The Bird and the Sword (14 page)

The window shattered, spraying glass in every direction.

I covered my face and fell to the ground as the door burst open behind me, the footmen crying out that we must be under some sort of attack. They ran to the jagged opening to peer up into the sky, cautiously navigating the broken glass. When they could see nothing that would cause further alarm, they helped me to my feet. I was covered with glass but mostly uninjured, and I shook myself gingerly, sprinkling shards from my dress and my hair, and surveyed my clumsy attempt at escape. I started fires and broke glass. I needed a great deal more practice or I was going to hurt myself.

They left once more and carefully locked the door behind them again, murmuring about what could have caused the window to shatter in such a way. This time they didn’t remain, but hurried off down the corridor, leaving a trail of mumbled words in their wake. I sighed in relief and calmly, purposefully asked the lock to disengage.

It did so with an audible click, and I sent up a grateful prayer to the God of Words.

I
eased the door open and peeked down the hall. It had grown dark, and sconces had been lit on every floor. I would have to be certain to avoid the staff who were all aware that I should not be roaming the palace unattended. I’d never been in this wing, never negotiated these halls, and I didn’t know how I would reach the king without being seen. My father would be returning as well, and I didn’t want to attempt another command that could completely backfire.

Twenty minutes later, breathless and frazzled, I eased myself into the king’s quarters and leaned heavily against the door. The room was dark, the king’s clothes in a messy pile, boots toppled, sword and sheath abandoned, even his crown—something he rarely wore—sat atop his tunic, like he’d melted into the oak floor and left his clothes behind. There was an emptiness to the room, a melancholic abandonment in the crumpled clothing that had me calling out, as if I could make contact with his thoughts.

Tiras, where are you?

I called again, sending my words outward, flinging them into the darkness, shouting the only way I could. But there was no response. I paused in indecision, afraid to leave the room, uncertain of where to hide myself or what I should do. I walked to the balcony and stepped out into the darkness, my eyes searching the guards below for Kjell, for Boojohni, for something.

Kjell?
I pushed the word out into the night air, and it vibrated like a gong in my head. The guard below me didn’t raise his head. I slumped down onto the balcony, pressing my face against the iron rails, weary and uncertain. I could see my chambers across the way. My room was ablaze with light, which was odd, as it had not been night when I’d been escorted through the halls to the banquet and I doubted that the maids awaited me now. I could see the open balcony door and beyond that, a tall shadow loomed. There was someone in my room. Tiras had instructed me to go there, I remembered now. Why hadn’t I gone there first?

I wished again for flight, that I could wing across the distance between the two balconies. I couldn’t change into a bird, a little lark, and flutter up into the sky, but maybe I could still fly.

I retreated back into the king’s chambers and pulled the silk sheet from his bed. Clutching it in my arms, I pressed it to my chest, eyes closed, concentrating on the words that would give it flight. When I was a child, I had pressed the words into inanimate objects with my lips, with sound. This was decidedly more difficult.

Up, away, into the sky

Lift me high and let me fly.

Nothing happened, and I realized I had to be specific. I had to imbue the sheet with a name, and direct it by that name. When the candle had moved, I had called to it specifically. When the fire died, I had done the same. When the glass broke, I had been precise about what I’d wanted. So precise that it had opened the only way it could, by breaking.

Coverlet. It was a coverlet. With the tip of my finger, I traced the word into the silk, focusing on the letters.
Then, with not a little dread, I fisted it in my hands and demanded it rise.

Rise, coverlet, from the floor, through the window, to my door.

It rose, billowing, pulling me toward the balcony like it was being sucked into a wind storm. But though it would have flown, I was too heavy to fly with it, and it simply flapped like a sheet in the breeze, helpless against my grip. I clung to it, not sure what to do next, and I didn’t hear the door open behind me.

“What are you doing?”

I started and jumped, almost losing my grip on the coverlet that whipped and tossed in my hands.

Tiras stood in the doorway of his room, clothed like he’d spent the last hour in the stables instead of writhing in pain like I’d envisioned. Kjell stood beside him, his eyes wide and his jaw slack. I gasped and immediately focused on the task at hand.

Coverlet, be still

Obey my will.

It was the first rhyme that came to my head, but the flapping ceased and the coverlet drooped from my fists, the flight removed from every corner.

“Witch,” Kjell breathed. “You are a bloody witch.”

“Kjell!” Tiras said. “Leave us.”

Kjell ignored him. “Tell me, Teller. Did you poison the king’s wine? Did you do your father’s bidding? Does the little lark want to be Princess of Jeru?” He strode forward and ripped the coverlet from my hands. I stepped back, eyes on his, arms at my sides. Kjell was afraid of me. His fear billowed out like the coverlet had moments before, whipping in the air, making me afraid too.

I shook my head.
No. I came to help.

He winced as if my voice in his head caused him pain. I looked at Tiras, who hadn’t moved except to shut the door behind him.

“Kjell. Go. I am fine. Go back to the hall and see that all is in order.”

“Tiras, by all the Gods! She is dangerous!”

“She is,” Tiras agreed, nodding, his eyes on mine. “She is that. Now go, Kjell. And make sure Lord Corvyn doesn’t slip away. Poison is more his style, I think. He had help though. I’m guessing certain members of the council are expecting news of my demise. I’ll be down shortly to let them see that they have failed.”

Kjell growled an expletive that made me blush and the king sigh, but he did as he was told, his hand on his sword, stomping to the door and pulling it shut with great force behind him.

“Show me.” Tiras nodded toward the sheet in my hands.

I stayed still, not willing to condemn myself further, and I pled with him silently.
It is nothing.

“Show me, Lark,” he demanded. I bunched the sheet in my hands and turned to put it back on the bed. He walked toward me slowly. “Why are you in my chambers?” he asked, allowing me to believe, for a moment, that he was not going to insist on a demonstration.

I thought you were ill.

“And you came to finish me off?” There was a smile in his voice. I looked at him sharply. “The door was locked. How did you get inside?” he asked as he continued to move closer.

I hung my head, having forgotten that detail.

It was not locked.

“It was.”

I wondered if he could feel the lie on me, the way I could feel falsehoods when others told them.

“You are a Teller. Did you tell the door to open?” He was so close I could feel his breath stir my hair. “Did you tell the apple to hit Bilwick in his fat mouth?” There was laughter in his voice, and I relaxed the smallest bit.

Yes.

“Show me.” He walked back to the heavy door and slid the bolt home. I hesitated briefly. He looked at me expectantly, and I knew there was no hiding any of it from him.

Open lock, upon the door, I wish to leave the room once more.

The bolt immediately released. The king laughed, and wonder rose from the sound.

“You could have gone . . . any time. Yet you have stayed in my castle behind locked doors, playing the prisoner. Why?”

I shook my head in denial.
Not any time. I had to learn the words. You gave them to me.

“I gave them to you?” he repeated, dumbfounded.

You taught me to read. You taught me to write.

“This power is new?” His voice lifted in surprise.

The power is not new. The words are new. My mother took the words away when she died. She took my voice away so I wouldn’t hurt anyone else.

“Maybe she took the words away so no one would hurt you,” he ventured, and his voice was kind. “It wasn’t your mother who made the poppet fly, was it?”

Sorrow crashed over me, weighing me down, causing my bowed head to hit my chest in despair.

No.

“
Does your father know what you can do?”

No.

I had no desire to lift my heavy head, and felt Tiras approach once more and stop in front of me. I kept my eyes on his boots until he touched my chin with one long finger, tipping my face to his. His eyes were soft, and I found myself wanting to tell him everything.

My father hates me.

“How can that be? He seems desperate to have you return to Corvyn.”

He is afraid you are going to hurt me. He is afraid I’m going to die. And if I die, he dies. Another gift from my mother. She made sure that his own survival depended upon ensuring mine.

“Ah, I see. Such a clever Teller. Your mother was very wise.”

I nodded.

“We are all caught in her snare. Your father. You. Me. Even my father was obsessed with her. Meshara,” Tiras whispered.

I felt my eyes widen and my heart skitter. Tiras raised both hands to my face and cradled it thoughtfully, his fingers tracing the line of my cheek and the sharp edge of my jaw down to the point of my chin. I could hardly breathe, and I didn’t know if it was his gentle touch or my mother’s name lingering in the air. Or both.

“None of us were ever the same after that day. My father lost me, just like your mother foretold. And he died knowing it.” His hands fell away suddenly, like he realized what he was doing and checked himself. He stepped back, but his eyes still held mine. I wondered what he saw when he gazed at me. Did he see my mother from that long ago day, the way I’d seen his father in him? I’d hated him for what his father had done. Did he hate me for the same reason? I shook myself and asked a tentative question.

He lost you?

“He was a monster, and that day, I saw him for what he was. I began to turn from him, to change. I am a far different king than I would have otherwise been.”

Kjell says you are dying.

“
I’m not dying.”

But there is something wrong.

“Many things.” He smiled, just a sad twist of his mouth. “There are many wrongs to be righted.” He walked to the balcony and opened the doors wider, letting in the evening air. After a moment he turned back to me once more.

But . . . you aren’t ill?

He shook his head slowly. “No. Not ill. Not dying. But I’m losing the battle.”

Against the Volgar?

“Against all of Jeru’s enemies.” He paused, considering. His eyes were black and his mouth was bracketed with weariness. “Will you help me, Lark?”

How?

“Show me what you can do.”

I thought of the broken window and the accidental fire. I didn’t want to hurt anyone. But maybe if I was very careful, very exact, it would be okay. And I wanted to show him, to show someone, what I could do. The attention was intoxicating and completely foreign.

I said a simple rhyme, lifting the coverlet off the floor, asking it to float in the air like a little boat. It rose and hovered obediently. I shot a fearful look at Tiras, but he seemed intrigued.

“Something else.”

I asked the coverlet to drift back to the floor. I told the chair to dance and it started to rock back and forth in a clumsy rhythm. Tiras laughed. I shrugged. Dancing chairs and floating coverlets wouldn’t right any wrongs.

“Can you compel me to act?” he asked quietly, and my heartbeat quickened. “Can you make me dance like the chair or rise into the air?” he pressed. I bit my lip and reached out with tentative words.

Dance now, Tiras, up and down. Move your body all around.

He stared at me, eyebrows raised, lips quirked.

You aren’t dancing.

“No. I’m not. And I feel no compulsion to do so.”

I shrugged helplessly.

It doesn’t seem to work on people. You have free will. It is but a suggestion with a little push behind it. Are you even tempted to dance? Even a little?

“No. I’m not,” he snorted, and my lips twitched too. “So how do you heal me, if your power doesn’t work on people?” he asked.

I don’t heal you. Not really. I tell your body to heal itself. It wants to be healed, and it obeys. I think.

“You think?”

I shrugged again.
I am learning more every day.

“And the Volgar? You told them to fly away. In the clearing after I took you from Corvyn. We all would have died. But suddenly they flew, and I could feel something repelling them. I could feel it.”

The Volgar are closer to animals than they are to humans, and it takes a great deal more energy to influence them than it does to instruct an object. A great deal more energy to influence you—even just your body.