Kushiel's Dart (59 page)

"Oh, nearly." Lodur worked deftly, winding bandages of clean linen about Joscelin's balm-smeared skin. "He'll heal quickly. These D'Angelines, they've gods' blood in their veins. It's old and faint all right, but even a mere trace of it's a powerful thing, Waldemar Berundson."

If I did not miss the warning in his words, Selig could not fail to heed it. "Old and powerful, and corrupted with generations of softness, old master. Their gods will bow their heads to the All-Father, and we will claim the magic of their blood for our own descendants, to infuse it with red-blooded Skaldi vigor."

The old man glanced up at him, his one eye as wintry and distant as a wolfs. "May it be as you say, young Waldemar. I am too ancient to strong-arm the gods."

I felt a chill run through me at his words. Whatever else was true, the old man had power, that much I knew. I felt it in that hut, creeping over my skin, whispering of the dark earth and the towering firs, of iron and blood, fox, wolf and raven. Lodur rose then, patting Joscelin kindly on the head, and gathered his things.

At the center of the steading, he refused a ride back to his home in the woods, saying he would welcome the walk. I, shivering as always, could not credit his hardiness, but truly, his bare skin seemed unaffected by the cold. Selig was speaking to the White Brethren about some matter, so I took the chance to approach Lodur as he made ready to leave.

"Did you mean it?" I asked him. "About the weapon?"

No more than that did I say, but he knew what I meant and considered me, standing ankle-deep in snow. "Who knows the ways of the gods? Baldur the Beautiful was slain with a sprig of mistletoe, cast by an unknowing hand. Are you less likely a weapon?"

I had no answer to that, and the old man laughed. "Still, if I were young Waldemar, I'd take the risk of you too," he added with a wicked grin, "and if I were not much younger at all, I'd ask you for a kiss."

Of all the unlikely things, it made me blush. Lodur cackled again and struck out across the snow, staff in hand, walking briskly back the way we'd come. A strange man; I'd never met stranger. I was sorry not to see him again.

For his part, Waldemar Selig responded to the whole encounter by regarding me with a new suspicion. It came out that night in bed, when he did not bid me to please him, but regarded me instead, tracing with one finger the lineaments of my marque. "Mayhap there is rune-magic in these markings, Faydra," he said, deceptively. "Would you say so?"

"It is my marque, that says I am pledged to Naamah's service. All her Servants bear such, and there is no magic in it save freedom, when it is made complete." I held myself quiet, kneeling before him.

"So you say." He laid his hand open across my back; it spanned a great expanse of my skin. "You say you were sold into slavery because you knew too much. I, I would merely kill you, were it so. Why do you live?"

Melisande's voice came back to me, calm and distant.
I'd no more kill you than I'd destroy a priceless fresco or a vase
. "My lord," I whispered, "I am the only one of my kind. Would you kill a wolf with fur of purest silver, if it wandered into your steading?"

He pondered it, then drew away from me, shaking his head. "I cannot say. Perhaps it was led by Odhinn, to my spear. I do not understand this thing you say you are."

It was true, and a mercy to me. Even he, the least unsubtle of Skaldi, understood pleasure in its simpler terms. It was not much, but I was grateful for it. "I am your servant, my lord," I said, bowing my head and setting the rest aside. It was enough. He reached for me, then, running his fingers through my hair, and drew me down to him.

FIFTY

As Lodur had predicted, Joscelin healed quickly. Selig had his arms brought to their training-sessions, and sought to learn this new D'Angeline skill.

I'd paid little heed to Joscelin's sessions with Alcuin in the garden. Now I watched more closely. The forms through which Joscelin flowed so effortlessly in his morning ritual were at the heart of it. Watching, I saw them broken down and how each one had a purpose. No matter that the Cassilines had given them poetic names, they were strikes and feints, blocks and parries, all of them, designed to lead and anticipate an opponent's blows—or multiple opponents, as it were.

Members of the Cassiline Brotherhood begin their training at ten, when they are inducted. Day after day, for long years, they practice nothing else, until the forms are so deeply embedded in them that they can do them backwards and forwards, waking or sleeping. And even so, they do them every morning, lest the memory etched in their bones begin to flag.

