The Black King (Book 7) (31 page)

She gave him an odd look. “If you are an Enchanter like you claim, you are a weapon.” Then she sighed. “I suppose it doesn’t matter what you have in there. You’re more dangerous than any knife.”

Matt had never thought of himself that way, but he was. His magick had more power to it than anyone else’s, even a Visionary’s. It also carried more risk.

The woman took his arm and led him through a small door on the side of the palace. It was cool and dark inside. They had entered into an antechamber. She took him up a flight of stairs and down a long narrow corridor made of stone. There, she opened a solid oak door. It led into a small room that had no windows. It wasn’t a cell, but it felt like one. There was a cot with a straw-stuffed mattress against one wall, a Fey lamp hanging from a peg, and nothing else in the room.

“Wait here,” she said. “I’ll have the Domestics come and tidy you up. I’ll also let the Black Queen know you’ve arrived.”

He nodded. He glanced at the cot. He didn’t really want to be trapped in here, but he saw no other choice.

“Are you hungry?” the woman asked.

For the first time in days, he was. He nodded.

“I’ll have them bring you something to eat as well.” She studied him for a moment. “You’re very young, aren’t you?”

“I’m fifteen,” he said, drawing himself to his full height.

“What’s your name?”

“Matt.”

“Where are you from?”

“A small village in the mountains.”

She nodded. “You’ve come a long way. Why now?”

He had to give her the practiced answer, the only one that Coulter believed she would accept from someone his age. “I ran away.”

“Why?”

“Because my family hates me.” The words were too close to the truth. He shook just a little.

The woman studied him as if she were trying to see through him. “I’m Zayna. If you need anything, ask for me. I will be your sponsor. But if you do any harm, I will be the first to kill you. Do you understand?”

He couldn’t answer her. The words were stuck in his throat. Instead, he nodded.

“Good. I’ll send Ling to you. She is a Domestic. She will feed you, clean you up, and make certain you have the proper clothing.”

“All right.” The words came out as a whisper.

Zayna nodded once, crisply. “Normally, you would not receive this kind of treatment. But the Black Queen does need an Enchanter, and I have been instructed to let her know whenever an Enchanter approaches the palace.”

Matt swallowed. “I understand.”

“Good.” She went out the open door, and then closed it behind her. Matt waited for the rasp of the lock, but it never came. Her footsteps disappeared down the stone corridor.

He could let himself out. He didn’t see doorways into any other part of the palace, but he would wager if there were any, they would be locked. But he didn’t want to get deeper into the palace. If he walked out this door, he would get his horse and leave Jahn for good.

He walked to the cot and sat down. The straw poked through the mattress cover. He was filthy and extremely tired. He had made it farther than he imagined, and he had gotten himself inside. Now they claimed they would let him see the Black Queen.

Matt sighed. If only Coulter and Arianna were already in Jahn. Then he could go after Rugad right away instead of going through this entire farce. But he didn’t have that kind of choice. He only had two: leave or continue forward.

He wasn’t going to leave. No matter how uncertain he was, he wouldn’t leave. But he would take precautions.

He picked up his knapsack and opened it. The dolls were in a special sack of their own, along with the vials of blood. He wished he had the ability to create a Shadowlands like the Visionaries did, but that was not an Enchanter spell. So he pushed the sack as far into the knapsack as he could, and then, with a wave of his hand, built a small wall of cloth in front of it, a wall that looked like it was part of the sack itself.

Still, the sack was bigger on the outside than on the inside. Anyone touching it would know. So he put a visual spell over the sack itself, so that it looked shorter than it really was.

The dolls were safe, for the moment.

He only wished he was, too.

TWENTY-TWO

THE SUMMONS startled Xihu. A Nyeian sailor had knocked on her door and called to her. When Xihu opened the door, he had told her that the visitor was from the palace, and she had felt a strange light-headedness, as if this were the confirmation of a Vision she didn’t remember.

She had gone to see Gift first, who told her to go, and reminded her that she had promised to serve the Black Family. She hadn’t needed the reminding, but what she hadn’t said to him was that she had thought of the Black family as him, and him alone. She didn’t feel that was worth confessing to anyone.

The sun had risen and was a small ball on the eastern horizon. It was a pale sun, giving little warmth and even less comfort. Xihu was used to the chill of Protector’s Village, a dry cold that contained the smell of the mountains and a crispness that made even the air seem sharp. Here the cold was damp. The buildings were bright and colorful—a Fey addition, Gift told her—but their structure was plain, a sign of their Islander roots.

The marriage between Fey and Islander cultures wasn’t usually so easy. She had felt a strain ever since the ship had arrived in the harbor, a strain that wasn’t connected to the assassination attempts or Gift’s Open Vision. The strain was part of the air, part of the very land that surrounded her. It was as if she could feel a discomfort that emanated from every part of the Isle.

The messenger had led her through a different gate than she had gone through the day before. He had taken her in a different door, and brought her to an audience room that was so large, it could have housed a dozen supplicants and another dozen guards and not seemed crowded.

There was a throne on the dais before her, a simple sturdy throne with ornate carvings on the arms. It was nothing like the Black Throne, which was actual stone, built into the wall of the mountain. This was a simple throne for a simple ruler who had no pretensions, no thoughts of world conquest.

The swords and spears that decorated the walls surprised her. She had heard that the Islanders were a peaceful people, even though Gift had once told her that the symbol of their religion was a small sword. She also knew that the Islanders had proven themselves strong fighters. Still, she had not expected such a warlike place.

She walked toward the throne and stopped, looking up at the coat of arms emblazoned against the wall. Two swords crossed over a single heart. Gift had mentioned that as well, but seeing it mesmerized her. It looked like it had been created by the same person who created the Fey crest, which was a sword piercing two hearts. No wonder Gift had been startled when he had gone into the Black Throne Room.

Two peoples with magick. Two peoples with Places of Power on their homelands. Two peoples with inverted crests. There was a message here that she felt she should understand.

A door closed behind the dais, and then a person swept into the room. For a moment, Xihu thought she was looking at Gift’s identical twin—and then she saw the braid running down the back, the birthmark on the chin, the feminized features, and knew that she was looking at Arianna.

Arianna wore breeches and a jerkin, and thick boots. She had muscular arms and a trim, athletic figure. Her eyes were blue like Gift’s, only unlike Gift’s they had an edge to them, a darkness that seemed to be threaded through them.

Xihu remembered Gift’s suspicion, that Arianna had somehow been tainted by the Throne’s dark magick, and wondered at it. It certainly seemed possible. She knew that the Light had gone Seeking. She just didn’t know what it had found in Arianna—if it had found anything at all.

Arianna did not sit on the throne. Instead she stepped off the dais and walked across to Xihu. Arianna extended her hand in the Nyeian fashion. Xihu stared at it a moment before taking it, knowing that it was some kind of test.

Arianna’s hand was warm and dry. Xihu was surprised at the warmth and the fleshy feel of the fingers. She had half-expected, after the Visions and the comments she had heard, that this Arianna would be a golem.

“Do I pass?” Her voice was throaty and filled with a dry irony.

“I thought I was the one being tested,” Xihu said.

Arianna smiled faintly. It was a cool, appraising smile, almost appreciative, and Xihu remembered the feeling she had had in the tower room, that Arianna seemed to play emotions for effect, not because she felt them.

“You are,” she said. “I need a Shaman. I’m not thrilled with having one from the Eccrasian Mountains, nor am I thrilled with having one who is my brother’s choice, but here you are. I do have some issues that I wouldn’t mind discussing with a Shaman.”

“Issues?” Xihu asked.

“Yes.” Arianna did not elaborate. “I suppose Gift has already convinced you that I’m not the woman I once was.”

“He says you’re different.”

“What do you think?”

Xihu shrugged. “I did not know you before.”

“But you have an opinion.”

Xihu folded her hands into her robe. “I believe that the course you have led us on during the last fifteen years is an appropriate one. I do not think that moving to Leut, as you outlined to Gift yesterday, is the appropriate path.”

Arianna studied her for a moment. “So you would interpret any Vision to point me in a peaceful direction.”

