Where Light Meets Shadow (16 page)

Yet he had one question he must
ask. “How does the queen?”

Was that a shadow that passed
over Dermot’s face? “Well enough. You’ll see for yourself. I’m sure you shall
have an audience with her once you have rested and eaten.”

One of the royal servants brought
ewers of hot water and scented soap, and along with those a selection of fine
clothes that seemed above his station. The servant bowed out after being
assured that, no, Kieran most assuredly did not need help bathing and dressing.

He took longer than strictly
necessary with the water and soap, but it felt so good to get clean after his
long ride. The last inn had been two nights past, and the water had been barely
tepid. The previous night he had spent in a farmer’s barn.

He studied the clothes, rich
cloth and fine, soft doeskin, all dyed in dark, expensive colors. All were
elaborately embroidered. He had seen some of the courtiers surrounding Brona
garbed so, and Brona had gowns equally elaborate when her handmaids and her
mother’s counselors overruled her preference for plain stuff she could go
adventuring in without worrying overmuch about tears and grass stains.

In Kieran’s dim childhood
memories, his father would sometimes wear such clothes to play at important
feasts, but Kieran himself had never owned such outfits. He reached out to
finger a tunic of deep red velvet trimmed in black and stiff with gold
embroidery and beadwork.

He’d feel like a child playing
dress-up. On the other hand, he had been offered these clothes, and didn’t want
to offend, especially if Dermot was right and he was to be called before the
queen.

He chose breeches of black
doeskin, wondering as he pulled them on how a tanner made leather so soft. He
considered the red tunic, the finest of all that had been brought for him to
choose from, but he would feel utterly ridiculous. The black with silver thread
might make him look more sober, older—and more like he was going to a funeral.

He wished Alban were here. Surely
he had some experience in such things. Though the Leas were far less formal,
Kieran had seen a painting in the halls of the Leas castle of Alban dressed in
white and gold finery, and so he knew it happened on occasion. If nothing else,
they could laugh together at the absurdity of a simple fool dressing up like a
peacock.

Except Alban would not be
welcomed here, would not even be safe.

He chose a tunic of deep forest
green that seemed like a midpoint between the extravagant red and the somber
black, and braided back his hair in the way that Brona said made him look
older.

Odd. He had been less nervous of
audiences with Toryn than he was his own queen. Was it because he cared less
what Toryn thought of him?

The central bell that called the
clock in the Shadowed Lands had just finished striking the first bell of the
afternoon when one of the royal maidservants came in bearing a tray of fruits
and cheeses, bread and cold meat. He knew her, for she sometimes waited upon
Brona, but couldn’t for the life of him remember her name. Which didn’t much
matter, as she’d never had more than two words to say to him, and those
generally not friendly.

Except this time, she looked him
up and down and smiled as though she liked what she saw. “Her majesty will see
you on the next bell, as it please you, sir.”

The last was just a courtesy; all
Scathlan were subject to her majesty’s pleasure. But it was a courtesy she
wouldn’t have bothered with before.

“Should you have need of anything
else, sir, just send for me and I would be more than happy to oblige.”

The words could carry more than
one meaning; her smile told him she intended both of them.

He returned the smile. “I shall
keep that in mind.”

“Do.” She gave a saucy twitch of
her hips on the way out of the door.

Alban was lost to him. The Leas
prince would, please Grace, find someone suitable to his station that would
love him as he deserved. In the meantime, he had to get on with his own life.

Soon. Not tonight, but soon.

Kieran ate with a restored
appetite, but could not do justice to all that had been given him. The clock
struck quarter to the hour, and he stood to go. Should he bring his harp? It
had not been requested, so he left it behind, though he would have liked to
have something to do with his hands. He knew his role as a bard, it was
comfortable. This audience with the queen put him on unfamiliar footing.

As soon as he stepped into the
antechamber, Brona pounced on him in a flurry of words and hugs. “Oh, Kieran,
it’s so good to see you! I’m glad you’re home. But Mother, oh it’s so
wonderful. And so terrible. You must do something. You’re a bard, surely you
can,
you
must do something.”

So terrible? What? And what did
she mean him to do?

But Riagan, the queen’s chief
counselor, opened the door to the throne room, and bid him enter, so there was
no time. Riagan, counselor by title, had ruled in the queen’s name since she
had fallen into her long sleep. Though Brona had reached her majority in the
last year, she had made no move to challenge him, and indeed the matter of rule
would have been difficult enough to resolve with the queen neither dead nor
truly alive.

