Mercedes Lackey - Anthology (27 page)

 
          
Pray
as you have never prayed before. Our lives and the survival of our kingdom lie
in the goddess' hands."

 
          
The
King had disembarked and had been escorted to his home by his guard without so
much as exchanging a word with the Prince. He had favored Gonten with only a
brief nod, a wordless acknowledgment that he had kept his word and had spoken
to the priestess.

 
          
Gonten
inwardly admitted to admiration of the boy-king. In the past few days, he had
wondered many times if he could have handled himself with such aplomb had their
roles been reversed.

 
          
"So,"
drawled Hvandi who stood at the Prince's shoulder. "You've arranged it,
then."

 
          
"I've
arranged nothing," Gonten corrected the priest. "I've only passed on
a promise of the King's demise if the priestess refuses to return with you.

 
          
These
people revere their kings, seeing them as an unbroken link to their ancestral
past. The life of their kingdom is the life of their king. If this priestess
does refuse, then we'll deal with the King at our leisure. An accident, this
close to the water, should not be hard to arrange."

 
          
"But what of the people?
Don't you think they'll
recognize our hand in this?"

 
          
Hvandi
asked. "Be very careful here, Prince. Remember your father's
predicament."

 
          
Remind
me again, old dog, Gonten thought, and by the Bright Lord, priest of his or
not, you'll suffer for your impudence! He allowed the slightest of cold smiles
to touch his lips. "If enough of our people die with the King, how could
anyone suspect us?"

 
          
For
the first time in years, Gonten saw the priest blink slightly. Good, you old
tyrant, he thought. Learn now that I, too, have teeth!

 
          
The
two days that followed the King's visit to slinda's island had passed in what
seemed to her a blur of confusion. She held to her duties, ering up her prayers
to the goddess and meeting all those who came from across the lake for comfort,
healing and hope.

 
          
But
for her, hope was slowly dying. Even the goddess kept silent, though her owl
continued to visit Yslinda's dreams at night. But the owl, like the goddess,
offered no words of comfort, no hope that the marriage could be halted. Despair
took root in Yslinda's heart, though she refused to allow its darkness to show
on her face as she ministered to the people.

 
          
Only
one constant remained in the world for her now: her faith and a certainty that,
when the time was ripe, Savanya would speak at last.

 
          
On
the second day after the King's visit, some of Yslinda's visitors recounted the
arrival of Asketians in their chariots to the capital city.
Important
arrivals, these local lords, if importance could be assumed by the number of
their servants.
Yslinda held her tongue as she listened to these tales,
not wanting to vocalize her fears. First and foremost, she was Priestess of
Savanya and her duties were those of a priestess, not a young woman who
trembled before a dreaded event.

 
          
But
the people who visited her island could not understand the danger she faced,
the peril behind this supposedly ceremonial marriage of Asketian High Priest
and Deladian High Priestess. They could not guess how the very powers that made
her priestess would be jeopardized by marriage to the Lord Hvandi.

 
          
How
he could, in the moment he consummated their marriage, bind an invisible chain
to her and her mystic powers, lessening the ease with which the goddess could
manifest in the physical world. They had no idea of the threat she faced. They
thought the event merely symbolic and, consequently, remained undisturbed by
the upcoming ceremony.

 
          
Only
the King, she perceived in some vague manner, was capable of understanding just
how terrible this event would be. And, like Yslinda, he appeared powerless to
prevent it.

 
          
Her
duties done for the day, Yslinda took a slice of cheese and some greens one
farmer had brought as payment for healing his youngest son, and settled down on
the front steps of her house. Nibbling at the cheese, she gazed over the waters
of the lake, at the glowing colors the setting sun painted on the water. Never,
in all her years on this island had loneliness plagued her. Now that emotion
overwhelmed, rocking her self-assurance to the core.

 
          
Tears
misted her vision as she looked across the darkening lake toward Lord-Hill.
Only one day left. One day.

 
          
Suddenly,
in ghostly quietness, a great white dipped down from the trees at her back and
snatched up a mouse nearly at Yslinda's feet. The surprise she felt at seeing
the bird claim its prey so close was only slightly less than that cited by its
presence. As a night hunter, sunset was not its preferred choice of times to
hunt. Did a message lie here that she could not read?

 
          
The
owl stood for a moment, one foot on the dispatched mouse, and its eyes met
Yslinda's. She held her breath, waiting for the owl to speak, but this one did
not. It merely spread its wings and lifted effortlessly into its worlds of
trees and coming nighttime.

 
          
There
was no message. There were no words. It was only an owl, not the Owl of her
dreams.

 
          
Irdun,
King of Delad, last link to all the kings that had gone before him, awoke from
a night of dark dreams and clamoring voices. All he could remember of those
nightmares was a sense of despair and a feeling of impotence greater than he
had ever known before. It was not the same emotion he experienced when dealing
with the Asketians, for he had grown from infancy to young manhood knowing he
was King in title only, that the real power in the land was the Emperor's,
exercised by the governor who ruled from the shadows behind Irdun's throne.

