Lonen's War (12 page)

As if they felt it, too, the other men fell
silent until they crossed one more bridge over the deepest chasm of
all and entered a complex of towers near the one Lonen had picked
as the tallest. Tracing the line of the surrounding outer wall with
his eye, he reconstructed the encounter from the fragmented images
of that long night of assault, deciding that it could indeed be the
spot where he’d stood and seen Oria in the window.

“Is this the palace then?” he asked Ion,
figuring it for a reasonable question.

Ion nodded brusquely. “So far as we can
discern. We haven’t been sitting around chatting. But apparently
this is where their council meets and makes decisions. Prince Nat
sent me a message—a surprisingly deferential one—that this would be
the logical site for negotiations, as they had the room for plenty
at the table and for as many guards as each side felt comfortable
bringing. He offered to accede to our wishes for an alternate
meeting site, but as I had no better to offer…” He glanced at the
king.

“We shall see when we arrive, but I imagine
I would have chosen the same.” King Archimago put a hand on Ion’s
shoulder, gripping it much as he had Lonen’s the day before. “I’m
proud of you for how you’ve handled this occupation. Of all three
of you. And of—” He broke off, not naming his fourth, lost son.

The council chamber occupied a vast space
indeed, with many windows, a cross-ventilating breeze blowing
between them, fluttering the pale curtains made of sheer,
shimmering cloth reminiscent of Oria’s white gown. Destrye guard
ringed one side, the Bára guard on the other.

The two priests, masked and in their crimson
robes, sat at one end of a long table, a dozen other Bárans, mostly
elderly, ranged along the sides near them. Though women made up
part of Prince Nat’s council, some of them in golden masks and
others not, none had Oria’s distinctive hair. King Archimago took
the seat at the far end, Lonen and his brothers taking the chairs
to the sides.

Just as well. It would be a long day,
hammering out a lasting agreement. Not that Oria’s presence would
have distracted him, but the less trouble from that direction, the
better.

She floated through a gray mist.

Amorphous, numbing, it calmed her for an
endless time. She felt nothing, sensed nothing, was nothing.

Restful nothing.

But after a while, as she became aware of
the passage of time, the nothing began to bother her. The dragging
muck of sleep went from comforting to cloying to confining, keeping
her wrapped tightly like the silkworms succumbing to their lovely
cocoons. Only she would not emerge into a night-winged moth. She’d
remain trapped in this place, blind, deaf, without touch or scent
of anything. She struggled against it, wanting to scream and
finding that, too, entirely missing.

Was this death? She was alone, bereft of the
world.

“
Oria. Oria, you’re alive and I’m with
you. I’ll never leave you.”

She didn’t know who that was or who Oria
was, but she clung to the calming voice, as if it were shelter in a
sandstorm.

“
Yes. I will shelter you. Rest.
Heal.”

No longer so afraid and alone, she allowed
the sleep to rise up, grateful for the black to replace all that
clinging gray.

“…what to expect…”

“…never before…”

The disjointed phrases cottoned through her
mind. At first the words held no more meaning than the soughing of
an afternoon breeze just before sunset stilled it. After a while,
they began to retain their shape, sticking longer, with edges that
signified something. “…no more mind than an infant’s…”

Hot rose light beat through her eyelids,
burning away the last of the mist that had obliterated her senses,
and she registered a breeze on her skin, the scent of day-blooming
lilies.

“…prepare yourself for the worst.”

“I’ve already lived through the worst,” a
voice she knew well cut through. She reached out for it, blindly
seeking.

“Mama?” No sound came through her stiffened,
dry lips, which cracked, bringing bright pain that she actually
welcomed. She
was
alive. She fought to make that final
escape. There were things living people did—opening their eyes,
moving their limbs.

“
She’s here, Oria. We’re both here. Try
harder.”

“Mama!” she called, some part of her
remembering that time when she’d been unable to feed herself,
calling for this woman who—oh yes. There. That cool hand on her
forehead, then slipping behind her neck, dribbling cool, sweet
water between her lips.

“I’m here, baby girl. Wake up now.”

“It may not be wise to—”

“I’ll care for my daughter. Leave us
now.”

The room went blessedly silent, of both
sound and a certain anxiety that had strummed unpleasantly. A
smoothly scaled tail wrapped around her wrist, caressing, affection
flowing in as restorative as the water in her parched throat.

“
Swallow the water, Oria.”

“Can you open your eyes? Come on now. Wake
up for me. Chuffta is here.”

It took a monumental effort. One she had to
carefully think through, finding the old nerve pathways, cranking
at them like a servant girl working a well pulley. That helped, to
imagine the stiff wheel turning, the rope pulling, tugging at her
lashes painfully.

“Wait a moment, baby. Hold still.” The hands
went away and Oria whined an inarticulate protest. They came back,
a cool cloth on her eyelids. So much better. “There. Try
again.”

They moved more easily this time. The light
hurt, but she squinched against it, seeking her mother’s
face—unmasked and lined with worry. “Mama.”

“Yes.” The familiar brown eyes filled with
tears and spilled over, running down her face, choking out her next
words.

“Why are you crying? Don’t cry.” The words
only came out partially, mostly in a voiceless whisper. She tried
to raise a hand to wipe the tears away, but couldn’t.

“
She is happy, Oria. Grateful to have you
back with us. As am I.”

“What happened to me?” The words came better
this time, but with effort. She managed to move her eyes, though
not her head, to spot Chuffta on her pillow, green gaze intent on
her face.

“
It may be best for the moment not to try
to remember too much. Just know you’ve been ill and must recover.
Slow and steady wins this race.”

She didn’t like it, the not knowing. But it
also made her head hurt to think about it, a much less welcome
pain.

“Swallow a little more water. You need to
drink,” her mother urged.

Oria obeyed because it was the easier
choice, and because she suddenly discovered a raging thirst, as if
her belly, too, had only just awakened.

“Not too much. Not at first.” Her mother set
the cup aside, then wiped her tears away. “Sleep if you can and
I’ll wake you in a bit for more.”

Succumbing to the suggestion—or, more truly,
giving up fighting the onrushing darkness, she did. “Love you,” she
muttered before she went under.

“
We love you, too, Oria. We’re with
you.”

She sank again, with her mother’s hand
stroking her forehead and Chuffta’s firm presence in her mind, tail
wrapped around her wrist.

And a puzzling fragmented memory of granite
eyes searching hers, asking some question she couldn’t answer,
before strong arms swept her up, holding her close against his
heart.

T
hey’d been too many days
at the negotiations. Stalled, in the most galling way.

The young king, hastily ratified by his
people the evening of Bára’s crushing defeat, so they’d been told,
proved cagey and stubborn in his arguments. Far too much so for the
ruler of a conquered people. To Lonen’s ongoing puzzlement, his
father seemed to be losing ground in this war of words. Certainly
King Archimago had never had to debate in these subtly insidious
ways before. Among the Destrye, his word was law—none argued with
him, on the battlefield or off.

These sorcerers and priestesses, however,
with their expressionless masks and endless picking apart of
details—they wielded arguments as the deftest warrior would a set
of sharp blades.

And the Destrye king…well, he wasn’t the man
he’d been when they set out on this quest, much as Lonen hated to
acknowledge that much, even in his darkest thoughts.

He’d learned a great deal in the past few
days that would serve him well should he ever have to take the
crown, an unlikely event with Ion heir before him. Still, he’d
never expected Nolan to perish and leave him one step closer to the
burden of rule, so he filed the lessons away as a precaution,
trying not to fret over how his father seemed to fade with every
passing hour under the desert heat. Beyond that, the disquiet of
wondering what had happened to Oria nibbled at his peace of mind
like the biting insects that came in the open windows in late
afternoon, until someone thought to summon servants to draw the
sheer curtains. He needed to step away from it all, clear away the
nattering worries. So when they broke for a midday meal, Lonen went
walking instead.

He followed the path along the gorge that
separated the palace complex from the other parts of the city.
Clearly some long-ago ancestor had set it up so the bridges could
be quickly destroyed in case an enemy breached the walls. If the
people supporting Oria the day Bára fell had been smart, they would
have advised her to do just that, and to remain in her tower. Maybe
they had and she’d ignored the advice—she seemed stubborn enough
for it, even on brief acquaintance.

It’s not my fault the idiot left her
tower.

Indulging himself, he squinted up at the
structure, reasonably certain she must be up there somewhere. He
hadn’t seen her at all since the surrender—and her subsequent
collapse—and he couldn’t exactly ask after her health. Giving it
up, he resumed his walk, nodding at the Destrye guards stationed
here and there.

The Bárans had begun to emerge more with
every passing day, slowly taking up the business of daily life
again. Another strangeness, seeing the Destrye warriors and their
enemy interact over such things as putting the city back to order,
or even bartering for pretty objects to take home to their women.
Lonen should think about getting something for Natly. Maybe some of
that fine fabric that gleamed with its own light, for a gown or
scarf.

Hopefully they’d hear from the Destrye women
soon. Fast-riding messengers had gone out but had yet to return
with word.

A few young Báran women passed him, bare
faces tanned and hair streaked with sun, though none with Oria’s
distinctive copper. Nor did anyone he’d seen have a pet dragonlet
like hers. They nodded to him cautiously, one eyeing him with more
boldness, then fell to whispering among themselves after he’d
passed. King Archimago and Ion both had been firm in orders that
the women of Bára were not to be touched. They’d leave no Destrye
blood behind to be fouled with their witchcraft and magic.

To his surprise, he encountered Ion
approaching on the path from the other direction. His brother
lifted a hand in greeting, as if they hadn’t parted less than an
hour before. “I see we have the same idea.”

Lonen nodded ruefully at an elderly
priestess he knew from their meetings by her tower of platinum
braids, and who sat on a nearby bench, unmoving, nearly a statue in
her stillness, only the midday breeze stirring her crimson
garments, sun reflecting painfully off the golden mask. “I can’t
bear to sit any longer. How do they stand it? I feel as if I’ve
been moldering in my grave.”

Ion cocked his head in the other direction,
indicating they should move away. After they made it a short
distance down the walk, he said, “I’m concerned about how long this
is taking.”