Limits of Power (17 page)

Camwyn remembered looking up as he rode down that street; the wall here was far higher than on the other sides of the palace complex, and there was, he knew, a long blank stretch between windows. Still … surely the best thieves could climb up to the roof. From another part of the wall?

“You're not here to gape,” Master Danthur said. “Pay attention.”

Camwyn looked around again. Nothing but boxes, chests, shelves of smaller boxes and chests, cabinets … The steward and his tutor joined in opening boxes filled with sacks of coins old and new, counterfeit and true. The castle's own expert, Master Junnar of the Money-changers' Guild, arrived to show him how to test coins for gold or silver, how to use fine scales and displacement to determine whether a coin had the right amount of a precious metal.

Camwyn found that part moderately interesting, though he was tempted to ask why Master Junnar didn't just smell the coins. To him, each had a distinct odor, and he saw no reason for the tests. He did not ask, suspecting that this was yet another sign that he was developing powers he should not.

He did learn more about the Tsaian coinage than he'd known before, and his ability to pick out the counterfeits impressed Master Junnar, but it was not until near the end of the lesson, when he walked about the treasury and asked what was in this or that box or chest, that he found the one containing the regalia.

The closer he got to it, in fact, the more he wanted to approach. It was a plain box—not finely finished, carved, or inlaid—and its only distinguishing feature was a lack of any: no hinges, no hasp, no discernible line where lid met body.

“What is this?” he asked, though he already knew. “A box without any opening?”

“It's a puzzle,” the steward said. “It houses the gifts Duke Verrakai gave the king at his coronation.”

“It's none of your concern, Prince Camwyn,” Master Danthur said. Master Junnar nodded. “Such a thing, even if it could be seen, would have no place in your education.”

That was too much. “Surely, sir, a foreign crown in our treasury—one that has both affected our history and is like to affect our future—should be part of my education. The king—” He stopped, thinking how to say anything useful without breaking Mikeli's prohibitions. “Any king,” he said, “or any king's advisor, must understand the implications of such a thing, should he not?”

Master Danthur looked down his nose, more difficult as Camwyn was now his height. “Well, prince, you certainly are showing more interest in foreign affairs than you were a few days past.”

“Mikeli—the king—explained to me why it was important, especially with the Lyonyan queen visiting,” Camwyn said, attempting a mix of naivete and humility and seeing from his tutor's face that he'd failed.

“Hmpf. And I see you apply that advice to what interests the boy you are, not to what may be needed by the man you might become. Explain to me, then, what you see as the ‘implications,' as you call them, of these objects.”

That he could do, having thought about them since Duke Verrakai first brought them. “Possession of them must have affected Verrakai policy,” he said. “If only in keeping them secret so long. We do not have all the records of Tsaia during the Girdish war, but I would guess—”

“Guessing is not history, Prince.”

“I know that, sir, but it's all we have. The Verrakaien had these things and might well have thought to be kings when the old king fell in the war—only they weren't allowed. They would resent that; anyone would. They kept the things secret and used blood magery to bind them—”

“And no blood magery binds them now—so why are they bound?” asked the steward, coming nearer.

“They bound themselves,” Camwyn said. “At least that's what I heard—” And his sources, he knew, would be dismissed by his tutor as mere gossip.

“So it seems,” the steward said. “But why? Was it part of a Verrakai plot to move their influence here, into the heart of the realm?”

“I doubt it,” Camwyn said before his tutor could get a word in. “If we stipulate—” A word his tutors used often; he was proud of himself for using it now. “—that the former Verrakaien were hostile to the Crown, they were doing their best to keep the regalia and knowledge of it secret. I think the king thinks that keeping it secret was treasonous and handing it over was not.”

“True,” his tutor said. “But that does not explain how the box sealed itself. Or why.”

“To keep anyone but Duke Verrakai from opening it,” Camwyn said. “And—there's that necklace people talk about, the one stolen from Fin Panir. If the magicks in this box—” He patted it and felt his hand tingle.
Oh, please, don't let it light up!
He rushed on. “If the magicks in this box somehow know that the necklace was stolen—if the regalia have a will and want to be together—then it might fear having pieces stolen here.”

“But it's in the treasury,” the steward said. “It's safe here.”

“The Marshal-General thought the necklace was safe in the treasury in Fin Panir,” Camwyn said.

Silence for a moment; they all looked at him as if they could see his thoughts. He hoped they couldn't.

“I did wonder if it was Duke Verrakai's magery,” the steward said. “That she did not trust me—or the king—and wanted it to open only in her presence. But she said it talked to her—I heard her say so.”

Camwyn held himself still with an effort. If it talked to her, and to Mikeli, and to him … that had to be its own magery somehow. “If the other Verrakai held it bound in blood magery—then they weren't listening to it.”

“That doesn't necessarily follow,” his tutor said. “Maybe they forced it to talk.”

“Duke Verrakai could ask it,” Camwyn said. They all stared at him again; he felt his face heating. “She could,” he said. “Why not?”

So
could
you.
The voice was so clear in his head he expected to see them all react to it, but no one did.

“What was that?” his tutor asked.

“Um?”

“You looked as if you'd sat on a hot horseshoe nail.”

“I just thought—if it can talk to Duke Verrakai, whom else can it talk to?”

“What, do you think it would talk to
you
? Isn't it more likely to talk to the king, if anyone other than the Duke?”

Camwyn felt the heat on his face.

