The Immortal Heights (29 page)

Iolanthe laid her hand on Kashkari's arm. “Are you sure?”

He smiled a little. “I will need to consult my brother, of course. But in the main, I believe Amara would have been tickled to have such a grand send-off.”

Kashkari left to write to his brother. Dalbert departed on his many and often mysterious tasks. But Commander Rainstone remained at the table.

“If you don't mind me asking, Your Highness, Miss Seabourne, what happened to Master Horatio Haywood and Miss Aramia Tiberius?”

“Master Haywood died defending us with a last-mage-standing spell. Miss Tiberius is currently with Atlantean authorities, I believe—she betrayed us.”

Commander Rainstone sucked in a breath. “Oh, that child.”

“The apple doesn't fall far from the tree.”

“So you know that she is indeed Lady Callista's flesh and blood, sire?”

This caught Titus's attention. “You know too?”

“After Horatio made the switch, I switched them back.”

Fairfax gasped. “You were the one who switched us back?”

Commander Rainstone sighed. “You probably know that I read Her Highness's diary, Miss Seabourne, which I did under
duress—Callista, my half sister, kept insisting that something terrible might happen to her child if I refused to find out what Her Highness might have foreseen. As it turned out, I read a vision of a man switching the places of two infants in a nursery, on a night during which there seemed to be a steady shower of fireworks outside the window.
⁵

“As I left the hospital, after having been caught snooping by Her Highness herself, I saw the meteor storm overhead and realized that the streaks of falling stars were what Her Highness had foreseen. All at once I understood why Callista had been spending so much time with Horatio, because he knew an orphaned baby girl in that hospital, and because that girl was soon to go to a relative who had never seen her before.

“I made up my mind then that I would not let Callista do this. She would not steal someone else's child. I reversed the switch.

“I was afraid that Callista might treat her own child as a mere decoy. But that did not happen, as most of the time Callista kept her memories suppressed and didn't think of Aramia as someone else's child—though she was disappointed that Aramia was neither beautiful nor a born charmer.

“I spent time with my niece when I could. I wanted to be a different kind of influence in her life. And at first she proved to be a very rewarding child, bright, inquisitive, always attentive, and with beautiful manners. But later I saw that she was obsessed with winning
her mother's love, the kind of obsession that didn't care what it crushed underfoot, or that this mother of hers was made of a monstrous indifference to just about everyone except herself.

“I pulled back my involvement with Aramia, but I must apologize here.” Commander Rainstone bowed her head in Titus's direction. “Early on I had told her about Validus's sister wand. She gave the information to Atlantis, when the new Inquisitor wanted to know how he could find Your Highness, after your escape from their bell jar dome in the desert.”

“Did you also tell her about the destination disruptor in my possession?” asked Titus. “The one that would have allowed me to use a translocator at Delamer East to get to Atlantis?”

“No. According to those at the Inquisitory, Aramia told them that it was Prince Gaius who had shown her the disruptor long ago.” Commander Rainstone turned to Fairfax. “Miss Seabourne, please allow me to apologize to you also. I should never have spoken of Validus's daughter wand to anyone, blood relation or not. I hope you will forgive me for having put your life in danger.”

“Quite to the contrary,” said Fairfax. “I am
most
grateful to you for not letting me grow up under Lady Callista's influence.”

They were silent for some time. Commander Rainstone rose and bowed to Titus. “With your permission, sire, I will return to my duties.”

Titus nodded.

As she reached the door of the room, Fairfax stood up. “If you will excuse me, Commander. You and my guardian were friends—very good friends, I believe. Did you ever speak to him about what he had done?”

Commander Rainstone shook her head. “For a time I was as upset at Horatio as I was at Callista. But then, about a year after Aramia was born, I asked to meet with him. He said he was too busy just then. A year after that, he contacted me. But when we met, I realized that the only memory he had of Callista was the first time he saw her.

