The Riven Shield: The Sun Sword #5 (25 page)

You may have surmised that the armies of Lorenza and Garrardi did not come to me blindly; they serve their Tyrs, and their Tyrs serve their own interests. Some of that interest lies in the lands of Mancorvo
.

The Serra Donna en’Lamberto did the first clumsy thing that she had done in many months; she spilled the water that she had, in the silence, attempted to pour. It pooled upon the surface of the table like a stain or an accusation, but he barely noticed it himself.

Ser Mareo kai di’Lamberto was a man of the High Courts; the contents of this letter, shorn of the nuance and the subtlety of that Court, were as unexpected as an assassin’s blade; they cut deeply, robbing him of like words.

It is an interest that I cultivated
.

And cut again. The geography of the known world was shifting beneath his feet, and Ser Mareo kai di’Lamberto, as all Lambertans, was a man whose feet were firmly planted upon the ground.

You will no doubt have surmised this
.

Lesser men may equate honor with stupidity, but I have seen you upon the field, Tyr’agnate, and if in my youth I might have made the same mistake, I have learned
—
at cost
—
the error of that assumption
.

The lands to the North of Raverra have always been the most fertile of our lands; they are also the lands which have been most vulnerable to Northern attack. You, better than any, know the cost of that vulnerability
.

I have considered all options with care, and I have come to this conclusion: Ser Ramiro kai di’Callesta, and his clan, must pay the price of their treachery. Were I not the Tyr’agar, they would still pay: they have given to the North what men have died to prevent, and for less reason
.

Averda itself cannot be governed by a man who would turn against the clans, and the lands of Averda are therefore forfeit
.

It matters little that Ser Ramiro hides behind the Leonne name. He brings a Northerner with a Southern face and a tenuous claim to a dead clan at the head of Northern armies; how will a pawn of the Demon Kings serve the Dominion ? Could you pledge allegiance to a boy who bears such a strong Northern taint
?

I gamble, now; I assume that your answer is no
.

And therefore I offer this: The lands to the West of Mancorvo are yours, if you can take and hold them against the Callestans. I have reason to believe that you can; past history supports this
.

The lands that were to be claimed by the Tyrs will be offered solely from Averdan soil. In this fashion, all may benefit from the defense of Annagar
.

I do not ask for your answer immediately. I understand that my own haste has brought me to this position, and if I am a man who is prone to error, I am seldom accused of making the same mistake twice
.

Consider what I ask. If you cannot, at this time, bring yourself to join your forces with mine, I ask simply that you hold the borders against the Northern foe. They will be hemmed in on all sides, with no clear advantage
.

Ser Mareo kai di’Lamberto did not look up until he had read the letter three times. The sun had not set, but he felt the nighttime wind through the distant screens. “My apologies, Serra Donna,” he said, “for bringing this war to your harem.” He made to rise; she caught his elbow.

They stood, thus bound by her delicate touch.

“Mareo,” she said quietly.

Something in her tone was not right—but the whole of the letter was a shock to the conservative Tyr; he said nothing for a time, meeting her eyes.

“So,” he said at last. “He has admitted all.”

“No,” she said, surprising him. “Not all.” She rose, and walked past him, past the table, to the closed screen that opened, at last, upon the room they shared.

There, stark upon a simple stand, stood the sheathed and silent
Balagar
.

“Your brother’s sword,” she said softly.

He nodded.

“You want to trust Ser Alesso.”

He did not answer her; she knew him well. “Na’donna, speak. Tell me what you think.”

“I think that this is war,” she replied, an evasion. “And war is not the province of Serras.”

He bowed his head. He did not touch
Balagar
.

“But I think, as well, that Ser Fredero died because he wished to strike out at Ser Alesso.”

“Yes.”

“I spent little time with your par,” she continued, failing to meet his gaze. “But enough to know that he was not a foolish man. Speak to Jevri, Mareo.”

“Can you not—”

“No. He is Radann, not seraf. I am Serra.” She walked past him, evading his grasp. “It is day, Tyr’agnate.”

“Tyr’ agnate, Na’donna? Why so formal? Have I angered you?”

“Calculating man,” she said, a hint of amusement and affection in her voice. Only a hint; something lay within the words that was stronger.

Na’donna was afraid.

“War has come to the harem,” she said. “But not with your letter. Not with the arrival of Ser Adano.”

He was still, now. Although Ser Alesso’s letter was not forgotten, he found that he could set it aside. He waited.

“It is too bright,” she continued, “to speak of these things.”

“The Lord does not rule the harem.”

“Aye, no. Nor our hearts,” she added. “But it is not the Lady’s time.” She drew breath, held it, and slowly lowered her shoulders. “The Havallans came to the domis,” she said at last.

“The Voyani?”

She nodded. “Not Yollana. But her daughters.”

“Why?”

She lifted her head as well. “To speak of war,” she told him quietly. “And to speak of the future. One of the two—I do not know which, so please, do not ask—has lifted the veil and gazed.”

“What did she speak of, Na’donna?”

“They will leave our lands,” she replied.

“The Voyani?”

“Yes. The Havallans. The Arkosans have already forsaken Averda.”

“So. Even they.”

“No. Not because of the war. Not because of the Northerners; they care little for such things.”

“Then why?”

“They would not say.”

“You did not ask.”

“It is said that it is unwise to know the business of the Voyani. More so, Tyr’agnate, for the men of the clans than their Serras.”

“Why did they come, Na’donna?”

“To speak,” she told him quietly, “of the Lord of Night. Of the Lord of Night and his kin.”

8th of Corvil, 427 AA

City of Callesta, Terrean of Averda

Kiriel di’Ashaf stood in the moonlight on the height of the plateau.

