The Sacred Hunt Duology (68 page)

“But what happened?”

Zareth Kahn grinned, for he knew the story well. “It's obvious that it worked out well, Stephen,” he said as Evayne smiled. “Because there are still the Twin Kings, and they rule from the city of Averalaan.” He pulled his pack up and tied it shut. “You, Lady, have a touch of the bard in you.”

“I?” Her smile faltered, and then she regained it again, holding it tight to her lips. “No, it's just the influence of a friend in Senniel.”

“Senniel? A talented friend indeed.”

Kallandras
, Stephen thought, remembering his first Sacred Hunt. But he did not mention the name aloud. Instead he wondered whether or not their sojourn into the city at the heart of the Empire would bring them together again.

• • •

“But I don't understand how it works. I mean, there are two kings
and
there are two queens—how does anything get decided?”

“Stephen,” Evayne said, as the fire began to die in the grate, “it's a pity that you don't have a spark of the mage-born in you. You'd have made a wonderful mage. You could,” she said, standing, “still join the Order of Knowledge. It exists for those who can't stop asking questions when the time for questions has long passed.”

“Which means you don't know.”

“Which means,” she said, laughing, “that I don't understand it either, no. The god-born have spines of steel when it comes to the traits of their parents—I can't imagine either of the Kings being willing to compromise when it comes to those areas that most concern him. But I know there are situations in which wisdom and justice are not easy allies. I'm just happy I'm not either of the Queens.”

He lifted his glass and drank the remnants of the oddly flavored drink that she had brought for him. He was happy for her company, although he could feel that Gilliam was not. This eve she was the same woman that she had been this morning, which was rare. “We're almost there, aren't we?”

“Yes. A few days and we'll be in the outer fields that surround the city; a full day more, and we'll be at the city itself. It's not walled in any real way, but there is the half-wall to mark its boundaries. You'll understand the lack of the wall when you see it.” She smiled. “And you'll see the ocean for the first time, Stephen. I just hope that I'm here to see it with you. It has a feel and a call that is quite unique.”

2nd Corvil, 410 A.A.
Averalaan

It was huge. It lay across the horizon like the scattered manors of giants, or the halls of the Gods beyond the half-world. At first, before the rising sun burned the misty gauze from the morning air, Stephen thought that he was looking at an unexpected mountain chain; he knew a moment of panic—what if they had taken a wrong turn? Followed the wrong road?—and then he realized that he was seeing the towers of Averalaan and the hills upon which they were built.

As they followed the wide road, wagons joined them in a longer train than Stephen or Gilliam had ever seen. Gilliam said nothing, but Stephen turned to Evayne. She was not quite the same woman as yesterday. He knew she was almost the same age, but whether younger or older, it was hard to tell.

“Is it festival season in Essalieyan?”

“No. Why?”

He looked over his shoulder, to his side, and then to the road that stretched, crowded as a market street, ahead of them. The wagons were of a different variety than those that were common in Breodanir—the wheels seemed thinner and the bases higher. They carried all manner of things—in fact, he thought he saw one that carried horses, and he could not understand why they were not made to walk.

Evayne tried not to laugh. “It's—this is normal for the time of morning, Stephen. Averalaan is the capital of trade along the seacoast; no city in Annagar can boast such a market, or such a selection, as Averalaan does. The merchants arrive by wagon and by ship. There.” She lifted a hand and pointed. “Do you see the light flashing? Beside it, there are sails.”

But her eyes were better than his, a fact which did not surprise him at all. His steps were quick and light. A situation of gravity and urgency had brought them to the heart of Essalieyan—but all wisdom and all knowledge could be found in Averalaan, or so the tales often said, and he could not help but be excited. Very few indeed were the Hunter Lords who could afford the time away from their demesnes that would have allowed them to travel to the city. Fewer still were those who would have any such inclination. And a huntbrother rarely left the side of his Lord.

Gilliam looked back and mouthed the word “Cynthia” and Stephen frowned. He took better care, thereafter, to conceal his enthusiasm.

