Heaven's Needle (49 page)

“There's still Duradh Mal,” Kelland said. It was an abrupt change of subject, but Bitharn wasn't surprised by that. He wasn't ready to confront the possibilities that the High Solaros had opened for them. Neither was she. Not yet. They'd deal with that later, together.

“Maolites on one side, Baozites on the other.” Thierras traced the painted mountains on his map, stopping his finger on the black dot that marked the cursed fortress. “You still want to help them reclaim it?”

“Yes. That map shows why. The same mountains that made Ang'duradh impregnable can keep its soldiers penned up just as easily. It will be years, maybe decades, before the fortress hosts a fighting force again. In that time we can be prepared to confront them.”

“At a considerable cost in blood.”

“We accept that possibility when we choose to serve. The people of Carden Vale did not, and the price they paid was worse.”

“You're certain of that?”

“Yes,” Bitharn answered. What she'd seen with her own eyes and read in the gaoler's book proved that much. She'd only read a few pages of that grisly chronicle before pushing the book aside, sickened, but one would have been enough. Death in battle, even death at the hands of Baozites, was one thing. Madness and monstrosity was entirely another. Nothing the Baozites did could compare to the horrors that Maol's victims inflicted on their families and themselves.

Kelland nodded. He rested a hand atop hers and went on. “If we leave Duradh Mal as it is, sooner or later someone like Gethel will release its corruption again. We were lucky this time; we were able to catch the madness before it spread beyond the mountains. Even so it destroyed Carden Vale and threatens Cailan. We should expect worse if it happens again. Next time we may not realize the seals are broken until all Calantyr succumbs.”

“Ah. So you want to do this because the Baozites are easier to watch?”

“Easier to watch, and less dangerous. Baozites are soldiers. Maol is a plague.”

“I wish I shared your certainty,” the High Solaros said. “There is something they want in Ang'duradh that goes beyond the fortress itself. I'm certain of that.”

“Aurandane?” Bitharn asked. But as soon as the name passed her lips, she knew that was wrong. Malentir had left the sword with them, even though he could have taken it before or after Gethel's death.

“Perhaps,” Thierras said, although clearly he thought it as unlikely as she did. “In the last few years, Baozite soldiers have made inquiries with scholars, libraries, and book dealers from Aluvair to Seawatch, buying or copying anything that purports to deal with Ang'duradh and its fall. They've been discreet about it, relatively speaking, but a rough-spoken soldier interested in that historical era is an unusual buyer of books.”

“They can't have been that concerned with secrecy,” Kelland said, “or they would have used the Thorns, and we would never have known who they were.”

Thierras shook his head. “The Thorns were otherwise occupied. They were hunting our Blessed. You were not the first one they attacked. You were only the first to have been taken.”

“Why?” Bitharn asked, at the same time Kelland said: “Who?”

“Isleyn Silverlock, though he escaped their trap. Oralia of the White Seas, who died rather than let herself be taken. Riulan of Knight's Lake, Tanarroc Hillwalker. There were others. They've been been trying since the Battle of Thelyand Ford.” Thierras turned to Bitharn. “Your question is not as easily answered. I thought, initially, that they wanted to interrogate our Blessed, or perhaps sacrifice them. Some spells are more powerful when written in holy blood. But Kelland was neither questioned nor tortured, and now I wonder if all along their goal was the reclamation of Duradh Mal. If my understanding is correct, the attacks began around the time Malentir realized that Maol was behind the fortress' fall.”

“What if it was?” Kelland asked. “If retaking Ang'duradh is truly what they want, they'll keep hunting our Blessed until they have one. Better if we cooperate—and go in with our eyes open. Working beside them in Duradh Mal will let us learn the strength and shape of their magic before it's directed at us. The chance is too valuable to waste.”

“You assume they'll let you come back alive to report anything,” Thierras said.

“The Thorn could have killed us in Shadefell. Instead he saved our lives.”

Thierras shrugged, filling his cup with tepid tea. “Because he needed you. You told me yourself; he was dying when you left that place. Only your prayers spared him from Maol's claim.”

