Crown of Renewal (Legend of Paksenarrion) (44 page)

“That’s … impossible,” she said. “Water can’t be solid except as ice or snow. Magery can’t change something’s nature.”

He grinned, more relaxed than he’d been before. “So much lost. You strong mage but not know. You have some water magery, yes?”

“Yes,” Dorrin said. “I healed a cursed well, brought water.”

“You broke mage curse? Very strong, you. Verrakaisti always strong. Cannot believe they lost crown.”

Dorrin shrugged. “Maybe they took it somewhere else. It has been a long time.”

“If you alive back in our time, your family teach more water magery. Make jewels, maybe.” His look was challenging. “Would give much for such jewels. Have only this.” He dipped into a pocket in his tunic and brought out a jewel the size of her little fingertip, red as blood and reeking with evil power. “Know what this is?”

“It looks like blood,” Dorrin said. “Do you say it is made with blood as you say the others are with water?”

He nodded. “Yes. Much blood it takes. A hundred and a hundred died for this.” He wrapped his hand around it quickly as if afraid she might take it from him. “You do magery with blood?”

“Never,” Dorrin said. She could not keep the anger out of her voice. “Blood magery is evil.”

He lifted one shoulder and let it fall. “So that peasant said. I not agree. What your king say? And this one?”

“Use blood magery here or in Tsaia and you will die.” His brows went up: disbelief. “You know I am stronger than you; so is Lyonya’s king. I will kill you if you use blood magery here.”

“You would kill your own kind?”

“I have killed mages,” Dorrin said. She did not elaborate.

His hands moved in a gesture she hoped meant submission. “It is good to know. No blood magery here. Over the sea is same?”

“Over the sea?”

“Esa-aare, sun-land, Esea Sunlord’s home. Do you not know it?”

“I do not,” Dorrin said. “The Seafolk trade there, I think. Pargunese and Kostandanyans.”

“Seafolk … good fighters after they learned ships; we taught them that after taking land. What that red jewel you wear, if not blood jewel?”

“Falk’s honor, a ruby,” Dorrin said. “You know of Falk and the Knights of Falk?”

He sniffed. “King Cunias’s youngest son, yes. Before our time, but heard story. He never amount to anything. When he came back that time, he crippled and scarred and no one marry him, so Cunias offered him a woodsman’s house and a servant, but he went away. The Company of Falk just band of younger sons, not inheriting. Wander around with Falk, wear rags until tired of it. Went back to real clothes after Falk die. You are one?”

“Yes. I trained here in Lyonya, at Falk’s Hall.”

“All students mages?”

“No. Only some. But all well born. Girdish now have knightly orders, you know.”

He laughed. “The peasants? Did they finally learn to ride horses and wear fancy clothes?”

“Indeed yes,” Dorrin said.

His eyes narrowed. “It is hard to believe a Verrakai would not know about the crown even if it had been moved.”

“I left home early,” Dorrin said. “My father did not like me. He was angry that I wanted to be in the Company of Falk.”

“Ah. Suspected you a bastard and did not wait to see that you had the water magery. Sorry later, no doubt.”

“No doubt,” Dorrin said. “But I came to the title and the estate. To my knowledge there is no crown as you describe anywhere in the house or on the estate.”

“It may have been suspected and they moved it. Too bad you do not know.”

Dorrin blessed the years of military service that gave her the control she needed now.

Finally he bowed and left her. The others followed, with polite excuses. Dorrin went immediately to Kieri’s office, where a group of King’s Squires, both western and local elves, and Aliam Halveric waited.

“What have you learned?” Kieri asked.

“Much to distress us,” Dorrin said. “All in that group are indeed in others’ bodies. Matharin, the oldest man, not only has shifted bodies at least once, he admits to having used blood magery. I warned him that use of blood magery here would mean his death. He confirms the story King Torfinn told you of how the Pargunese came here: the magelords invaded and stole their land across the ocean. I now know their name for that land; they think it’s where Esea Sunlord came from. Matharin thinks Falk was a fool and his father reasonable to send him away.”

“By my word, Dorrin, you could have killed him for being a blood mage—are you sure he is not one now? And how did he survive the Girdish Wars and make his way to Kolobia? I thought all those mages who left were thought to be of good character.”

