow.
Here
. Not at Peysimun Mansion.”

“She’ll be furious.” He smiled, amused—and, she thought, a little relieved.

“
Good
.”

(excerpt)

One item of grave importance, on which you may not have been fully informed, Lord Oruen, is the matter of differing life spans; especially as relating to the desert Families. While commoners, north to south, have the same life expectancy, desert Families tend to be very different. Desert lords, in particular, live for upwards of a hundred years; their children tend to live rather longer than commoners. Over the years, this tendency has created a sturdy and long-lived group of people. There are desert lords alive today who remember meeting Initin the Red, not to mention the infamous Dusty Rose.

It also means that feuds between individuals or Families can go on for a very long time indeed, and take on infinitely subtle complexities. There is no possible way you could avoid tripping over them. It would take a lifetime of study to understand the first third of the underground battles throughout the southlands.

Your previous advisor on southland matters, Chacerly, thought himself wise but had no more knowledge than that. Additionally, his understanding was flawed by his personal biases and background as a Darden supporter. Much of what he taught you will likely only get you into deep trouble with southern ambassadors. I strongly suggest attempting to recruit a southern lore-master as an advisor, but that will require significant negotiation and a strong incentive based on offered benefits, not threats.

Such negotiations can easily take years. The southlands, given their longer life spans, see urgency very differently than northerns. I counsel patience and tolerance; and in the meanwhile, listening to what Deiq of Stass has to say might well benefit you, as his knowledge of southern custom is unequaled. Offending him would be a grave mistake, for a number of reasons.

From the collection
Letters to a Northern King of Merit
penned by Lord Cafad Scratha during the reign of King Oruen