The Dagger of Adendigaeth (A Pattern of Shadow & Light) (28 page)

“Who
is
she?” Ean asked breathlessly.

Julian glanced at him. “That’s Isabel. Epiphany’s Prophet.”

Ean couldn’t take his eyes off of her. “Isabel,” he repeated, loving even the sound of her name.

“
Isabel van Gelderan
,” Julian added significantly.

Ean gave him a startled look. His heart skipped a beat, and a lump formed in his throat. “Björn’s…wife?” It would certainly be fitting for him to have a wife such as her.

Julian grinned—clearly Ean’s reaction to Isabel wasn’t lost on him. He shook his head, eyes sparkling with amusement. “His sister.”  

Ean’s heart started beating again and he exhaled forcefully in relief.

“Boy, you don’t start small, do you?” Julian observed, still grinning. “Pinning your sights on Epiphany’s Prophet?” He shook his head and let out a low whistle. “That’s no small favor to win.”

Isabel returned to speak with Markal while the class continued their chanting dance.

Ean shook his head, frowning as he gazed at her. His heart was pinned to the end of a string looped around her finger, and every time she moved, the string tugged a painful desire in his chest. “I haven’t…” he tried to say. “I just…”

Julian clapped him on the shoulder. “Hey—don’t fret it,
mon ami
. Rest assured, whatever happens,
she
already knows how it will end. You can be certain of that.”

Ean spun him a hard look. “What do you mean?”

Julian barked a laugh. “Haven’t you heard a word I’ve said? Isabel van Gelderan is Epiphany’s Prophet—she’s a
real
prophet, not like that terrorist, Bethamin. Isabel
knows
things. She’s special, Ean. She’s…” he paused, frowned…shrugged. “Well, she’s just not like anyone else in the world.” 

Ean knew that already. His palpitating heart told him so.

Julian joined him in gazing at Isabel. “They say she sees the future always,” he advised in a low voice, as if loath to disturb her with even the whispers of gossip. “It’s said that every path is laid bare before her eyes. She cannot help but know a man’s ultimate end with a single look, so she wears the blindfold rather than gaze perpetually into infinity.” He shuddered suddenly. “Imagine. It’d be enough to drive a man mad, I think.”

“She’s a Healer then?” Ean murmured, only half listening. “To have the Sight?”

“She’s a lot of things,” Julian said. “Come on,” and he nudged Ean’s elbow, “else we’ll be here all day while you stare all moon-eyed at her.”

With the greatest force of will, Ean tore himself away. He felt like he was abandoning Isabel, and it took an effort to swallow back the sense of doom that beset him at the idea. After a while, however, the string of his heart, which she still held, became thin enough that Ean could focus on something other than the sense of her presence rubbing up against his soul like a purring cat.

“So if everything is so peaceful here,” he posed then, forcing thoughts of Isabel regretfully from mind, “if there will never be war and no one wears weapons, why build a wall with battlements?”

Julian gave him such a look. “So it’s easy to see down into the gardens and the yards,” he said, like this reasoning was terribly obvious. 

At the end of the Court Wall, they passed beneath an archway carved in the shape of two rearing lions and emerged from the tunnel thirty paces later onto the circular end of a great promenade. In the middle of the turnabout, a huge marble fountain sprayed water from myriad creatures and basins, its mist glittering in the sun. A green-lawned park studded with majestic trees spread to either side of the promenade, which in turn was busy with strolling couples, children playing, peddlers tending to colorful carts, and men and women of varied races going about their day. The scene reminded Ean very much of his first sight of Cair Rethynnea, but without the sense of imminent disaster. Ean could just make out another fountain at the next circle, at least half a mile further down.

“This way,” Julian said, and he tugged Ean after him.

They made their way through the Promenade and down into the city, moving from park to piazza, from café to taverna to playhouse. Julian introduced Ean to everyone they met, from the barkeep at his favorite alehouse to the Mistress of Chambers at the
Teatro del Benedire Artista
, where Julian said the greatest musicians in T’khendar came to perform. In turn, everyone who met Ean steepled their palms, pressed fingertips to lips and bowed to him. He found it terribly confusing.

