Prophecy (21 page)

“Oh, but there’s no need to be cautious with
us
,” the man responded, again looking startled. “We know, you see, and we’ve known from the very first. Surely you must have expected
someone
to know?”

Lorand saw Vallant exchange glances with Jovvi and Rion just before he himself exchanged a glance with Tamrissa. He didn’t need to be told that the man spoke what he considered the truth, but just what that truth was still hadn’t been made clear.

“Why don’t you tell us what it is that you know,” Jovvi suggested gently to the man in her friendliest voice, possibly even using her talent at the same time. The man automatically returned her smile and relaxed a bit, but that didn’t have to be talent, just a normal response to the woman who was Jovvi.

“Why, we know the truth,” the man supplied willingly enough. “You five are the Chosen Blending, the one spoken of in the Prophecies, and the only way the nobles could have won the final competition against you is with cheating. We consider it our duty to stand beside you when you return, so that—”

“Ensor, enough,” a stronger voice interrupted, and Lorand looked up to see a group of men and women following the boy who had run off only a moment earlier. All those people must have been close and together, Lorand realized, or they couldn’t have gotten here this fast. “The Chosen don’t need to be burbled over, not when they’reobviously so tired. Let’s at least see them seated and fed before we pester them.”

“I was merely answering their question, High Master,” the man called Ensor replied, but in a quietly respectful way. “And now that you and the others are here…”

He faded back without finishing his sentence, ceding his place in front of the Blending with what looked to Lorand like a great deal of relief. The newcomers quickly made up for that by crowding forward—in a reserved way—and the man addressed as High Master smiled around at them.

“I’m Lavrit Mohr, and we’redelighted to have you here with us at last, Excellences,” he said with a bow. “Accommodations have been prepared for you, and as soon as you’ve had your meal you can all—”

“Just a moment, Dom Mohr,” Vallant interrupted the flow of the man’s words, his tone as dry as Lorand’s would have been. “There seems to be some sort of misunderstandin’ here, and we need to get it straightened out before we go any further. We do happen to be the ones who would have bested the new Seated Five in the final competition if their people hadn’t cheated, but that doesn’t make us the Chosen ones spoken of in the Prophecies. I’ve never put much stock in the Prophecies, so—”

“But Excellence, of course you’rethe Chosen ones,” Mohr interrupted with a small laugh, looking around now to see that the entire Blending agreed with what Vallant had said. “How can you possibly doubt it, when each of you witnessed the first sign yourselves?”

“What sort of sign were we supposed to have witnessed?” Jovvi asked gently—and rather quickly, probably to keep Tamrissa from telling the man her opinion of him. Tamrissa had opened her mouth with an impatient expression on her face, but Jovvi’s question kept the second woman from speaking.

“Yes, I’d like to know that as well,” Rion put in, supporting what Jovvi had asked. “I recall nothing in the way of signs, and it was merely happenstance which threw us all together. We could just as easily have ended up as members of different challenging Blendings.”

“But Excellence, of course there were signs,” Mohr protested, having lost his air of ecstatic delight. “All of the Guild members who sent you five to Gan Garee reported on them most completely, so there can’t possibly be any doubt.”

“If you’retalkin’ about Guild members supportin’ what you’resayin’, now I know you’remistaken,” Vallant told him with what was almost a snort of scorn. “The—lady who was in charge of sendin’
me
to Gan Garee tried her best to see that I made the trip in chains, with guardsmen as travelin’ companions. I don’t know why she felt such … almost hatred for me, but she made it perfectly clear that she did.”

“Yes, I’m aware of the incident, Excellence,” Mohr replied, his nod quiet and his expression just short of amused. “Raina Santray had … a bad experience with a young man from a monied family, and so developed a certain prejudice. She confessed what she’d done in her report, and also confessed that she hadn’t had the heart to apologize afterward, when she realized the truth. If she’d faced you again she would surely have blurted out what she knew, and all Guild members were warned against speaking about the signs when they came. The nobility was also watching for those signs, you know, and we had no wish to let them learn that the first had manifested. It could well have meant your deaths.”