“Later that day I confronted Callista. But she didn't know what I was talking about either—her own memories were suppressed too. I left completely frustrated: I couldn't help him, nor could I find help for him. So I pulled away from Horatio, feeling that our friendship simply wasn't strong enough to withstand what he had done and who he had become.”

Fairfax slid her fingers along the edge of the table. “And were the two of you ever . . . more than just friends?”

Titus remembered the picture Fairfax had shown him of Haywood and Commander Rainstone from many years ago—they had seemed completely taken with each other.

Commander Rainstone shook her head. “No, we were very, very good friends, but never more than friends. The one I loved was . . .”

She looked down at her hands before her gaze came to Titus. “The one I loved was Her Highness, sire, your mother.”
⁶

Iolanthe and Titus didn't even go to bed, but fell asleep on long sofas in the solarium. At some point she became aware that Titus was speaking to her.

“. . . approved of the transfer of power. I have to go. I love you.”

She made some sounds. They were probably a series of
mm-mm
s, but she felt he would know that she told him she loved him with a ferocity that would frighten most wyverns.

When she woke up again, it was afternoon and a steady shower fell outside. She walked out onto the covered balcony and sucked in a breath: the great bell tower of the Conservatory, less than half a mile away! And the red roofs of the colleges, soaring above the tree line. And if she squinted really hard, she could even convince herself she was looking at the flow of colorful umbrellas on University Avenue.

“I see you are up, Miss Seabourne,” came Dalbert's voice.

She spun around. “Oh, Master Dalbert, I know you have no time to spare. But would you happen to have a lackey you can send out for a copy of last May's upper-academy entrance examination?”

Dalbert smiled. “Consider it done. In the meanwhile, I have a visitor waiting for you.”

“Who is it?” Who else knew that she was here?

“Master Kashkari,” answered Dalbert. “Master Vasudev Kashkari.”

She exclaimed softly. “When did he arrive?”

“About half an hour ago.”

Dalbert conducted her to the reception room, where Vasudev Kashkari was waiting. The family resemblance was obvious—the brothers had the same build, same dark, expressive eyes, and same elegant mouth. Yet the difference immediately struck her; there was a great gentleness to the elder brother. The younger brother, for all his impeccable manners, was driven. But Vasudev Kashkari was the kind to smile and laugh easily.

Or at least he must have been once.

They shook hands.

“Please have a seat,” she said. “It's an honor to meet you.”

“The honor is mine. You have accomplished what mages have been aspiring to for generations.”

“Not without help. Not without the sacrifice of many.” She already had tears in her eyes. “We could never have done it without Durga Devi.”

“I went to see her just now,” he said softly. “I was told that she looked like you, but still it was . . . it was something of a shock.”

“I'm sorry you couldn't look upon her face one last time.”

“I already did that before she left the desert. She told me exactly what she meant to do.”

“So you knew she was a mutable?”

He smiled slightly. “I have never told anyone this story—her mutability was something we had to keep a secret—but I fell in love with her when she looked very different.”

“Oh,” said Iolanthe.

“You know that mutables can take anyone's form when they are children, but can only change form once when they are full grown?”

She nodded.

“We met during a time when she probably should have stopped assuming the appearances of others. But she was reluctant to give up the freedom not to be stared at everywhere she went. So I first saw her as her cousin Shulini.”
⁷

Iolanthe had met Shulini, who was a pleasant-looking young woman, but hardly a beauty of Amara's stature. “What a story that must have been. I wish . . . I wish I'd had the chance to know her better.”

“You saw how she conducted herself under the most extreme of conditions. In a way, you couldn't have known her any better than that. But yes, I wish you had met her under different circumstances, when she was simply a warm, wonderful person to be around.”

Iolanthe's eyes once again welled with tears. “Did you . . . did you ever ask her not to do this? Not to go on a venture from which she would not return?”

He looked outside the window for a moment, at the rain that was still steadily falling. She noticed for the first time that he wore Amara's troth band around his wrist.