• • •

The demiwalls that Evayne spoke of came into view, and as they did it became clear that they weren't walls at all; they were like the stone work fence that surrounded a few of the more pretentious manors in the King's City in Breodanir—but they stretched out to the horizon on either side, a thin, pale line whose division of the landscape faded quickly from view.

“We approach the city of Averalaan,” Evayne said. “It is the city of the Kings, and the laws here are complex and more strictly enforced than anywhere else in the empire.” She smiled wryly. “Of course that doesn't mean that you shouldn't keep an eye on your purses in at least half the hundred.”

“Half the hundred?”

“The hundred holdings.” Her eyes widened slightly. “The city is divided into a hundred holdings of theoretically equal size. No, they aren't visible divisions. In the King's City, there are different circles, and within those circles there are areas like the warrens.”

“What do you mean by complex?”

She shrugged. “Actually, what I mean is be polite, don't steal, don't kill anyone who isn't trying to kill you first, don't run a horse to death and leave it in the road, and keep a tight grip on your dogs.”

“Doesn't sound that complicated.”

“Well, with luck you won't have to run into the complicated parts.”

“Are there no guards and no gate?”

“No; they aren't deemed necessary. It's hundreds of miles to the border of Annagar, and hundreds to the free townships that buffer us from the kingdoms to the west. There are guards, but they watch the three bridges that lead to the Isle, and they man the ports to which the ferries travel with their goods. If Kalliaris smiles, we won't have to deal with them either.”

“You don't think Luck is going to smile, do you?”

“This is what I think she'll do.” She turned to him and made the most extraordinary face that he had yet seen her make. Then she laughed at his expression, sobering slowly. “No, Stephen, I don't think she'll smile, but if she doesn't frown, I'll make offerings to Reymaris for the rest of my life.”

A horn sounded at their backs, low and loud, the captured voice of a cow. Evayne pulled them hurriedly off the road as four horses galloped down the stretch of road to the farthest south. There were no wagons along it, and the people that were there did not tarry either.

But the dogs barked angrily at the passing intruders and stopped only when Stephen made it clear to Gilliam that their anger was not acceptable. Gilliam's reply was subvocal, which was just as well. He was ill at ease on the road and the closer they got to the city itself, the more uncomfortable he became. Stephen had never felt such a lack of ease from Gilliam—not even when the most marriage-minded of ladies were attempting to ally their houses with his through their daughters and he was forced, by Elsabet or Stephen, to sit, smile, and endure. He could also tell that Gilliam was doing his best to subdue what traveled between them, but subdued or no, it grew strong, and stronger still, until the half-walls were at their backs and the heights of the city buildings began to cast shadows upon them.

It was hard to ignore it, but ignore it he did, although it took much of his concentration. Perhaps that was why he did not notice the shadows that crossed their path and stopped, weapons raised in swiftness and silence. Or why he did not notice, until he felt Zareth Kahn's sharp shove, the tall, pale stranger with eyes of fire behind four men in a foreign uniform.

But whatever it was that had webbed his mind and turned his thoughts so much inward that he did not notice his surroundings well was removed in that instant. As was Gilliam's unease—replaced by something akin to excitement. Excitement.

Zareth Kahn stepped forward. “May we help you, gentleman?”

“I believe you can. The young men you are with are wanted in connection with a murder that occurred yesterday.”

Zareth Kahn's dark brows rose a fraction, and then he smiled. “Well, I can assure you that they could not possibly be involved in the commission of any such crime; they've never been to the city before they crossed the demiwalls today.”

The man sneered; there was no other word for the expression. “I'm afraid that we're going to have to go to the magisterial holding courts, where the magisterial truthseekers involved in the rest of the investigation will decide that for themselves.”

“Very well,” Zareth Kahn said, with a snort that easily matched the sneer for contempt. “If you will insist on wasting our time in such a petty fashion, we'll follow.”

“We will do no such—”

“Lord Elseth.” Zareth Kahn touched his shoulder with the appearance of gentleness. It was only appearance; his grip was solid. “The customs of Averalaan dictate a certain amount of cooperation with the magisterial guards. We will, unfortunately, be brought to a hearing in which these charges will be summarily dismissed. At that point, we are well within our rights to question the competence of the truthseeker involved in our arrest.”

Gilliam brought the dogs to bear and then stopped. “Stephen?”

Stephen was staring at the man that Zareth Kahn had called truthseeker. The man's uniform was not completely unlike those of the guards who surrounded him, but he did not wear the chain and plate that they did, and his insignia, that of two crowns above a crossed rod and sword, covered a white field, not a gray one.

“Stephen, what is wrong?” Evayne's voice was strained but oddly pitched; her words were a tickle in his ear.

“His eyes,” Stephen whispered back. “Can't you see his eyes?”

The truthseeker leveled his gaze at Stephen, and then he smiled, and the smile was that of an executioner who revels in his work.
“These men are attempting to escape. Kill them.”
His voice had the echo of a power that Stephen had only heard once before, upon his first Sacred Hunt.

The guards stiffened, and then their expressions changed. “Halt! Halt in the name of the Kings!” Even under the power of suggestion, the magisterial guards resisted the order to kill. “Halt!”

Zareth Kahn looked confused, but Evayne's features were harder and grimmer. She raised her arms and spoke three words; light flared from her hands. Stephen saw her limned with it, as if she were the Goddess at the birth of creation, offering the sun to the world.

The truthseeker screamed in agony.

The magisterial guards stopped as the fleeing suspects suddenly appeared, standing before them as if they had never left.
“KILL THEM NOW!”

Evayne sent light in a fan of sparks, and the guards cried out, blinded even as their former leader. “Follow!” Evayne cried. No one gainsaid her.

• • •

She was afraid.

She was not the older Evayne; power such as her enemies possessed was still just outside of her grasp. But she recognized those enemies—that much was obvious to Stephen.

“Where do we go?” Zareth Kahn asked, looking over his shoulder, as he'd done every time they'd slowed their pace. He did not seek to accuse Evayne of causing trouble or breaking the much-loved laws of Averalaan; he knew her well enough by now to know that her reasons for it were unimpeachable—and more important, were not reasons that could be explained at leisure without some loss of life.

She looked around the streets, gazing at buildings and moving crowds as if to wrest some answer from them.

“There!” came a cry at their backs. “The men with the dogs! Stop them—they've murdered a magisterial 'seeker!”

Zareth Kahn swore.

Evayne paled.

And pale, she made the only decision that it was safe to make. She lifted her arms and cast a web of violet light across her group.

The people immediately around them gave a collective gasp and drew back, staring intently.

“What are you doing?”

“I'm doing my best to keep us hidden,” she replied, speaking slowly and with some difficulty. “But I can't keep it up for long.”

Zareth Kahn stepped forward quietly. “No, you can't. But I can. Let me, Lady.”

She was not used to accepting help; not accustomed, judging from her expression, to hearing it offered. But she swallowed once and nodded.

“You will,” the mage said softly, as his web seemed to settle over hers, dissolving and replacing the strands, “have to lead us.”

She nodded. “Thank you.”

“Where are we going?” Stephen hissed.

“Do you see the circle on the ground?”

He nodded.

“Don't step outside it. Tell Gilliam to keep his dogs, and Espere, well within its confines. We go to less traveled streets.”

“Should we avoid going beyond the net?”

“The what?”

“The net. The one that Zareth Kahn has cast.”

Her brows went up. “You can see it?” And then she shook her head. “Never mind. If you see me later, remind me. You are not a mage, and not mage-born, and only the mage-born have the sight. Or the seer-born.” As an afterthought, she added, “And yes, avoid at all costs going beyond the net; if you pass your arm through it, it will appear, without the usual body attached, in midair in front of passersby.”

• • •