“He survived the war by not being at Greenfields,” Dorrin said. She told him what Matharin had said. “I suspect he survived later by transferring to the body he now wears and pretending to be a peasant, but I did not ask him that.”

“Faithless to his liege
and
a blood mage,” Kieri said. Dorrin could feel his anger, see it in the tightening of his mouth. “I will not have him here. He must go or die. I wish—”

“I did not know what killing by magery would do to your elvenhome or the taig,” Dorrin said.

“You could have used steel,” Kieri said.

“He will fight with magery,” Dorrin said. “He tried to dominate me and now considers me stronger, but he would use magery to defend himself. That’s another of the things you must know. Will that destroy or harm the elvenhome, do you think?”

“I don’t know,” Kieri said. “Amrothlin?” He looked at one of the elves.

“No human magery can harm the elvenhome, sir king, but only injury to you.”

“Do you think he sensed the regalia?” Kieri asked.

“No. He showed no sign of it, and he was not as careful of his face as I was of mine. I believe, too, that the regalia wants nothing to do with his kind. And I now know what the stones are.”

“What?”

“At least what he thinks they are. Water, changed by magery to jewels. He showed me a bloodstone, made he said from the blood of a hundred men.”

Kieri’s face paled. “Bloodstone! Are you sure?”

“It felt evil to me, but I do not know more than he told me.”

He looked at Arian. “Baron Sekkady, the magelord who held me captive all those years, had a bloodstone the size of my fist. He told me it held his power and the blood of ten thousand, drained one by one into it. He used it to control people; he said the spirits of those men were trapped in their blood.”

“But the water …” Arian said, her hand on Kieri’s arm. “Are
those
stones evil?”

NO
.

“I am sure they’re not,” Dorrin said. “I think they’re why the Sandlord came. I think the old magelords used up the water to make them.”

“So few?”

“Who knows how many jugs of water it takes to make one of them? You say the blood of ten thousand went into the fist-sized stone—imagine if it were water—and we don’t know if the amounts are the same. Or if the stones in the regalia are the only stones. Remember, I told you more were found on Verrakai land.”

“It hardly seems possible …” Kieri said.

“I know. And yet … the regalia say that’s what it is … they’ve been trying to tell me, but I didn’t understand. That’s why they want to go back to Old Aare, I’m sure. There’s some way to undo the magery and restore the water.”

“But the other magelords want the regalia and the power in the jewels to regain their power. Of course.” He stroked his beard. “And we must not let them. This one you spoke with—is he the most dangerous, do you think?”

“I won’t know without talking to the others. I suspect he’s their leader—or the most powerful mage, which means the same to him. He wanted to go fight King Mikeli for the throne; he thinks only mage strength matters.”

“We can’t wait,” Kieri said. “It will not be long before they do mischief, one way or another. I thought them stupid and harmless at first, so far out of their time, so ignorant of current happenings, but even one magelord determined to upset rule—Mikeli’s, mine, the Marshal-General’s—”

“Is too many. Yes.”

Another King’s Squire came to the door. “Sir king, a messenger arrived for Duke Verrakai; he will not say the cause—”

Dorrin’s belly clenched again. “What colors?”

“Tsaian.”

“Excuse me, then,” she said.

The messenger, a royal courier, was still standing in the entrance hall, gulping down a mug of water, when she emerged and nearly dropped the mug in his haste to reach her. “My lord Duke, the king’s word—” He held out the velvet pouch.

Dorrin took it. “I have received the king’s word,” she said formally. “You have witnessed it.”

“I must start back,” he said, taking another gulp from the mug.

“You must rest until the Master of Horse finds you a mount,” Dorrin said. “And why not overnight?”

“King’s orders,” the man said. “Do not spend even the turn of a glass in that place with magelords, he said. Leave at once, ride back to the nearest relay station—”

“That’s a half-day’s ride,” Dorrin said. “You won’t be there until full dark, even riding fast.”

“I must—the king said—”

“Did he not want an answer from me to whatever this is?” Dorrin asked.

“Yes, if you could, but he expected you’d send your own messenger.”