Too,
while Ean appreciated Niyadbakir’s beauty, he couldn’t help but wonder how so many people came to be living in a realm that was supposedly barren of life—not just living there, but
making
a living. Niyadbakir was a prosperous city, with clearly flourishing commerce and a diverse population.

As they were heading across a wide plaza bordered on all sides by enormous buildings that Julian identified as the Guild Halls, a shadow passed before the sun, and Ean glanced up to see an enormous creature soaring across the sky. The sight of it stopped him in his tracks.

“Dear Epiphany,” he whispered. All he could see of the dragon was its darkened underbelly as it moved in silhouette between him and the sun, but as the creature banked just beyond the square, Ean saw that its hide sparkled with bronze and gold. He turned an awestruck look to Julian. “Was that…?”

“One of the Sundragons,” Julian said, gazing after it with a tiny frown furrowing his fair brow. “Rhakar, maybe? It’s hard to tell them apart when they’re in the form. You used to see the
drachwyr
only rarely, but of late I’ve seen them more often.”

Ean barely heard most of what he said. “What do you mean ‘in the form?’”

“Well, they’re fifth-strand, you know,” Julian replied, shifting his gaze to Ean. “Like the zanthyrs. They have two forms.”

“Oh…” Ean said. “Right.” He’d forgotten all about the shapeshifting aspect of fifth-strand creatures. He didn’t know anyone who’d ever seen a zanthyr in the form, but he was sure he’d never realized that the Sundragons were also shapeshifters. “Sundragons,” he repeated slowly, pondering what he knew of them. All he remembered was that they’d been banished by the Alorin Seat after the Adept Wars because they were sworn to Björn, and that more recently the Emir’s Mage had recalled them from isolation. “But they’re in service to the Emir’s Mage—or so I’ve heard.”

Julian gave him a strange look. “Ean…”

And then it finally hit him. But before he had time to think through what it meant that Björn van Gelderan was posing as a Mage and involving himself in the war in M’Nador, Julian grabbed his arm.

“
Ean
,” he whispered, “Look! He’s coming back!”

Indeed, a man approached across the busy square. Even from that distance, Ean could tell he was very tall, perhaps as tall as the zanthyr. His features were foreign, but his face had the same perfection of form as the zanthyr’s, although the two men looked nothing alike. He wore black boot and pants beneath a grey tunic and quilted vest, and the black hilt of a greatsword extended diagonally above one shoulder. As the man neared, Ean noted that the hilt of his sword was impressively carved into the image of a dragon, with the cross-guard fashioned as the dragon’s spread wings.

More impressive was that everyone the man passed bent and bowed, hands steepled and fingertips pressed to lips, but it seemed the man had eyes only for…
him
.

Julian was looking positively exuberant. As the man reached them, Julian pressed his hands together and bowed, murmuring “General,” with excitement and awe coloring his tone. 

The
drachwyr
only barely acknowledged him, for his dark eyes were pinned on Ean. The prince thought he saw a flash of confusion cross his gaze, but recognition quickly replaced it. “You must be Ean,” he said in a voice that appeared well used to command—indeed, he veritably exuded power through every pore. Yet his manner was entirely welcoming.

Ean felt th
e force of his presence like a furnace blast of heat. “I am,” he said, finally regaining his composure. “I’m sorry, I don’t—”

“I am Ramu,” the
drachwyr
said, smiling.

Ramuhárihkamáth
. Ean knew his famous name.
Gods and devils
, what a day this was turning out to be!

“Be welcome, Ean,” Ramu said with a gracious nod. He glanced to the sky and offered, “When I first passed overhead, I confess I thought you might be your brother. I was confused because it seemed too early for his arrival in T’khendar.”

“My brother?” Ean repeated blankly. “You mean…Creighton?” It made no sense that the man would mistake him for a Shade.

