King of Assassins: The Elven Ways: Book Three (27 page)

“I am done here.”

“Ahhhh.” The water sighed against her thoughts. “But I am not.”

She stood, an agonizing effort against a gravity that would flatten her to the ground that would keep her fixed in place against her will. Bones trembled, sinews tightened and then crackled with the effort, but stand she did, drops of sweat running over her face like raindrops or tears, and her mouth went even drier. She placed the palms of her hands carefully against the rock wall, feeling its texture cut into her skin: rough, gritty, solid, unthinking. She turned her face away from the pool even as it cajoled her.

“I am water, but I bridge. I know what I am from what has touched me, from what will touch me, what will cross me. But because I am water, I can be shaped by a vessel. You are such a vessel.”

“Anyone who tries the shaping of such as you are plays with darkness. You infiltrate.”

“A vessel cannot hold water without becoming damp, that is true. Still. Listen. I have more to show you.”

“No.” Grace pressed herself tighter against the wall, grounding herself in the solid feel of the stone, the minerals trapped inside it, the quiet depths of its existence. With a clarity she wished she didn’t have, she knew she had begun to understand most of what the pool had shown her, the blurred images, the shadowy specters, the barest silhouettes of truth cast across the waters. Her knowledge would lead her to a course that would change her forever. She longed for Sevryn. But this course would make that impossible. She’d put a gap between them. Pain pierced her. He was already angry with her for making a decision to protect him; she’d heard the outrage in his voice. But this was different, far different, and there would be no going back from the path she intended to take, a Way of sorts, as another Vaelinar might view it, into a future she could only hope she could manipulate.

She had choices. A myriad of them. But, as it often was with choices, she had no method of telling which would be the best, in the end. All she could do was weigh them now and make the best judgment she could, and she had done that.

Rivergrace pushed herself away from the tunnel wall, headed back the way she had come in, knowing it now whether in thready light or pitch-black darkness.

“A
N OPEN ACT OF TREASON,” Lara said stubbornly, her jaw set as the words left her mouth.

“You can’t treat it as such.”

“And why not?” She swung on Bistane.

“Because we are at war and because, within our own ranks, we have enemies.”

“I count him as one of them.”

With a faint sigh, Bistane sat on the corner of her desk. “You don’t know that. Despite your anger, despite what you think he might have done, I see no evidence of any wrongdoing, Lara, and if you have secrets you fear his revealing, there’s no word on the wind of any such betrayal.” The other two men in the office kept their silence.

Her mouth twisted bitterly. “You doubt me? Who do you think tied me to my chair?”

He considered her face. “Under the right circumstances, almost any lover might have,” he answered lightly.

“He’s not my lover!” Her blue eyes reflected icily at him.

“I found you in no harm except for nightmares.”

Lara looked away from him, but not before giving him an expression of contempt.

“He is your Hand, Lara. He’s done more for you than perhaps anyone save Jeredon, and your brother is gone. You’ve kept him close and he’s kept your commands, odious as they have been from time to time. You’ve asked much from him and, as far as I know, he’s delivered it.”

“He fled.”

“It would appear from your actions now that he had reason to.”

“Don’t try to lecture me further, Bistane. You’ve haven’t your father’s experience or authority to do so.” She looked back to him, her brows drawn tightly in disdain.

It hurt him to meet her expression, but he did, saying quietly, “I have the experience even if you won’t credit me for it. But you misunderstand me. This is not a lecture, this is a discussion, and I won’t be left out of your council. I deserve it; I have earned it.” His voice tightened. “Since you dismiss me, I’ll leave you with the information I came to tell you, and it’s not good news.”

Lara put her hand up, taking in a breath with a sound as if it must have cut like a knife into her lungs. “Forgive me, Bis. It’s not just Sevryn. I would hold Rivergrace as a surety against his actions, but I don’t know if I can trust her as I want to. She has abilities; you saw them at the Andredia. My river, but she commanded it. What else could she wrest away from me?”

The other two men in the room, had remained quiet, but Tranta stirred now. “M’lady, Rivergrace has never done you malicious harm.”

“No. No, but she hasn’t been raised as we were, trained as we were, and she has ties to this world that none of us has, ties to Kerith Gods which seemed to both aid and war with her Vaelinar Talents. I don’t fear her, but I do hold her with great . . .” Lara paused, as if picking out a word after deliberation, “concern.”

“She’s aided you with those same abilities.”

After another long moment, she continued, “At Ashenbrook, true, but upon that battlefield, with others in hand—Daravan and the Ferryman—I can’t swear as to whose power it might have been or who initiated it, and what we saw then we are unlikely to ever see again, a braiding of Talents. She might be able, but does she have the heart to do it?”

“We all fear the unknown, Lara.”

She shook her head slowly. “I’ve seen her turn a river into fire, Bistane, and if she did not use that power tonight, but held it in reserve in case she needed to, then she is even more dangerous. To all of us and to herself. I love her, but I can’t trust her.”

“You don’t trust because you have doubt. You haven’t condemned her because of that same doubt. We all know her. She’s good and loving, but with a core of stone, like that which lies in the riverbeds, solid and polished and all the more beautiful for the wear of the water. Dweller-raised, she has her . . . eccentricities, but I wouldn’t even fault those.”

“But is she one of us? Truly?”

“If you count on blood alone to be one of us, what have you to say for the likes of Quendius?”

She took in a slight hiss through her teeth. “It wasn’t our blood that made him thus.”

“Perhaps. Or lack of it doesn’t make her what she is.”

“In another time, perhaps, I might be able to give her the time she needs. I haven’t got that liberty now, Bistane.”

“You would punish her for being unpolished?”

“I can’t afford to have a tool whose temper cannot be judged, whose use is unknown and uncertain and whose attraction is a distraction among those I do know well.” Lara moved back, put her hand to the nape of her neck, and rubbed gently. “Nor a prisoner.”

“What are you going to do?”

“I don’t know. The only sure remedy is one I can’t face right now.”

Bistane put his hand on her shoulder. “Then don’t.”

“One life against many? You know what I have to choose.”

“What I know, Lara,” Tranta murmured, “is that Bistane is right in that we have many enemies and few enough friends. We don’t have the experience among us that we used to: Osten is gone, Bistel is gone, Gilgarran and Daravan, gone, Jeredon and my brother.”

Bistane smiled and gripped her shoulder gently, feeling the heat of her body through fabric, the smell of her subtle perfume in the strands of her hair. “If being a pawn were treasonous, there would be many of us condemned. We don’t always know who uses it.” He leaned forward and took a subtle inhalation, breathing her in. She turned slightly, so that their cheeks almost brushed.

“Which should I take comfort in? Your advice . . . or your presence?”

Clearing his throat, Bistane moved away from her. “Whichever you need most from me.” The prick of her contempt had faded away until all that he felt now was being moved by her, as he always did, his body hardening to her closeness and his own feelings for her. She knew that of him, surely, not quite but almost lovers. He ached for her to allow him to close that gap between them, but he would not let it happen because she felt weak and helpless. He would wait. As he had for a long time, and could a while longer. Either of them might succumb to a momentary weakness, but neither of them would respect that, and if any relationship lay in their future, respect had to be partnered with the passion. She deserved and he demanded nothing less.

Farlen shifted his massive shoulders, an oft-seen habit of Osten Drebukar. He stated, “I have men searching downstream on the Andredia, to see if Sevryn survived the flash flood and where he might have washed ashore.”

“Oh, he’s gone. Where, I don’t know, but I’ve no doubt Grace had the river carry him free, far beyond where I could have reached out for him.” Lara made a tiny sound that might have been a sigh before turning about, twisting her fingers together. “What’s done is done. Tranta has a long way to get back to the shore, and Farlen has a day of plotting logistics ahead of him yet. You’ve ridden a long way, and in the night, to find me. Give us your news. I’ll have mulled wine brought up and the first of the breakfast bread.”

“That would be appreciated. Who stands watch on your door?”

“Tranta, if you do not mind.”

He did, slightly, and there was a small hitch in his stride as he filled the threshold and said, “Of course not.”