“I do not believe Vision can be interpreted,” Xihu said. “I believe it can be compared and perhaps the pieces will fall together.”

Arianna’s eyes narrowed. It wasn’t quite with disapproval. It was as if her quick and agile mind were assessing all that she heard. Then she swept a hand toward the dais. “This is not a comfortable place for a real conversation. Let us go somewhere where we can both sit down.”

Xihu followed Arianna behind the dais. Arianna took her through a small door to a room that had upholstered furniture and a fireplace with a warm fire burning in it. The room smelled of woodsmoke and seemed extremely homey, but Xihu found the entire transition disturbing. She knew that Arianna had had guards listening in the audience chamber. Now that Xihu had passed some sort of test—what kind she wasn’t sure—apparently, Arianna didn’t want them to hear anything.

Arianna took a seat near the fire. She stretched out her legs and crossed them at the ankle. Then she pulled another chair close and bid Xihu to sit as well.

Xihu did. The fire warmed her legs. She hadn’t realized how chilled she had become during the walk over.

“I suppose Lyndred told you that she believes I am Blind,” Arianna said. “You probably think I need a Shaman to give me Sight.”

Xihu froze. There would be no lying here. “Lyndred said that, yes.”

“So you have come here as a response to my summons not because you are interested in serving me, but because you want to see if you can tell whether or not I’m Blind.”

“I came because you said you needed a Shaman.”

“Did you expect it to be a permanent Shaman?”

“Is it?” Xihu asked.

Arianna’s small smile returned. “You’re young, but you are well trained. Is it true that you belong to that small sect of Shaman who defied Kerde?”

Kerde was the leader of Protector’s village, and she had once been Rugad’s Shaman. There were several Shaman who did not believe Kerde’s ways. One of them had been the Shaman assigned to Rugar, the Shaman who had eventually worked with Gift’s Islander father, Nicholas.

“You are well informed,” Xihu said, not certain if that would work to her advantage or not.

“I try to know what I can about people.” Arianna rested her wrist on the arm of a chair. “What little I know of you suggests you might be untraditional. Are you?”

Xihu shrugged. “I am what I am.”

“A traditional Shamanic answer. Let me ask you questions, then.”

Xihu nodded. She had hoped for this. It would give her insight into Arianna.

“If you were to become my Shaman,” Arianna said, “would you tell me every Vision that you had?”

“That’s not required.”

“But would you?”

“Would it be a condition?”

“Yes,” Arianna said.

“Then, if I agreed to be your Shaman, I would abide by your conditions.”

“My conditions would be to tell me all your Visions, to follow all instruction, to analyze Visions only when told to, and to disregard most of your training from the Eccrasian Mountains. Could you do that?” Arianna’s eyes sparkled. She knew that most Shaman would not accept such conditions. Shaman liked to think of themselves as the most independent of the Fey.

“If I agreed to be your Shaman,” Xihu said again, “I would abide by your conditions.”

“Would you agree to be my Shaman knowing those conditions?” Arianna asked.

Xihu studied her. Arianna was sprawled in the chair, completely at ease with herself. There was something about her expression that suggested a hardness—not an evil, exactly, nor a love of cruelty. Just a tendency to use it if it became absolutely necessary—and a suggestion, however slight, that someday it would.

“Well?” Arianna asked.

This time, Xihu almost smiled. So, the Black Queen of the Fey was impatient.

“Would I be your Shaman knowing those conditions?” Xihu said. “No.”

Arianna tilted her head back. “You disappoint me. I thought you did not follow all the Shamanic traditions.”

“I don’t,” Xihu said. “If I did, I would be proud to serve the Black Family in any capacity.”

“That’s not my experience with Shaman.”

“Your father’s Shaman was not typical.”

Something flitted through Arianna’s eyes. It seemed like surprise. What other Shaman would she be thinking of? There had been none on Blue Isle since Arianna became Black Queen.

“Then what makes your choice?” Arianna asked.

“I will not be the only source of Vision to a Blind leader.”

“You believe I’m Blind?”

“You’ve given me no cause to believe otherwise.”