“He'll need us in Duradh Mal as well,” Kelland said. “You taught me to use the tools I have. This is an opportunity.
We can watch the Thorn, learn from him, find weaknesses we'd never see otherwise. I've already seen at least one. There's a hidden cell near the south docks. An albino girl named Brielle guards it.”

“It isn't much.”

“It's more than we knew before. Now that we know they have a foothold in Cailan, we can watch it, and see who else goes there, or seize the girl and question her. I expect she is an acolyte, at best; I doubt the Spider would have shown me anyone truly valuable. But it's a beginning. In Duradh Mal we're likely to learn much more.”

The High Solaros glanced wryly at Bitharn. “Did he give you this speech as well?”

“Something like it,” she admitted.

“Well, if you couldn't talk him out of it, I won't expect to do better.” He turned to Kelland. “You were held in Ang'arta; you know the beast's nature. If you are still determined that this is the best course, so be it. Go to Duradh Mal. Help the Baozites reclaim their fortress. Learn what you can, and come back to report it.”

“I'll see that he does,” Bitharn said, and the two of them saw themselves out.

Instead of going to the training hall, as Bitharn had expected, Kelland took the spiral paths to the gardens. New green softened the rosebushes' gnarled stems. Nodding white snowdrops and purple-tipped spikes of crocus flourished on their rich black beds, stretching toward the afternoon sun.

Bitharn closed her eyes and turned her face to the sky. It felt so warm here, so
clean
. She understood why the flowers gloried in it. “I'm going with you to Duradh Mal.”

“It won't be pretty,” Kelland warned.

“Oh, I know. You never take me anywhere pretty.”

“This is.”

“It is,” she admitted, opening her eyes. “But we'll have to leave it soon.”

“We might, yes.” He took her hand again, folding her fingers into his, and pressed their clasped hands over his heart. “But we're here now.”

“S
hurr.”

The word was harsh and mangled, but Asharre recognized her name. She had been dreading, and hoping for, this moment since she woke to find herself in the Dome of the Sun's healing halls. Apart from a short debriefing in Thierras' study the day after her arrival, she'd spent all her waking moments sitting by Evenna's bed. After attending to the worst of her wounds, the Celestians had moved Evenna to a solitary room where she could recuperate without being disturbed by the clamor of the main healing halls.

There Asharre had gone every morning, waiting for the Illuminer to awaken. Waiting to find out how badly she had failed. Sometimes Bitharn sat with her, but mostly she waited alone.

Yellow curtains and white-oak cabinets gave the sickroom a sunny air, although the morning was cool and misty. A black-and-white cat dozed on the windowsill. Paintings of orchids and saffron crocuses adorned the walls. It was all almost cheerful … as long as Asharre ignored the woman on the bed.

Swallowing her guilt, she made herself look at Evenna. “Yes?”

The Illuminer was staring at her fiercely. From the nose down, her face was gone, torn away by her own nails. Scars covered the lower halves of her cheeks, healed smooth and shiny around the stretched-thin holes. Every word took a tremendous effort to force past her ruined lips, and Asharre could barely recognize the sounds. “Not … your fault.”

“I led you into Shadefell. Into the Mad God's snare.”

Evenna shook her head. Her eyes were clear and luminous, still beautiful. “
Our
choice to enter Carden Vale. We knew … better than you … what limits were. My pride … pushed us on after Falcien died.”

“I should have stopped you. I failed to do that and I failed to protect you.”

“You kept … me alive.” Evenna touched the rippled scars on her chin, glossy as pink obsidian. “
I am not my face
. You told me this. Taught me. Loss of vanity is … nothing. Less than nothing. I live. I serve. Because of you. Not … a small gift.”

“It should have been more. I'm sorry,” Asharre whispered.

“No. Be sorry if you stop.” The Illuminer pushed herself against the pillows, sitting up higher. Her blue eyes blazed. “
Then
… would be a waste. Wasted on pity. Did not go to Shadefell to surrender. Or so you could. Go. Go to High Solaros. Help them. Fight. Shadefell did not end it.”

Tears stung Asharre's eyes. She couldn't let them fall. Not in front of Evenna. “Forgive me,” she said, stumbling from the sickroom.