Ramu’s eyes widened slightly. “You don’t know,” he breathed aloud.

Seeing the look on Ramu’s face, Ean had the dreadful premonition that the earth was about to shift on him again. Some part of his consciousness braced for it while the rest of him already felt the world slipping off its axis.

Ramu took him by the arm. “Why don’t we sit down?” He drew Ean toward the plaza’s central fountain.

Ean’s stomach lurched with desperate understanding.
My brother lives?
Which brother? How?

Ramu settled on Ean’s right while Julian sat down to his left, looking concerned. “More than three moons ago,” Ramu explained then, “my brother Rhakar and I pulled a man from a well in the mountains west of Raku Oasis. He was known to us as the commander of a company of the Emir’s Converted—though he is not Converted himself—and for five years he served the Emir as his adopted son. Knowing this man’s importance to the First Lord, we saved him from the well waters. The First Lord healed him of his injuries, and three days later he woke.” Ramu pinned Ean with his darkly compelling gaze. “We knew this soldier as Ama-Kai’alil, the Man of the Tides, but the First Lord knew his true identity. He is your brother Trell.”

Ean felt the Kings board upending. He stared hard at the plaza stones and drew in a trembling breath.

“He does not know himself,” Ramu continued gently. “For five years he has known only his given name and remembers nothing of his life before waking on a beach in the Akkad—his family, his kingdom…these memories are lost to him. But there are some things that do not hide in the shadows of his past: honor, enduring nobility, acts of true leadership, courage in command. You will be proud of the man your brother has become.”

Ean pushed palms to his eyes and smiled so hard that his cheeks ached. That Trell lived changed so much—for everyone. “I…can’t believe it,” he whispered, barely managing the words around his overwhelming happiness.
Trell lives!
The knowledge was too monumental, too impactful, to fully comprehend. For now, Ean just held firmly onto the understanding that his brother was alive. The rest would come in its time.

Ramu placed a strong hand on Ean’s shoulder, and the prince slowly looked to him. “Be assured,” Ramu said, “the First Lord took steps to ensure Trell will find his way to those who will know him, who will help him reconnect with your family. While you cannot immediately seek him out, perhaps you can take solace in this knowledge.”

Ean nodded. He’d known there was no chance of going after Trell, though the thought had certainly crossed his mind.

“The First Lord will be relieved that I have told you this,” Ramu added. “I’m certain he would’ve done so as soon as he felt you were capable of hearing it.”

Ean just nodded. Admittedly there was no way he could’ve taken the news yesterday on top of what he’d learned about his Return.

“Oh, Shadow take me!” Julian suddenly exclaimed. “General, I’m so sorry but we have to go. Ean has an appointment with Monsieur L’Meppe to be fitted for his masquerade costume, and I fear we are already late.”

“Of course.” Ramu stood and nodded farewell to Ean. Then he turned and strode away through the crowds, with the city dwellers bowing and murmuring in his wake.

Julian looked at the position of the sun in the sky. “Burn me, we’d better run.”

They made it to the atelier of Monsieur L’Meppe in time to receive the sharp side of his tongue but not so late that the man refused to do the fitting altogether. A narrow escape.

All the while the costumer taped and pinned and measured, muttering under his breath, Ean felt in a daze. For so long his life had been a convoluted series of tragedies and mishaps where treachery lurked at every turn and loss shadowed each waking moment, a perpetual overcast. Now, suddenly, he was getting answers to his most agonizing questions—albeit slowly and sporadically. He felt welcome, even…
wanted
, and he was surrounded by people who
knew
things.

And now…now Trell lived.

When the Kings board of his life finally found its way back onto solid footing, Ean saw that one of the priests had been righted along with it. He never imagined that treasured piece could ever find its place in his life again. But now, suddenly, he had
hope
. Hope that there could be peace for his father’s kingdom, that his brother would be reunited with all that was rightfully his, that Ean might have his own future. But above all, hope surged from the one impossible truth: