Master (Book 5) (42 page)

He ate with them, listening to the subtle and pleasant buzz of conversation. He heard no griping at the thinness of the stew, nor of the flavor of the conjured bread or the water that had been hauled in buckets from the nearby stream and from the well. The sound was all amiable, children playing in the background with yells and yawps of joy, laughter at jests. It reminded him of the days of Sanctuary before he’d left to go to war. The pall over the Great Hall had been thorough of late, but it had not always been so. Once, there had been joy in meals, happiness and shared humor. A lightness at being together in fellowship that made him wonder at its absence.

“What are you thinking?” Cattrine asked him, sitting across the table after he had finished his meal. The noonday sun was sinking in the sky, and Cyrus reckoned it was growing late, perhaps even toward the dinner hour at Sanctuary.

“Thinking about the way things were,” Cyrus said. “The way I’d like them to be again.”

“That sounds like the task of a leader,” Cattrine said. “Boosting morale.”

“Morale is a difficult thing to control, what with the war,” Cyrus said. “With the famine.”

“Send the world’s greatest farmer into the desert for a year and all you’re reap is a prodigious crop of sand,” Cattrine said.

Cyrus pondered the meaning for a moment before acknowledging defeat. “What is that supposed to mean?”

“It means that sometimes you can’t win given the circumstances,” she said. “That sometimes perhaps the morale battle is lost. But I don’t think—judging from those of my people who live and work with you in Sanctuary—that you’re trying to farm in the desert. I think the morale is fine, that the company is good and true. I think you simply see through darker eyes now yourself. Perhaps what is a desert to you is a green field to another.” She glanced toward the emerald hillside, taking it all in with the sweep of her gaze. “Bare and barren are two separate things, after all.”

“I see it as more work,” Cyrus said, leaning his elbows on the table. “Things I need to take handle of, even if I’m only the General of Sanctuary. Things I need to get my hands around.”

“I am sure that whatever you turn your eye to will burgeon,” Cattrine said. “Your talents, when applied, will make short work of most problems.”

He watched her carefully. “Your words are kind.”

She returned his gaze. “You are suspicious of my motives?”

“I suspect gratitude is your motive,” Cyrus said. “For what we’ve done to try and help you.” He let out a sigh. “And nothing else.”

“I will always be fond of you, Cyrus Davidon,” she said, a shadow of disappointment visible in her eye, “but yes, it is mostly gratitude for what you have done for myself and my people. Perhaps just a hint of that which was between us, also expressed in the form of gratitude.”

Cyrus lowered his eyes. “I’m sorry, Cattrine.”

“You have nothing to apologize for,” she said simply, and he knew she was sincere.

“You have my apologies nonetheless,” Cyrus said, and he stood. “I thank you for your kindness, for your counsel.”

“You are most welcome, any time,” she said, and rose. She smiled at him, deep and true, and he knew she meant every word of it. “Give me warning in advance when next you plan to visit, and I will arrange a tour of the far-flung reaches of our valley, our fields, and show you all the good you have done.”

He cast an eye over the fields filled with tables, with people and families, with the whole of the town gathered near and chatting, gradually drifting apart as they moved off to their afternoon labors. “I think, for today, I have seen the good I have done.” He took a breath of that fresh, clear air, felt just as awakened by it as he had when he emerged from the stream. “And it has made a world of difference.”

She looked at him, corners of her mouth tugging outward in a smile. “Are you ready to return to your battlefield, then, Lord Davidon?”

He thought it over carefully, just for a moment. “I didn’t leave a battlefield behind.” He straightened, feeling unburdened for the first time in a while. “But I am ready to return to what needs to be done. Back to my guild.” He felt the first hint of his own smile. “Ready to get back to my duty.”

Cyrus teleported into the foyer of Sanctuary with his eyes closed, opening them only as the flash began to fade. He took in the columns and the balcony, swept his gaze around to see the fading light coming through the enormous stained glass window that stood above the grand doors outside. It had taken him some time to hike back to the portal where he met Verity, and he knew sundown was approaching even Emerald Fields by the time he left. He could see the faint hints of sunset stirring orange beams across the stone floor of the foyer, cascading ochre that reminded him of everything good in this place.

It felt like home.

“Sir,” came a thin voice from over his shoulder. Cyrus swung ’round, taking in the guard stationed around the seal on which he stood. Cyrus’s eyes fell upon a youth of Luukessia, obvious by his sash of Galbadien, the Garden Kingdom. He wore the armor of a dragoon, like Samwen Longwell. A shock of bright, hay-colored hair sprouted atop his head like a fountain of gold in contrast to his sun-tanned skin. He had only one eye, though, a scarred pit replacing his right one, a strange, out-of-place detail on an otherwise youthful visage. It reminded him, in placement and detail, of Alaric.

“Dragoon,” Cyrus said, using the cavalryman’s formal title. “What can I do for you …?” He waited for a name.

“Rainey McIlven, sir,” the young man said with a bow of respect. His lance stood at his side, pointed toward the ceiling. All of the guards had their weapons pointed at the ceiling now, though Cyrus knew they had not been when he first began to appear.

“What can I do for you, Rainey McIlven of Galbadien?” Cyrus asked with a smile.

“You have done all I needed already, sir,” McIlven said, bowing that blond head again. “I wanted you to know I have voted for you, sir. I trust you to lead us as steady as you ever have.”

Cyrus felt a faint twitch as an eyebrow rose of its own accord. “I thank you for your belief in me, Rainey McIlven, and I hope I will do credit to that faith should I win.” With a slight bow of his own, Cyrus broke and turned toward the entry to the Great Hall. He could see the full tables laid out within, could hear the buzz of dinner already in progress.

“You did get one thing wrong, sir,” McIlven called to him as Cyrus had just reached the doors of the Great Hall. He turned back, looking through the patch of men standing ’round the great seal, curious about the answer. “I may be from Galbadien, but I am Rainey McIlven of Sanctuary, sir.” He snapped off a crisp salute that scraped the butt of his lance against the stone floor as he came to attention. There was a clatter and clink of metal as every one of the soldiers in the formation matched the young calvaryman of Luukessia. Cyrus froze, uncertain of how to respond for a moment, and finally returned the salute a few seconds delayed, his own armor making only a whisper of noise in the process.

Cyrus entered the Great Hall, easing into the wash of conversation like he was taking slow steps into a stream. It ebbed around him, a hush falling on those nearest him as he passed through the main aisle, keeping his gaze straight ahead so as to avoid any chance that someone might stop him to congratulate him the way young McIlven had. He had accepted the compliment, but uneasily, wearing it the way he might wear unfamiliar armor.

He made his way without comment, amid a sea of whispers, to the officers’ table at the front of the room. It was a simple, circular thing, not unlike the one in the Council chambers, but situated as near to the far wall as it could be—and far from the kitchens, Cyrus reflected. He did not tilt a gaze in that direction, knowing that Larana would surely have made something for him. His stomach, though, was surprisingly sated with the simple stew and bread, lighter fare that had settled him. Even a meat pie held little appeal at the moment; he feared he would look into it and imagine how many mouths it might have fed in the Emerald Fields.

“So kind of you to join us,” Vaste said from his place at the table. They were all there, waiting, plates in front of them in various states of disassembly. “It almost feels like there was some reason you should have been here today, something you might have missed by your absence.”

“The voting is done?” Cyrus asked, his gaze drifting over a silent Vara and a surprisingly bubbly Ryin. He took note of Erith, fidgeting in her chair, and then realized J’anda was sitting in his seat, still and silent, trace of a smile upon his thin lips.

“I don’t suppose you thought to cast your ballot before you left this morning?” Vaste asked.

“I did not,” Cyrus said, taking his seat beside Vara. It made no protest at the addition of his weight, and she made no move to acknowledge his presence. Her meal was barely picked at.

He met Curatio’s gaze across the table, the elder elf with a cup in his hand. He raised it to Cyrus in silent salute, and Cyrus bowed his head in acknowledgment of the quiet gesture. Once he had settled it, the healer kept his gaze on Cyrus. “And what mischief have you been up to today, General, that has your eyes as lively as I have seen them in some time?”

“I went to the Emerald Fields to inspect the results of our patronage,” Cyrus said, staring at the empty place in front of him, curiously satisfied with the lack of plate and cup, “and I found things there much to my liking.”

“It is not all gloom and darkness the world over, then?” This from Longwell, who wore a canny, surprisingly sly smile, his dark steel helm riding on the table next to his meal, which was entirely finished.

“I am pleased to report that there are places where the sun shines and the crops grow, unfettered and unchallenged by this war and this famine,” Cyrus said, that trace of a smile matching Longwell’s own. “Where people eat in fellowship and celebrate each other’s company, grateful to have what they do, remembering that there are many who have none.”
Including their lives
, he did not add.

“I find a healthy pinch of gratitude leavens the bread of life,” Curatio said, his cup in hand. “Is that not so?” He looked to J’anda.

The enchanter stirred. “The contrast provides all the glory to the painting of life; what is brightest day without blackest night? What is the light without the dark? We should celebrate our lives, our moments, for those who cannot.” He raised his own cup at that and drank deeply from it.

Cyrus thought about saying something, about asking the question on his mind, but Nyad pre-empted him. “You haven’t asked about the election.”

He let his eyes drift to the wizard, her blond hair arranged in careful ringlets around her bronzed skin. “I assumed someone would tell me if there were anything of import I needed to know.”

“We were just about to announce the results without you,” Vaste said. “Should we tell you first, or make it a surprise?”

Cyrus blinked, considering it. “I enjoy a good surprise.” He looked at Vara, catching her eye, then to Ryin. “I wish you both the very best of luck, and I want you to know that I will follow either one of you and serve this guild as best I can, regardless of the result.”

Ryin almost flinched. “Well. That is … magnanimous.”

Cyrus watched him carefully. “Do you know who won?”

The druid shrugged. “Of course. But I accept your kind words for what they are—the sincere gesture of a true servant of Sanctuary.” He met Cyrus’s gaze evenly. “Which, I hope you know, I have ever been as well.”

Cyrus gave him a slight nod. “I believe that with all that is in me.”

Ryin smiled faintly, and Cyrus turned to Vara, who did not look at him. “I wish you all the best as well, Lady Vara,” Cyrus said.

“I know that you do,” she said.

Cyrus turned his gaze to J’anda, upon the cup he held in his thin and creased hands. “What brings you to our table this night, J’anda? Spying for Sovereign?”

“Indeed, he shows great interest in this election,” the enchanter said. “However, I have other business to discuss with you; but it can wait until the morrow.”

Cyrus began to frown, but Curatio rose at his place and a silence fell in the Great Hall. Despite the assembled crowd, it had a curiously vacuous feeling, as though all the air had been purged from the chamber. “I stand before you now,” the healer began, “in my role as interim Guildmaster of Sanctuary, to declare the results of the vote placed before the membership this day.”

Curatio cleared his throat, a curiously dramatic sound. Cyrus noted the presence of a twinkle in his eye and wondered whether it was relief knowing his time as Guildmaster was at end or excitement at the prospect of what would follow. He had little time to judge, though, as Curatio went on: “The self-determination of Sanctuary is our greatest uniqueness. Other guilds may beat us in sweep of power, but we are tied to no city, have our loyalty and fealty irrevocably sworn to none, and our Council rules at the behest of our members. We chart our own course, our choice of destination is entirely of our own making. To that end, I directed our officers to carry out a vote to determine the members’ wishes on the following matters:

“One, the disposition of several candidates for officership in Sanctuary.

“And two, the candidacy of three officers deemed worthy to ascend to the role of duly-elected Guildmaster.”

Curatio cleared his throat again, and this time Cyrus realized it was a theatrical trick; a moment’s pause to let his words sink in for desired effect. “The election was carried out in compliance with the procedures laid down in the Sanctuary charter,” Curatio said, “and administered with the impartial supervision of Erith Frostmoor, Samwen Longwell, Nyad Spiritcaster and myself.” He straightened his back.

“The following individuals were elected to officership in the Sanctuary Council—Andren.”

Cyrus blinked, scanning the crowd until he found the bedraggled elf, who was halfway to a sip of his flask when the attention of everyone in the room fell on him. His face was frozen, as if he were listening for something that he had missed, his dark, tangled hair and long beard giving him his usual disheveled look. “I’m sorry,” he said, in his drawling, lower-class elven accent, “did someone say my name?”