“Come with me,” Dorrin said, and led the way outside. To the doorward, she said, “Send for food and drink from the kitchen; I will be in the stables with this man.”

She found the Master of Horse in his office looking at the list of mounts available for courier duty. “We have three lame and one that needs shoes,” he said as he looked up. “The king’s been lending mounts to these visiting magelords any time they want to ride, so the horses are out every day. I’ve only two in who are rested, besides the Squires’ horses, which cannot be lent. Of those two, the gray knows that trail—are you comfortable with air and water horses?”

The courier looked confused.

“Elves prefer grays and blue roans,” Dorrin murmured. “The color of air and water, they say. Humans here prefer earth and fire horses: bays, chestnuts, red roans.”

“Oh … ah … I ride any color,” the courier said.

“He’s in the west paddock right now,” the Master of Horse said. “I’ll have him brought in and tacked up—say, a turn of the glass.”

“I’m having a meal brought from the palace,” Dorrin said. “It’s crowded in there, and a bit of quiet won’t do us any harm. I need to read the king’s word that this courier brought me.”

“Stable mess is quiet enough for another turn of the glass,” the Master of Horse said. “Second door on the left. I’ll send in the food when it comes.”

The room—the size of a double box stall—had a table, six chairs, and a wall of cubbyholes. The courier sat down, leaning on the table. Dorrin untied the ribbons on the velvet pouch and pulled out the king’s message.

The news, as she’d expected from its urgency, was not good.

Leaving at once would mean retrieving the regalia from the ossuary. If the magelords, especially Matharin, could sense the regalia directly, then they, too, would know, and they were surely—she had to believe—closer than any pursuit from Tsaia could be.

“Sometimes solutions lead only to new problems,” she said aloud; the courier stared at her. “I’m sorry,” she said. “It’s just—I dare not give the king an answer lest you be beset on the road. He is right that you must not linger here, tired as you are, but anything I send with you might be intercepted.”

A noise in the corridor alerted her; she stood and made for the door. Servants with trays … and behind them, a sly look on his face, Matharin.

Dorrin waved the servants into the room, where they set out dishes and bowls of food on the table but stood in the doorway, blocking Matharin.

“I thought you were busy with correspondence,” Matharin said, brow raised. “In the stable?”

“I had a new message,” Dorrin said. “From my king, who bade his courier return in haste. I came here with him to arrange for a fresh horse and thought we might as well eat here. Why should that concern you?”

“Oh … so you
are
busy …” No relaxation in his stance, no relenting in his gaze. “But I wonder if I might have just a moment—”

His gaze fogged; Dorrin felt a wave of enchantment. It did not affect her, but she heard noises in the room behind her—falling crockery, someone falling to the floor, followed by unnatural silence. She did not turn to look; she met his gaze steadily, and her own power rose within her. “You forget that you are merely a guest,” she said. “And a guest does not so abuse a host’s servants. Not if the guest wishes to remain within the protection of guest-right.”

“I merely gave us a quiet place in which to talk,” he said. “They take no harm, though the maid will have to wipe redroots off her face.”

Falk, help me
. Dorrin felt a surge in her own power and shaped it into a spear that pierced the bubble of silence he had wrought, and then—with no attempt at gentleness—she thrust him away with power alone. He staggered back and back again until he fell against a stall door across the aisle.

“You!” he snarled, pushing himself to his feet. Dorrin walked forward, and he stumbled sideways toward the stable opening. She walked with him, keeping the pressure on, noting as she went by that the Master of Horse was slumped over his desk and the palace courtyard empty of its usual traffic.

“You abused guest-right,” Dorrin said. “And I, as the representative of Tsaia’s king and the friend of Lyonya’s, will not let you get away with it.”

“What are you going to do, kill me?” he asked, all sarcasm now. He made a gesture with one hand, and Dorrin felt his power pushing against hers.

“I am going to present you to King Kieri for judgment,” Dorrin said. “As I would do with any thief or liar or lurking menace I found in his palace.”

“You can’t—” He made more gestures, this time rubbing the bloodstone on his finger. Wind swirled in the courtyard, cold as Midwinter night.