“Now don't sulk,” Master Danthur said. “You surely realize the king is more important than you are—you may be a prince, but you're only a boy. Did you really, seriously, think a magical item would prefer to talk to you?”

“No,” Camwyn muttered. The men all stared at him; he felt himself going redder by the instant. He would have to say something more to divert them but couldn't think of anything that wouldn't make things worse. “I just … I just worry that if it can talk to one person, it could talk to another. What if it did talk to the king? We don't know whose it was or what its purpose is. Is it even safe to have it here?”

“That's what I said,” the steward said. “Granted it's not a Verrakai plot. But just that it's here … If it started talking to the king—or the prince—or you or me—and no one else could hear it, that would be a foreign influence.”

All the men were staring at the box now, not at him; Camwyn edged toward the door but made only two careful steps before being noticed. “Where do you think you're going?” Master Danthur asked.

“I'm hungry,” he said. “And I thought I heard the gong.”

“You're always hungry,” Master Danthur said. “But enough of this time wasting. Back to the schoolroom with you this instant.”

Camwyn didn't argue. He now knew the way to the treasury and the order in which its locks must be unlocked. He had seen the keys for each lock; he had seen them hooked back onto the steward's belt. The guards didn't have keys; no use befriending them. The treasury had no windows, of course … but it did have, high overhead, what looked to him like a skylight. Lucky the dragon hadn't landed there, Camwyn thought.

A
rian arrived in Vérella after a journey far different from what she had expected; the forest she was used to dwindled quickly to strips of woods, giving long views of cultivated land. But nothing compared to Vérella. At Westbells, where they paused to greet Marshal Torin, Arian first heard the faint sound of bells.

“Yes, those are the bells the elves gave,” Marshal Torin said when she asked. “You will hear them all the way to the city, I expect.”

“Then we had better ride on,” Duke Mahieran said, “or the whole city will go deaf.”

As they rode, more and more people stood by the road to watch and shout greetings.

“Look there—you can see the walls now. And the bridge.”

Arian stared at the looming gray shape. Walls, towers, more towers, the tops of buildings just visible. She could not even guess how tall the walls were, or the towers within them. She saw buildings outside the walls on the downstream side—ramshackle structures, part stone and part wood, petering out into mere hovels. Her nose wrinkled at the stench of filth draining into the river, something no elf-born could ignore or tolerate.

A bridge, massive as the walls, spanned the Honnorgat, which ran deep and swift. Buildings clustered around its near end as well and stretched along the road south. Kieri had told her about that road to the Dwarfmounts that led over the pass to Valdaire and Aarenis. As they came between the buildings—inns and taverns and shops crammed together—the lines of people watching them pass thickened. The air smelled of people and cooked food and more animals.

Most had flowers to throw in her path; others waved flowering branches. Arian had never seen so many people at once in her life. Their cheers and the sound of the bells together were deafening; she could not tell what they were shouting for the noise. As they neared the bridge, Arian saw a party riding toward them, escorted by more of the Royal Guard, one in the lead bearing a great banner.

“It's the king,” Mahieran said, shouting in her ear. “He's come to welcome you.”

The heavy white horses Kieri had told her about, the Tsaian Grays, pranced over the bridge. Arian's mount trembled; she soothed it as she watched the others come nearer. The king's party stopped when the king had cleared the bridge. Someone—Arian could not see who—bellowed, and the crowd nearest them fell silent. Overhead the bell chime continued, sweet and inexorable. The king wore the Mahieran colors, with a long crimson cloak, its silver embroidery glittering in the sun, draped back over his horse's rump.

Two mounted trumpeters blew fanfares, and the king rode forward another two lengths. Beside Arian, Duke Mahieran bowed almost to his horse's crest. Arian merely inclined her head as Kieri had advised.

For a moment, all was still. King Mikeli looked at her, and she at him; she was sure he was making the same assessment she was. He was young—very young—and the family resemblance to Duke Mahieran and both Beclan and Rothlin was strong. He had darker hair and eyes than his cousins but the same bone structure, the same nose. And when he smiled, which he did then, the same smile.

“Be welcome here, Arian, Lyonya's queen,” he said then. “We greet you in all honor and wish you all joy of your visit.”

Arian had her first speech memorized, formal and full of praise for Tsaia and the courtesy of her escort. She delivered it smoothly, and the crowd cheered.

“If it pleases you to ride with me to the palace,” the king said, “my escort and yours will join together.”

“Thank you, sir king,” Arian said. She nudged her mount closer; the king wheeled and came up on her heart-side. The rest rearranged themselves; Arian noticed that the king looked straight ahead. “King Kieri sends his greetings,” she said. “He wishes you every health and joy.”

He glanced at her from the corner of his eye. “Things are more difficult without him,” he said.

“It is a difficult time,” Arian said.

“I understand that you are also half-elven,” he said.

“Yes. My father was an elf; he died not long ago.”

The king turned to look at her. “Died? I thought elves never died.”

“A blade through the heart will kill even an elf,” Arian said. “You have not heard the latest, then?”

“No—my uncle sent word that you—that poison had killed—”

“Our child, yes,” Arian said. Here in public, she must hide the grief that even new life could not extinguish. She kept her voice steady, her face immobile. “And others' babes as well. I hope Duke Mahieran bade you take care and have expensive spices examined for adulterants.”

“He said it was in food, yes. We have taken precautions. More of this at the palace,” the king said, just as one of the Royal Guard said, “Ready, sir king.” Ahead of them, the king's banner bearer moved forward, and behind him one of Arian's Squires with her banner. Their horses stepped off in stride.