None of that mattered now that
the queen had awakened.

Except when he stepped across the
mosaic tiles of the chamber floor, his feet echoing in the stillness, it felt
so like those visits with Brona to the sleeping queen that he wondered for a
moment if he had imagined all that had gone before.

The room was still dark, the only
illumination the four braziers set around the queen’s dais, making shadows
flicker at the edges of the hall and causing  the illusion of movement at
the corner of his eye.  It made him want to turn his head to be sure the
carved stone figures had not come to life. On the throne on the dais in the
center of the room, the queen still sat, unmoving, skin so pale against her
severely braided raven locks.

Then she smiled—she was awake!
But the smile chilled his blood for reasons he could not say.

It was only that he had never
seen her move before, surely that must be it.

“Come, my bard, my champion. Come
into the light and let me look upon you.”

He approached the dais and knelt,
some dimly remembered etiquette coming to the fore, court manners unneeded for
so long in a nation with a slumbering queen.

“You are the very image of your
father, young man. Has anyone told you that?”

Mutely, he shook his head as all
his bard’s skill with words fled.

“They should have. He would be
very proud of you, I am sure. He served me well, though he had the temerity to
disagree with me from time to time. You would never disagree with me, would
you, my young bard?”

He shook his head automatically,
although he heard his teacher’s voice in his memory, telling him that a bard’s
duty is to bring truth to light.
We may flatter, to make truth more
palatable, we may spin stories, telling lies in service of a greater truth, but
ultimately it is to the truth that we owe allegiance.

“You will serve me then, as he
did, and have a place of even greater honor in my court. You awakened me from
my dark dreams. You came when I called. And now you will aid me in crushing my
foes!”

“Your foes?” he dared to ask,
blood running cold in his veins.

“The Oathbreaker and all his
kind, who were responsible for my long sleep.”

“Your majesty, the Leas prince is
the one who helped me to wake you. Without him—”

“You will not contradict me!” the
queen shrieked. She took a few deep breaths, as though mastering herself. “You
are young, I know, and naive, and the Leas are capable of seeming friendship.”

“But, your majesty, Prince
Alban—”

 “I will not hold your
mistake against you. There will be plenty of time for you to see reason while
we prepare for the war that is to come. Go now. We will have a feast in your
honor tonight.”

Kieran turned and stumbled out of
the room.

Brona clung to him in the
antechamber. “You see?”

He did see. He saw war ahead,
fields of broken bodies, Scathlan and Leas alike. Saw warriors like Trodaire
turned from sense and honor by the bitterness of loss, saw another generation
like his own growing up orphaned and angry and hating.

And he would be responsible.

He let Brona lead him over to a
padded bench that stood against one wall, and they sat down together.

Waking the queen was supposed to
make things better for Brona and for his people. Was supposed to make it
possible for old wounds to heal.

Brona leaned into him. “It’s
like, for her, the last battle was yesterday, not years ago.”

He put an arm around her
shoulder. “Surely Riagan and the rest of the council will make her see sense.”

Brona let out a choked sound that
might have been a laugh or a sob. “The council either encourages her or panders
to her. None of them are brave enough to stand against her. And Riagan is the
worst of the lot.”

Kieran looked around to see if
Riagan was still in earshot, but the chief counselor was nowhere to be seen.
“What profit can he see in another war?”

“His own, most likely. Riagan, I
fear, has become used to ruling, albeit in my mother’s name. If he can keep her
distracted with thoughts of revenge, he can continue on pretty much as he has
been.”

“I have a hard time believing he
would let another kinslaying war happen just to maintain power.”

The Leas had always accused his
people of being cold and unfeeling, and he had always denied it.

“It’s no worse a reason than a
broken engagement.”

Startled, he sat back. For all
the long, lazy conversations he and Brona had shared, he realized he had never
really known her opinion of the last war. He only assumed it was the same as
his, the same as the rest of Scathlan society.

For that matter, he had only
assumed that all his people felt the same, though any who disagreed would have
been wise to keep quiet about it.

At the moment, he could not say
that Brona’s comparison had been unfair.

“Can’t you talk to her?” he
asked. “You’re her daughter. Surely she’ll listen to you.”