“So you kept quiet and thereby made sure we were all perfectly safe,” Tamrissa put in, the sarcasm in her voice much too clear to miss. “Or could it possibly be that no one noticed these ‘signs’ until we nearly won the last competition? Then everyone looked back and lo and behold, there were the signs they’d missed the first time around. How convenient for everyone involved.”

“You’reskepticism is somewhat puzzling to me, Excellences,” Mohr said, his brows having risen after hearing what Tamrissa had to say. “We were delighted to discover that no one noticed the signs but our own people, but now you’resaying that they were missed by your Five as well. Since I know that that can’t possibly be true, the answer must be that you’ve forgotten. With everything which happened to you afterward, that’s perfectly understandable. Would you permit me to remind you?”

“Yes, why don’t you do that,” Tamrissa said very dryly, speaking as Lorand might have if he hadn’t been taught to be polite and mannerly. These people were obviously entirely mistaken, but it might be worth their while to pretend to believe them—at least until they’d all had a few solid meals, a nice long bath, and a good night’s sleep in a bed…

“It would be my pleasure,” Mohr replied with a bow that was more courteous than sarcastic. “And it’s most fitting that the request should come from the lady of Fire. Inasmuch as the first sign was the appearance—from out of nowhere—of an attacking fireball. Surely you all remember now…”

Lorand felt the clang of shock as he suddenly did remember that fireball, the one which had attacked him on his way to the coach going to Gan Garee. He hadn’t known who could have been responsible for sending it, but he did remember how … intense master Lugal had been after the incident. He’d had to use his talent to put the thing out, but surely that applied only to him…

And then the shock grew more intense as Lorand noticed the same expression of shock on the faces of his groupmates. It couldn’t be, not them too … but that would mean…

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

Jovvi had to shield herself completely for a moment, so resoundingly strong were the feelings of shock coming from her groupmates. That wouldn’t have been so bad, though, if her own feelings hadn’t been sending the same message: this is all a mistake, it has to be a mistake.
We
can’t be the ones spoken about in the Prophecies…

But Jovvi could remember the fireball vividly, and judging from the reactions of her groupmates, they all had memories of the same sort. Realizing that brought an odd weakness to Jovvi’s knees, as though as strange as it seemed, there might be something to what the man had said after all…

“Ah, the silence speaks volumes, as do your expressions,” Lavrit Mohr said, his smile more benevolently pleased than triumphant. “May I assume that you now remember the incidents to which I referred? Each of you was threatened, and each of you met the threat and bested it.”

“But … surely that must be some sort of coincidence,” Rion tried, his voice less than steady. “Or possibly it was the doing of some of
your
people. You required a group you might call ‘Chosen’ to rally your members behind, and so you put everyone sent to Gan Garee through the same thing. No matter which of us ended up in the final competition, you would still be able to say that they were Chosen because of the ‘sign’.”

“Yes, that sounds reasonable,” Vallant immediately agreed, and so did the others. Now it was relief they showed on their faces, and Jovvi could understand that. The only problem was, the man called High Master now laughed gently at what he
knew
wasn’t the truth.

“The Prophecies also say that the Chosen will not know themselves at first,” Mohr supplied, still speaking gently. “And I think you’ve all apparently forgotten that none of my members could possibly have caused that fireball, because none of us can do magic the way everyone else can. Our talent is entirely different and, as you should know, revolves about being able to know a magic user’s strength. That particular talent tells me you’recurrently standing with others who can easily be considered High practitioners. Why don’t you ask
them
if they were attacked by fireballs when they were first sent to Gan Garee by my people?”

Jovvi found it impossible to keep herself from turning to look at the members of the link groups and the second Blending. They all stood there behind the people they considered their leaders, but their expressions and emotions had now changed to a large extent. Awe colored their thoughts, and any number of them shook their heads to answer the question that none of Jovvi’s group had been able to put.

“I’m suddenly feeling something of a chill,” Tamma muttered, wrapping her arms about herself. “But I also still agree with Rion; this can’t possibly be true, so why are we continuing to discuss it?”

“We’restill discussing it because we need the truth, not our own pet theories,” Jovvi told her, but made certain that her tone was completely gentle. “I know exactly how you feel because I feel the same way, but there are too many unexplained facts that we can’t simply dismiss.
Is
it true that the rest of you were attacked by a fireball in the same way I was?”

“I certainly was,” Lorand replied with a sigh, the expression in his dark eyes troubled. “The thing almost burned me to cinders, and Hat was no help at all. I had to stop the thing myself, before it killed me and then set the whole town on fire.”

“With me, it nearly ruined my favorite hat,” Rion said, and Jovvi could tell that he grasped at tiny details to keep the shock from returning. “I was outraged, of course, but when the Guild member with my coach ticket showed up, I denied all knowledge of what had happened. He himself seemed to have missed the incident.”

Now Rion looked rather closely at Lavrit Mohr, as though he’d found a flaw in the man’s story. It so happened that Jovvi had also denied all knowledge of the fireball attack, so she joined Rion in listening for Mohr’s answer.

“Allow me to assure you that Lord Astrath missed not a single minute of it,” the High Master replied to Rion, still looking completely unruffled. “None of your Guild members missed the incidents, but they were trying to find out what
your
reactions to the attacks were. If one of you had had a friend who was prone to playing practical jokes, for instance, the incident would have become much less certain. But no one lurked around snickering afterward, and there were only the five reported incidents. That helped to convince us that we weren’t wishful thinking…”

Jovvi contributed to the flood of disturbance coming from the others until she shielded herself again, and then it was only her own disturbance which she had to worry about. The whole thing seemed to be impossible to believe, and they really needed to discuss the matter alone.

“I … think we ought to accept the hospitality we’ve been offered here,” Jovvi said after a moment, looking at her groupmates. “I don’t know about the rest of you, but I’m too tired—and dirty—to think clearly. Let’s get a meal and some rest first, and then we can talk about this again.”

“Yes, please, we insist you accept,” Mohr said when the others hesitated. “This inn has been prepared for you and your companions, while my own people and our allies have been quartered at the other two. I meant to introduce you to them all, but later, at dinner, would be a much better idea. Right now it’s not much past lunchtime, and if you’ll honor us by taking the meal here in the dining room, we’ll have the rest of it ready for you as soon as you’rethrough.”

“The rest of what?” Jovvi couldn’t help asking, despite the picture her mind insisted on putting forward of her sitting down at a table again, as though she were a civilized woman instead of a hunted fugitive. “What else have you … prepared for us?”

“Well, we arranged to have some clothing made for you,” Mohr said, and now he sounded a bit hesitant. “We knew your approximate sizes, after all, and knew you probably hadn’t been able to take any clothing at all when you escaped. But we only had four outfits made for each of you, which is certainly not enough to clothe your entire group. If the tailors and seamstresses in the town are permitted to take measurements, though, and the extra outfits made for
you
are distributed, we may well be able to clothe everyone by tonight or tomorrow morning at the latest.”

Everyone began to murmur over that, and this time the surprise was a pleasant one. Every one of them needed new clothing rather badly, and the idea of being able to get into fresh new things after bathing had an attraction that couldn’t be ignored. So that meant they weren’t going to refuse what had been done for them, but Jovvi also had no intention of just relaxing and enjoying it all. Their Blending entity would have to have a good look around as well as a talk with some of those so-called supporters of theirs before that happened, and maybe not even then.

“I think we ought to apologize for being … less than grateful for all these marvelous things,” Jovvi said to Mohr with a smile meant to dazzle. “I’m sure you know we haven’t had an easy time of it, and after being attacked almost every time we stopped somewhere, it was hard to imagine being in a place where there would be help instead. We really do appreciate everything you’ve done for us, and especially for offering the members of your Guild as our supporters.”

“I … think I ought to mention that not all of our members mean to support you,” Mohr said, the admission obviously embarrassing and needing to be forced out. “One faction of our people seems to be rather firmly on the side of the nobles, and they claim that if we really give the nobility our support instead of just pretending to it, we’ll be rewarded the way we should be. They want what the nobility has within its power to give, you see, and refuse to admit that no one whom that monied group considers a freak will ever be granted any of the largesse. But we made certain that that faction knows nothing about this meeting, so their opinions and views won’t touch you in any way at all.”