 
          
No,
this was
a knowledge
that he should be doing
something—something he instinctively shied from, something that no one had
attempted since the Asketians had overrun Delad. The rising tide of terror that
gripped him was nearly enough to ruin his morning meal.

 
          
The
governor's palace hummed with activity this morning; courtiers hurried back and
forth on what to his eyes seemed meaningless errands. The Asketian guests stood
on the broad terrace overlooking the lake, bowing and murmuring unctuous words
to Prince Gonten and the priest Hvandi. Irdun gazed at the lake as well, toward
the goddess' island, and wondering how Yslinda had passed her last night of
freedom.

 
          
He
shook his head, as if he had taken a fall and was not clear-minded after.

 
          
The
memories of his nightmares returned. He tried to grasp at them, to bring them
into focus. What was it he must do? What?
And how?

 
          
He
looked away from his view of the lake and returned to his house that stood in
the shadow of Lord-Hill. Silent servants bowed as he passed, touching their
foreheads in homage. Irdun drew a deep breath. His hands trembled slightly, and
his stomach threatened to reject what he had eaten earlier. He rubbed his
eyes,
his mind still clouded, and entered the small chapel
of the goddess next to his rooms.

 
          
Bowing
before the statue of Savanya that sat on a small altar, he knelt and some of
his fear and confusion subsided. He murmured prayers he had said since he could
speak, but this time felt an urgency to utter those words with all the strength
he possessed. He closed his eyes and sought in the silence of the room to
achieve ~ome measure of calm.

 
          
An
owl appeared before him with a suddenness that made him gasp. He knew this to
be no ordinary bird, though he had contemplated owls in his prayers before.
Here was an Owl, owls, huge—impossibly huge—and glowing from within with a pure
radiance that outshone anything he had seen before.

 
          
And
in one of the Owl's feet there was a dagger.

 
          
Irdun
flinched backward, his eyes snapping open. But instead of seeing the small
familiar statue of Savanya, he knelt face to face with a huge Owl, white as the
light of stars ... an Owl that sat where the statue usually rested.

 
          
Irdun's
heart pounded in his chest as he stared at the bird and at what the bird
carried.

 
          
Follow
your heart, a voice whispered in his mind. Trust in me. I will not fail you.

 
          
As
if he were someone else, Irdun watched his hand reach out and take the dagger
from the Owl's talons.

 
          
The
sun was sinking low in the sky, and the feast had entered a new phase of
excited merriment. Prince Gonten sat at the head of the table, his eyes never
still, weighing and assessing the words and actions of the nobles who had
gathered to honor the upcoming marriage of the High Priest of Keti and the High
Priestess of Savanya. He had been accused of many things in his life, but no
one had ever so much as hinted he was stupid. He had learned well at his
father's knee, how to listen without seeming to listen, how to make small
conversation without those he spoke to knowing he was keeping track of every
word they uttered.

 
          
Now
was no different. He was well aware, even without Hvandi's prompting, of the
situation facing the legions of Asketi to the north and the west. And, sensing
a hidden current of discontent swirling through the room, he listened to the
hum of conversation with more than what to others might appear bored ears.

 
          
The
two nobles who sat several places away had lately come from those regions of
unrest and he heard, in their seemingly innocent conversation, hints of
uncertainty as to the strength of his father's hand in leading the legions.

 
          
Click.
He made a mental note of that, prepared to repeat nearly word for word all they
said to his father. Another noble spoke casually of the recent acquisition by
one of his friends of lands to the far west, an odd move for someone who had
gained fame for being wildly in love with the comforts of the Empire's capital
city. Click.
Another mental note taken and stored.

 
          
"Ah,
Prince Gonten," said a slightly nasal voice in his ear. He cringed
inwardly, but assumed his most gracious smile as he gestured the man to a seat
at his side. The governor's timing could not have been worse, having ended for
all practical purposes Gonten's eaves-ropping. "Do you think Lord Hvandi
can stand mother hour of waiting? Look at him. He's nearly beside himself with
anticipation."

 
          
Gonten
looked. The governor was accurate in his observation. The Prince could not
remember having seen the priest in such a state before.

 
          
Something
nudged at the back of his mind.

 
          
Maybe
there was more to this priestess than he knew. Maybe Hvandi was correct in
thinking much power could be won from this woman and her goddess.
Maybe.

 
          
"She's
an extraordinarily beautiful woman," the governor continued, "and I'm
sure that fact alone would kindle anyone."

 
          
"Oh?"
Gonten kept his voice pitched to polite boredom. "I was unaware that Lord
Hvandi had ever met the priestess."

 
          
The
governor waved a languid hand. "He hasn't, Prince, but he has ears. I've
met her many times myself, when I've been obliged by my position to visit her
island. She is beautiful, in a very un-Asketian way. Those gold eyes of hers,
though, are unsettling. There are times when I swear she's looking straight
into my heart."

 
          
For
an instant, the Prince remembered the young King's eyes, golden as were those
of his countrymen.
Beast eyes, bird eyes.
Eyes hardly human.
His grandfather's legions had brought
home tale after tale of the silent, gentle people they had conquered—a people
with eyes of gold.