I'd thought, when Joscelin said he couldn't teach it to Selig, that he meant it was against his vows; I saw then that he meant it was impossible. With Alcuin, it had been play, and he'd naught to unlearn. Waldemar Selig, acknowledged champion of the Skaldi, thought to add to his skill. But what Joscelin sought to teach him ran contrary to the simple, brutal efficiency bred and trained into him. When he found himself floundering, awkward as a stripling lad, he grew impatient and displeased.

The lessons ended. Joscelin's arms were locked away in Selig's cupboard, and his shackles returned permanently.

And Selig's suspicions mounted.

Kolbjorn of the Manni came to meet with him, bearing news from the south. There are Skaldi there, I learned, who live near the border of Caerdicca Unitas nigh unto Tiberian nobles, with proper houses and vast estates worked by slaves. The Caerdicci reckoned them almost civilized, and still maintained some measure of trade and correspondence with them. It was from them that Kolbjorn came, bearing a letter for Selig.

Even in the bustle of the great hall, I knew how to make myself invisible, kneeling motionless in a corner. Selig supposed me working on some new translation for him, and paid me no heed; taking their cue from him, the others ignored me. I was too far to read, but I saw his face as he broke the seal and opened the letter. It held relief. "Kilberhaar suspects nothing!" he exclaimed, clapping Kolbjorn on the back. "He will take our bait, and move his armies as we agreed. Good news, eh?"

Kolbjorn of the Manni rumbled something in agreement, I couldn't hear what. I saw, instead, the letter lying open on the table between them, the cracked seal impressed in gold wax. Broken or no, I knew the design, even at a distance. Three keys intertwined, almost lost in the intricate pattern; the emblem of Kushiel, who was said to hold the keys to the portals of hell.

It was the insignia of House Shahrizai.

Of course, I thought, kneeling in silent agony. Of course. Melisande Shahrizai was clever enough to bring down House Trevalion; she was too clever to fall with House d'Aiglemort. She would play both sides, and claim the victor's part. I clutched the diamond at my throat, grasping it until I could feel every facet impressed into my palm. Even here, I was not beyond her reach.

It was then that I heard, through a distant haze, Selig tell Kolbjorn in a casual tone that there would be a great hunt on the morrow. The Skaldi place great stock in hospitality, and Kolbjorn was a valuable ally; the hunt would be held in his honor, and a feast to follow.

That was when the plan came to me.

Withdrawing silently, I returned without subterfuge, approaching Selig and kneeling. He acknowledged me with a nod, and I begged his permission to visit Joscelin. He granted it absentmindedly, sending one of the White Brethren with me. Trudging across the snow, I studied the lay of the steading and the encampment, my mind working feverishly. It would work, perhaps. If sufficient numbers of Selig's thanes turned out for the hunt. If Joscelin would cooperate.

That was the sticking point.

I ducked through the doorway of the hut, my escort following. Joscelin was exercising insofar as his shackles permitted, hard at press-ups against the floor. He had little else to do, save meditate. He got to his feet when we entered, chains rattling. The White Brethren guard gave the hut a cursory scan, then went to wait outside the door, preferring the fresh cold air to the sullen, smoky chill inside.

"Look," Joscelin said to me, nudging the iron ring staked into the raw wooden planks of the floor. It wobbled, obviously loose in its hole. I was glad, for it was one less obstacle. "What's been happening?" he asked me then. "I've heard the camps stirring."

"Kolbjorn of the Manni is here," I said. "Joscelin, he brought a letter from the south, routed through Caerdicca Unitas. I saw the seal. It was from Melisande."

He was silent, then, taking in the extent of her betrayal. I knew the shock of it. "What did it say?" he asked eventually. I shook my head.

"I'd no chance to see. But I know she told him d'Aiglemort doesn't suspect anything."

"Do you think it's true?"

I hadn't considered it, too stunned to question it; seeing the possibility, I smacked my forehead. "I don't know. She might be playing Selig into d'Aiglemort's hands. It could be." We stared at each other. "Either way," I said softly, "the Crown falls, and she stands to gain. Joscelin, could you kill a man with your hands?"

He turned pale. "Why do you ask?"

I told him my plan.

When I was done, he paced the hut with shackled steps, circling at the length his chain allowed. I could see the thoughts chasing themselves across his features. "You are asking me to betray my vow," he said at last, not looking at me. "To attack, unprovoked ... to kill... it goes against all the tenets I have sworn to honor. What you ask, Phedre . .. it's murder."