Brona shook her head. “Her eyes
may see me as grown, but in her mind I am still a child. She pays no more heed
to my words than if I were still prattling on about my dollies.”

“I tried to tell her that Alban
was the one who helped—”

“Alban?”

He hadn’t even had a chance yet
to tell her about his adventures. “Oh, Brona, so much has happened to me since
I went away. I barely know where to start.”

He told her about his fall and
the broken harp, about being healed by the Leas lord and his son, about the
book and the mind-link and friendship with Alban, and finally about how they
worked together to heal the queen.

“Oh, Kieran,” she sighed when he
was done. “Trust you to fall in love in the most difficult, troublesome manner
possible.”

“What?” He hadn’t used the word
“love,” and he certainly hadn’t told her about that night in the crystal
spring. “I never said—”

“You didn’t have to. Does he love
you as well?”

He took a deep breath, trying to
stem the tide of memories that swelled at that one simple question. “Yes.”

“Why ever did you leave him to
come back here?”

“The queen called. It was my duty
to obey.”

“You chose duty over your love?”

How could she be so surprised,
and more, disappointed? “I am a loyal subject, as my father was before.”

“And if war comes?” Brona
pressed.

He closed his eyes against the thought.
“Maybe it won’t.”

“But if it does?” she asked in
that tone that told him that she would not let the matter drop.

The thought cut him like a
dagger. “If it does, then my place is with my own people.”

“Are you so sure?”

Why must she make him question
things that should not be questioned? “Yes.”
No.

Light from the torches gleamed on
the gilded statues and glinted off the golden tableware. Though the season was
early, garlands of spring flowers looped along the walls, perfuming the air
with their sweetness.

Being the guest of honor at a
formal feast made Kieran far more uncomfortable than he had imagined. He could
not perform, for one, and sitting silent while another, lesser musician played
made his hands crave his harp. He thought to use his position, seated at the
head table with Brona and the council, just two seats down from the queen, to
make his story known to those who should hear it. Surely if they understood how
gracious and generous the Leas had been, how he could not have wakened the
queen without their help, that war could be averted.

But every time he tried to speak
of his time with the Leas, Riagan or the queen diverted the conversation. He
thought that, since he was the guest of honor, the others at the table might
show some interest in his travels, but they confined their questions to his
time with the mortals, when they addressed him at all. Brona tried to help by
asking about the Leas, but the others talked over her as though they had not
heard the royal princess asking a question.

He had hoped that he might have a
chance to regale the assembly with the story of his journey—he was, after all a
bard, telling stories was part of what he did—but apparently his role as guest
of honor did not allow him to perform.

For all that it was supposed to
be a celebration, there was little laughter and even less merriment, and Kieran
remembered with longing the informal gatherings with Alban’s cousins.

Pleading exhaustion, he excused
himself as early as he could and returned to his room, where he lay awake,
staring into the shadows of the ceiling and missing Alban.

#

“Alban, there is news that might
interest you.”

Alban, leaning on the balcony
that overlooked the road to Scathlan lands, turned at his father’s words. He
made an effort to appear interested. Kieran was gone forever; brooding about it
did no one any good. It had been months since he’d bid Kieran farewell. Past
time he acted like the prince he was.

“I received a missive from the
Scathlan queen,” his father continued.

Though the sun was warm, Alban
shivered in the breeze. By the rumors from their mortal trading partners, there
was evidence of increased mining and smelting and metal craft in the Scathlan
stronghold, but no increase in trading. Whatever the Scathlan made, they kept
for themselves, and their mortal neighbors worried that they stockpiled
weapons.

The Leas could only share their
concern, and with more reason than most.

“She proposes a meeting between
us, so we can talk out our differences.”

“Will you go?”

His father’s gaze fell to the
distant black mountains. “I have no choice. If there is a chance to avert war,
we must try. Though I’ve no idea how we will come to agreement, since her
issues, so far as I know, stem from past actions that I cannot and would not
change.”

“Is it safe?”

Father took a deep breath. “I
believe so. The Scathlan hold honor in high regard. I cannot imagine that they
would violate a truce.”

“Where will you meet?”

“There is a royal hunting lodge
on the old border between our land and theirs, from the days when we met once a
year to hunt and celebrate together. From the times when elf-kind was more
numerous and mortals less so, and Scathlan and Leas held all the land between
the black mountain and the white.” He chuckled. “I do not envy them the task of
making it ready. It has long been vacant.”