She hurried out, chin lifted, and strode from the healing halls without troubling to see where she was going. Away, that was all that mattered.

When she realized that she had turned toward the eternal gardens, Asharre hesitated. She had avoided that
part of the temple, and the memories that lived there, since Oralia's loss … but she heard no grief in the gentle rustling of maple and flowering elm, and the trilled songs of unseen birds spoke of renewal rather than mourning. The morning's mist had given way to sunshine, and the beauty of the place was a balm on her soul after Shadefell's desolation.

She walked past the formal gardens with their rings of crocuses and snowdrops, past the rose vines that would blaze white and gold in summer but showed only serrated green now. The silvery laughter of the fountains drew her, and the medicinal fragrance of healers' herbs.

The herb gardens were, as they had always been, the wildest and sweetest place in the Dome. Some small magic kept them green year-round. Although the season was still young, the herb gardens were in full bloom. Pebbled silver leaves of sage spread over tiny-flowered carpets of thyme; lacy stems of yarrow and needle spikes of rosemary reached to the sun together, exuding a tangled spice. In the shade of the linden trees that swayed along the paths, wintermint and wormwood grew.

Asharre brushed her fingertips through their leaves as she passed, bruising them to bring out their scent. Wormwood and wintermint: the two most sacred healer's herbs, Celestia's gift to her mortal children. They grew in shade as easily as sun, so that they could be planted and used where the Bright Lady's light did not reach.

Her sister had always carried wintermint and wormwood. Wintermint to soothe pain and mask unpleasant flavors; wormwood for its healing properties and its bitterness, which so many took to mean that the medicine was as powerful as its taste. Adding wintermint or wormwood to change a potion's flavor was a small trick, but Oralia had always
said that half the healer's art was inspiring confidence. The patient's belief healed as much as the Illuminer's did.

She'd loved these plants, as she had loved the people they healed. That love drove her skill. Oralia hadn't always won her battles. Sometimes the wound was too grievous, the disease too advanced, an old body too frail. Sometimes she lost. But she never turned back from a fight, even if victory was measured only in lessening pain and fear at the end.

Asharre walked slowly through the garden, breathing its bittersweet perfume, and then she straightened her back and squared her shoulders and went in search of Thierras.

He was not in his study. The acolyte dusting the windowsills said that the High Solaros had gone down to the practice halls, and it was there that Asharre found him.

Thierras stood with his elbows on a goldenwood balustrade, watching knights-in-training spar in pairs on the scuffed, chalk-ringed floor below him. The clack of wooden swords against weighted shields resonated in the practice hall, along with the novices' chanting.

All those sweating young men praying as they hacked and parried made a peculiar sight, although Asharre understood the purpose of the exercise immediately. The Knights of the Sun had to build their lungs along with their muscles so that they did not lose their breath chanting in battle, and they had to be able to meld those prayers into their fighting without distraction.

“What do you think?” the High Solaros asked.

Asharre looked over the pairs. They were getting sloppy as they tired. A few slowed their footwork in time to the pauses between chanted lines, which made them predictable and therefore easy targets. And they were all too evenly matched: each youth faced off against one of comparable
size and strength, which no doubt made for fairer sparring but was poor preparation for fights against bigger men or smaller ones.

There were fewer than fifty of them. Most were striplings, thirteen or fourteen years old. They were so young, and so few, to carry the weight of the Bright Lady's duty across Ithelas.

She shrugged. “They work hard.”

“The look on your face suggests you could say more than that,” Thierras prodded.

“Why? I am not their teacher.”

“You could be. I think you'd make a good one. We lost our master of arms recently, and though Sir Gardain has done well, he does not have the breadth of experience that you would bring to the post.”

Asharre rubbed a thumb over a scarred cheek. She
could
train the Celestian knights. It would repay her debt to the temple for sheltering her after Oralia's death, and it would, in its way, honor Surag's teachings by passing them on to the young. The old warrior might not have been pleased to see his lessons given to summerlanders … but he was dead, and she thought he might have approved of the Sun Knights' code, if not of the knights themselves.