"I know." There were a great many things I could have said. I could have pointed out to him that we were both dying by slow degrees, he in chains, I serving Waldemar Selig's pleasure against a rising tide of hatred. I could have argued that we were at war and trapped behind enemy lines, where the common rules of decency no longer apply. I could have said these things, and did not. Joscelin knew them as well as I did.

It was still murder.

After a long moment, he looked at me. "I will do what you ask," he said softly, his voice inflectionless.

Thus our plan was laid.

All that day, I was restless, my heart beating at an unaccustomed pace and a sick, nervous feel in the pit of my stomach. I hid it with smiles and pleasantries, going quietly about the business of Selig's orders, wearing subservience like a mask. I must have done it well; he was in good enough spirits to set aside his suspicions during the day, making a point to compliment my service in Kolbjorn's presence. Glad that Selig would be wholly given over to Skaldic pursuits and not D'Angeline corruption on the mor-his thanes and the White Brethren made no trouble over it.

row.

He had me that night. By chance, it happened that we had come to a passage in the
Trois Milles Joies
called "The Rutting Stag," and Selig took it as a good omen, for they would hunt deer the next day. On my hands and knees, I shuddered beneath him, staring at the carved headboard and despising him as he thrust himself into me, head thrown back, hands clutching hard at my shoulders. Enjoy it, my lord, I thought, it is the last you will have of me.

Afterward he slept, while I lay wide-eyed in the darkness. Only a faint glimmer of orange came from the shifting embers, glinting where it struck metal. I stared at the nearest gleam, my mind occupied with a thousand details, not realizing what it was until the shape of it resolved itself out of darkness and made sense to my eyes.

It was Selig's dagger, laid upon the far night table when he undressed.

Of course, I thought, and relief suffused me. Of course there was another way. The price was higher, but the end . . . oh, the end was sure! Turning my head, I gazed at Selig as he slept, picking out his features by the faint emberlight. His face was peaceful in repose, as though no bad thoughts troubled his dreams. He breathed deeply, his powerful chest rising and falling with even, regular motions. There, I thought; my eyes had grown quite accustomed to the dark. There, in the hollow at the base of his throat, laid bare by his forked beard. Shove the point in there, and twist. I knew little of weapons, but it would suffice.

All I had to do was reach the dagger.

I shifted cautiously, reaching one arm across his body.

The bed creaked on its timbers, and I felt a hand grasp my wrist. Gazing down, I saw Selig's eyes, open and awake. He was not Gunter, to sleep like the dead through any manner of disturbance . . . Waldemar Selig, they called him, Blessed, proof against steel. What I did then, I did without choice. I had nearly been caught attempting to assassinate the apparent King of the Skaldi. With a murmuring sound of protest, I shifted my arm to reach around him in embrace, laying my head upon his shoulder.

It pleased him, to think I had come unwilling to tenderness. He gave a drowsy chuckle, which echoed like a drum beneath my ear, and let me stay, nestled into him. His breathing settled back quickly into the rhythms of sleep. I lay awake for a long time, forcing my limbs to pliancy, willing away the rigidity of terror. At last, exhausted by fear, I slid into restless dreams.

The morning dawned crisp and bright, and the great hall bustled with all of the activity attendant on a hunt. I moved through it all in wooden shock, feeling like I had stumbled, dazed, into some strange theatre. Refreshed by sleep, my terror had returned, split between horror at what had nearly befallen last night and the fear of what was to come. I remember very little of that morning. The Skaldi arming to hunt, the women at their labors, the horses brought round stamping against the cold; it blurs in my mind with the morning Gunter's folk went raiding and came back singing of slain D'Angelines. Even Harald the Beardless was there, fingering the new growth on his chin and giving me a cheerful wink, not knowing I was in disfavor among Selig's folk. Only the yelping of dogs was different; that, and the White Brethren drawing straws to see who would stay to guard me. Those were Selig's orders. A thane named Trygve drew the short straw, grumbling amid good-natured jeers from his comrades. He cut it short at a warning glance from Selig. I kept my eyes downcast, not wanting to look at the man whom fate and a short straw had marked for death.