Laughing Tranta, lord of the sea and his only true rival, if he really had any, for Lara’s attention. But he would not gain Lariel’s regard by disliking Tranta. And who could dislike the man anyway? He couldn’t, if it were not for her.

“Nothing you could messenger?”

“Not reliably.” He slid his coat off his fighting leathers. “It is a rather long story.” He waited until Lara seated herself as a maid came in with a tray quickly brought in and left, while Tranta took up a stoic stance at the door of the apartment facing into the hall, a goblet of wine in one hand and a pull of butter-soaked bread in the other, the back of his gleaming head of sea-blue hair to them. Bistane knew he would listen, but his words were not meant for Lariel alone. He took his chair to relate his visit. He spoke as if it were only a tale to be told, much as he had shared his experience with his brother, and when he finished, the room sat in quiet for a moment until Lara took a deep breath.

She stirred, smoothing the napkin over her lap distractedly. “What of the books?”

“We unwrapped the book Azel had marked as most advanced and found it in deplorable condition, as he warned we would. My brother secured it even more thoroughly than our good scholar had. It should last until Verdayne reaches Calcort although it may be in nothing but crumbles and ash if it does not. He carries a second, one barely touched, or at least that was its condition when Verdayne secured it. It’s virulent, whatever it is. If it is caused by pests, they are so tiny they can’t be sighted easily.”

“What if we are carrying the curse to Calcort? I don’t want to see the contamination spread. All those libraries, all those books.”

“Azel says his ordinary books and scrolls have not been infected. So far.”

Lara tilted her head to one side, a fall of silver-and-blonde hair cascading down her shoulder as she did. “The
Books of All Truth
are a Way. Is it coming undone?”

Tranta shifted uneasily in the threshold, and Bistane scratched the side of his jaw as her words fell ominously between them. Farlen made a deep noise of distress like a groan stifled in his vast Drebukar frame. Bistane gathered himself and leaned forward. “Pray it isn’t so, lady queen.”

C
EYLA LAY IN THE FALLEN TRUNK of the great tree, an aryn tree no less, and shivered despite the fact she no longer had feeling in her hands or feet, the decomposing matter inside as damp as it was outside, rain drizzling inside to find her no matter how deep she tried to burrow. She was now into her second day of running. The foul weather had given her two strokes of luck . . . the first being that the hounds had lost her scent (and the water washed her clean of the awful slime) and the second being that one of the hunters had gotten near her without knowing it before his horse slipped on the wet needles and leaves on the forest bed, throwing him and running off. She’d been the one to catch the horse and it stood now, half-dozing, as she tried to catch a small stretch of sleep. The rider had died of his injuries. Ceyla had rolled his body under a thicket of silver finger and led the horse away until she could find a tall enough stump or fallen tree to mount from, and ridden away as far as she could. They wouldn’t find the body for days, until the corpse stench could draw the hounds, and by then she should be south and east toward her destination. Should be. Would be. Could be. For a dizzying moment, the threads of many futures dazzled her thought and sight, and then one
twanged
true and her vision cleared again to the here and now.

Ceyla put the heel of her hand to her brow. Never had she been so struck and staggered by the futures ranging before her, all vaguely different and vaguely familiar at the same time, with a driving goal to reach that she could not forget or let go. That one thread, that tight and thrumming singleton that drove her and seemingly bound her fate, now told her to sleep. Sleep a while and then ride, ride to the one she must meet. The feeling in her limbs would return with a burning vengeance and she would stay alive and whole until she met the man of her destiny upon the road.

And then she knew little of what might happen beyond that.

She pressed the heel of her palm tightly against her temple as if it could wipe away the painful throbbing of her mind. It worked for the briefest of moments and then her thoughts broke through in a lightning-strike surge so strong that it flung her back against the rough trunk of the tree with a smack that sent a different sort of pain through her skull.

She needed sleep! Her body begged her for it and her mind perversely held it just out of her reach, spinning thought after thought instead. None and all could be true, and Ceyla no longer cared. She’d started on one path and would remain dogged to it no matter what frayed and scattered pathways seemed determined to sprout before her inner vision. She could not choose them all!