“A hunting lodge?” Alban asked.
“I somehow can’t imagine Kieran’s queen choosing anything so rustic.”

His father chuckled. “There is
very little rustic about it. It is built to Scathlan taste, for all that it
stands aboveground. All stone and elegance, with marble fountains in the
courtyard, though I believe Leas planned and planted the formal garden.”

It had to be a good sign that the
Scathlan queen wanted to talk. Surely it meant that the Scathlan were not
committed to war, there would be no point otherwise. Only what was there to
talk about?

“I thought to take you with me,”
Father continued. “It would be an opportunity for you to see diplomacy
firsthand, and it will reassure the Scathlan that I intend no hostility. But I
need your assurances.”

“You think I would embarrass
you?” Alban tried and failed to keep the hurt from his voice.

“Not in any ordinary sense, no.
You have always been a good son and an ideal prince.” His father took a deep
breath. “There is a chance, no, a likelihood that Kieran will be there.”

Of course, the queen would bring
her bard. There would be meals together, and music, as part of the diplomatic
proceedings.

“I will not ask you to stay away
from him. For one, it could be seen as a slight, and we cannot afford to give
the Scathlan more cause to claim against us. For another, if there is ever to
be peace between the kindreds as there once was, I believe it must start with
friendship between individuals.”

Alban was embarrassed to note
that his pulse had quickened with the prospect of seeing Kieran again.

“But I need you to remember that,
whatever our hopes may be for this meeting, for the time being the Scathlan are
enemies. Kieran is loyal to his people. I need to know that you will be loyal
to yours. Whatever your personal feelings are for this bard, you cannot let
them stand before your duty, as you did while he lived with us. If you cannot
promise me that, tell me now and I will leave you home.”

He had badly disappointed his
father in the past. He would not do so again.

“I understand. Kieran’s loyalty
is to his people, and my loyalty is to my own. I will not make you regret
including me.” Alban looked off to the distance for a moment, then faced his
father once again. “I’m sorry I helped Kieran to wake his queen.”

His father put a hand on his
shoulder. “Don’t be. I gave you permission to work toward that end, even
knowing what it might bring. The Scathlan are still elves, if only distant
kindred to us. We act on Grace, not expediency. It is, perhaps, what separates
us from mortals. Maybe that is why they are more successful than we, despite
their short lives. I fear that someday, like the ice dragons and the trolls of
the northern mountains, we will fade into a dream and be remembered only in
song. At least let us make it a beautiful dream and a happy song.”

#

Trying not to fidget, Kieran
stood in the queen’s retinue as they waited to receive the Leas. He brushed
invisible lint from his black tunic—he had chosen the black in the hope that it
would make him look older, more responsible, but he felt like an imposter. For
all that he held the title of royal bard, he still wasn’t accustomed to people
taking him seriously. He felt like any moment someone would call him out for
trying to wedge his way in among his betters.

He wasn’t entirely sure why he
was here in the marble-floored receiving hall, standing with the queen and her
retinue as they prepared to greet the Leas delegation. The queen had brought
him to entertain in the evenings, but that didn’t mean he had any place among
her advisors. For that matter, he couldn’t say why the queen had called this
meeting with the Leas at all. He could only hope it meant that she had finally
considered his words regarding the Leas and their role in waking her, but she
had given no other sign of having heard him.

The queen sat in the center of
their half-circle, regal and still, seeming almost as much a statue as she had
in her long sleep, with her council and her private guard arrayed around her.
Even Brona at her side looked untouchable, hair piled atop her head in an
intricate braid, dress stiff with elaborate gold embroidery.

An advance rider from the Leas
had announced the party’s arrival, and the queen had determined that her court
should greet them before they would be shown to their rooms. At the time, it
had seemed a courtesy, but when the Leas came into the hall, Kieran was not so
sure. The Leas were clearly exhausted and in travel clothes still, mud on their
boots and at the hem of their cloaks, undoubtedly at a disadvantage compared to
the Scathlan in their finery.

His breath went tight as they
approached.
No reason to be nervous.
He had met Toryn and his retinue
before, shared meals with some of them. And here he was the least member of the
Scathlan retinue, unlikely to come to any notice at all.

The queen stood as they
approached. Toryn bowed to her, a slight incline at the waist to acknowledge a
lady that was his equal, and introduced his party one by one, starting with
Alban who stood beside him looking, oh Grace, even more breathtaking than
Kieran remembered. Their eyes met, and Alban looked away.

Did he regret what they had been
to each other?

Toryn introduced Sheary as part
of his escort. When the king turned to the next member of the party, Sheary
caught his eye and winked. At least Alban’s irrepressible cousin had not
changed toward him.

Toryn finished his introductions,
and the queen introduced her retinue, starting with Brona, then moving on to
Riagan and the other advisers.

“And I believe you already know
my bard, Kieran,” she finished. “I understand I have you to thank for his safe
return.”

“It was an honor and a pleasure
to have him as a guest,” Toryn replied.

The words were a mere formality,
and Kieran could not read anything in the tone. He tried to make eye contact
with Alban, but the prince looked straight ahead into the middle distance.

“You will want a chance to rest
and change and refresh yourselves. We will meet again at dinner. It has been
too long since we broke bread with our Leas cousins. And then, on the morrow,
we will have much to discuss.”

#

Bathed, rested, and dressed in
more formal attire, Alban felt no more ready to face Kieran over dinner than he
had been in the receiving hall. He hadn’t been prepared for what it would be
like to see his—friend? Former friend? Lover of one night?—among the Scathlan,
among Alban’s enemies, as though Kieran were part of a force arrayed against
Alban’s kind.

He saw nothing of the reckless
Fool he loved in that unsmiling, black-garbed Scathlan. Could not imagine him
unbending enough to melt into him mind-to-mind, soul-to-soul. Could not imagine
him ever flashing a teasing smile as he called Alban his “Prince of Light.”

Enough. This was not about him,
not about his feelings for a Scathlan bard that had forgotten him soon enough.
This was about averting a war that would leave too many dead or scarred in mind
and soul.

Alban straightened, checked his
image in the mirror, and went to meet his father to walk down to dinner.

A white linen cloth edged with
silver embroidery covered the long table. The goblets were of intricately
worked gold, and even the plates and utensils gleamed golden. Whatever hard
times the Scathlan had known, they still had much of the pretty metal of which
they were so fond. He had to admit that the setting was lovely in the
candlelight.

The formal seating placed him
beside Brona, the Scathlan princess. He found her a warm and engaging
conversationalist and very interested in finding out about him. He obliged,
sharing with her the same stories of hunting mishaps with which he had
entertained Kieran and stories of pranks his cousins had played on him and the
few, sweet times he had gotten the upper hand.

He returned her questions with
his own, wanting to know more about this companion of Kieran’s youth. She was
frank in her answers, and her light sense of humor almost hid the loneliness of
growing up set apart by her rank from her peers and having a mother she knew
only as a living statue.

He could see why Kieran liked her
so much. He liked her himself and felt so at ease with her that, when she asked
him about Kieran’s time with the Leas, he answered her more openly than he
perhaps should have, for Kieran’s sake as well as his own.

He stopped short of admitting
that he loved the bard and, of course, he omitted that on one stolen night they
had been lovers.

Why, then, had she taken his hand
briefly, squeezed it, and told him that she hoped it would somehow all work out
between them?

Throughout the dinner, Kieran sat
on a stool in the corner, harping. Alban steadfastly refused to look at him,
stopped himself from wondering if he’d had a chance to eat earlier. Alban no
longer had responsibility for the bard’s care and comfort. Then Kieran started
to play the
Ballad of Heart’s Solace.
He didn’t sing the words, but
Alban would know that tune anywhere. Against his will, his head turned to the
bard, their eyes met, and Alban knew that Kieran had not forgotten one moment
of their time together.

Heat crept into his cheeks, and
he could only hope the dimness of the candlelight hid his flush.

When the dinner was over, Kieran
contrived to press against Alban’s side as they left the room. Alban felt his
mind yearning toward him and, without thinking, formed the mind-link.

Missed you,
Kieran told
him in a rush.
Meet me at midnight in the garden.

But they couldn’t hold the link
for long without being obvious, and Kieran was gone again before he could
reply.

Missed you.
Those two
words sent a tingling warmth through him. He had felt their sincerity through
the link, and the familiar touch of Kieran’s mind told him that, no matter his garb
or his company, beneath all existed his beloved Fool.

His father had explicitly said he
need not stay away from Kieran, but he probably had not intended such
permission to include clandestine meetings. For that had been the intent under
Kieran’s words.