In Callesta—the only city in the Terrean to be named after its founding family—the manor of the Tyr’agnate stood at the height of the city, surrounded by gates that were cleverly placed behind standing trees, bushes, sculptures. The sculptures themselves were larger than life; they did not resemble people except in the fanciful light of day, when sun lit their stone features, their marble countenances. In the evening, serafs walked the length of the Callestan estates, and placed fire in the hands of these carved garden denizens, and that fire, red and orange, lent them menace and an air of threat.

Valedan had chosen to accept the Tyr’s offer of hospitality while he awaited the arrival of the Commanders; two days had passed. During that time, some attempt had been made to integrate the Ospreys with the cerdan and Tyran that served Callesta.

In Auralis AKalakar’s admittedly subjective opinion, it had not been a disaster; the Ospreys had acquitted themselves as well as anyone—even Duarte—could have expected. But they were not dress guards, and the exacting standards held up by the Tyran were particularly trying. The heat did not bother the Callestans; the endless repetition of Ser Anton’s training seemed to hold an equally endless fascination for them. They spoke only when spoken to, and seemed content to follow the minimal orders they received.

The Ospreys tried.

But in the end, they served best in two capacities. The first was by Valedan’s side. He had Ser Andaro as Tyran, but had chosen no others; the Ospreys—or whatever it was they were calling themselves at any given moment—had proved themselves worthy of their place at his side by their defeat of numerous would-be assassins in the distant North. Demon assassins.

Unfortunately, there had been no similar attempts in the South with which to shore themselves up.

So they served in a secondary capacity as well: They guarded the perimeter of the Callestan holdings in key areas, although Duarte had elected to use them only in the evening, when the differences in their uniform and, more particularly, in their gender, would be less easily noted.

Valedan, however, had declined to remove the women from active duty.

It bought him respect from the Ospreys; they were suspicious enough to smell politics a mile away, and Auralis had won a tidy sum of money when laying wagers among the more cynical Ospreys about the length of time the women would be allowed to be useful once they had crossed the border.

Not that Auralis wasn’t cynical; he was simply more competent at being so. Kiriel was part of the heart of Valedan’s defense; would-be Tyr or no, she could not simply be set aside at the whim of Annie sensibility. Alexis, maybe—although Duarte would suffer for it later. Fiara, maybe. Any of the others, certainly. But not Kiriel.

And Valedan was not generally of a mind to make glaring exceptions to the few rules he set.

But he was politic enough that, when staying within the heart of the Callestan manor—if such an open, foreign building could be called that—he did not put the women on rotation within the halls themselves.

Kiriel, therefore, was here, beneath the night sky, the city of Callesta growing still and dark through the slender bars of the fence.

In the light shed by fire in cupped, stone palms, she cast the occasional shadow; it flickered with wind, as if it were living, and separate, from her.

She, too, had grown still.

In and of itself, this was not particularly disturbing; she was on duty; there weren’t a lot of other places she should have been. But Auralis, at a distance of not more than twenty feet—twenty very boring feet—found his attention caught by her, held.

“Kiriel?”

She turned to look at him, and the hairs on the back of his neck rose. His hand was on the hilt of his sword before he realized it had moved.

Her brow rose slightly, and then her eyes widened.

“Auralis?”

He nodded. Forced his hand down.

“I can see you.”

Something about the way she said the words made them significant. “What do you mean?”

“I can see . . . you. The way I used to see.”

He didn’t ask any more questions. He knew what she meant.

But instead of backing away, he walked closer; close enough that he was aware of her slightest move; the rise and fall of breath, the slight turn of her head, the way her lips quirked up in a dangerous, edgy smile.

“Does it matter?” he asked, with a shrug. No nonchalance, not here; she wasn’t an idiot.

She looked nonplussed.

“Does it matter,” he said again, “what you see, whether you see it?”

Her eyes were an odd color in the fire’s dim light. “Doesn’t it matter to you?”

He stared at her for a long time. “No.”

“Why not?”

There was a sharpness to her genuine curiosity; an expectation of pain.

He shrugged. “Can you change what you see?”

“Change it?”

“Sure. Change it. Can you make it something it’s not?”

“No. I can tell you what it is.”

“So what. I can tell you what it is. Maybe your vision upset someone back wherever it was you used to live, but maybe they were stupid. I know what I am, Kiriel.”

“And you’re proud of it.”

He laughed.

It was Kiriel who took a step back.

“Are you proud of what you are?” he responded, half snarling.

“I don’t . . . know what I am.”

“You can’t see yourself the way you see me?”

She shook her head; her hair curled around her shoulders as if it were alive.

“Then how in the Hells can you trust what you see in anyone else? Have you ever thought that maybe it’s all just a mirror?”

She stared at him for a long time, and as she did, Auralis watched her eyes change color. It was slow, deceptive; a trick of the light and heat she had moved away from.

But his hands relaxed as he watched.

“Maybe you’ll be lucky,” he said softly. “Maybe you’ll never know what you’re capable of. Maybe you’ll never have to live with it.”

The Serra Alina was given a room adjacent to the rooms Valedan occupied. It was far smaller than the rooms she had occupied when she had lived in her brother’s harem, but in every other respect, it was a Southern room. The hanging across the doors was weighted; no wrinkle, no fold, marred its blue background, its brilliant sun, each ray embroidered in such a way that no one seeing it could mistake it for any rank but Ramiro’s. It fell like steel, like an ordinance. Mats were laid against the floor; upon them a low table that had been decorated with fruit, twin fans, a spray of small, white blossoms which hung like silent bells toward the east.