“I wanted to,” he said softly. “I wanted very much to beg her not to leave. But she was more than the woman I loved; she was a fighter. And one does not hold back a fighter when the battle is on the line.”

This man might not have personally ended the Bane's existence,
but he was no less remarkable than his brother.

She reached out and took his hands in hers. “She was the bravest mage I have ever met. You and she both have my eternal gratitude.”

Vasudev Kashkari gazed upon her a moment. “And you ours. Never forget that.”

The story of the Bane's death was released that evening. Iolanthe read it in her copy of
The Delamer Observer
, fascinated even though she already knew everything. The article, which occupied nearly the entirety of the paper, ended with,

For their safety and the safety of their families, all who played important roles in these remarkable events have not been mentioned by name. To their extraordinary courage and sacrifice we owe our undying gratitude.

For the next forty-eight hours, the entire city was wild with celebration. And then came the state funeral. Dalbert had secured Iolanthe and West an empty reception room at Titus the Great Memorial Museum, next to the cathedral. They arrived as the sun was setting, the windows of the cathedral ablaze in the dying light of the day. An enormous crush of mages, quiet, sober, and all dressed in white, thronged the length of Palace Avenue.

West's fractured leg had already healed. He could have gone back to England, but he'd wished to attend the funeral. While they waited for the procession to start, they chatted about his plans, hers, and
all the marvelous things he had seen in the Domain. Then she said, “May I ask you a question?”

“Of course.”

“You were quite interested in the prince, at the beginning of last—no, this Half. It used to make me a bit suspicious. I wondered whether you weren't an Atlantean spy—but you aren't. So why did you have so many questions about His Highness?”

A little color came into West's face. “I first saw him on the Fourth of June, when his family set up court underneath that huge white canopy. He was beautiful and angry. And, well . . .” West shrugged. “I thought of him all summer.”

Iolanthe rested her fingers against her lips. “I never guessed in that direction.”

“Promise me you won't tell him.”

She was about to reassure him that Titus would hardly change his opinion of West because of something like this, when she realized that it was simply the request of a proud young man who preferred to keep his unrequited love to himself. “I promise.”

As the first stars appeared in the sky, the hundreds of torches that had been placed along Palace Avenue burst into flames. The ethereal notes of the Seraphim Prayer rose, almost inaudible at first, then growing stronger, more impassioned. The funeral procession started from the Citadel, the biers that bore the departed not drawn by pegasus, or even phoenix, but carried on the shoulders of mages.

The crowd joined in the prayer, hundreds of thousands of voices raised together. “Do you leave as a ship sailing out of harbor? Do you return as rain to the earth? Will I guide you in the Beyond, if I hold aloft the brightest light here on earth?”

Five biers arrived at the plaza before the cathedral: Amara, Wintervale, Titus Constantinos, Mrs. Hancock, and Master Haywood—these last two represented by lifelike wooden statues. The Master of the Domain was one of the bearers of his father's bier, the Kashkari brothers for Amara, Lady Wintervale for her son, and Commander Rainstone for Mrs. Hancock. Iolanthe was touched to see Dalbert as a bearer for Master Haywood.

The departed were set on their pyres. The prayer rose to a crescendo, then faded into complete silence. The Master of the Domain, solemn and compelling, addressed the crowd. “Before you lie courage, perseverance, kindness, friendship, and love. Before you lie men and women who could have chosen otherwise, who could have inured themselves to the injustices of the world, rather than giving their lives to change it. Tonight we honor them. Tonight we also honor all who have gone before and paved the way, the ones we remember and the ones we have forgotten.

“But nothing is lost in Eternity. A moment of grace resonates forever, as does an act of valor. So honor the dead—and live in grace and valor.”

One by one he lit the pyres. The flames leaped higher and higher, whipping, crackling. A child's voice, as clear and bright as the
Angels' clarion, rose with the opening notes of the Adamantine aria, “For what is the Void but the beginning of Light? What is Light but the end of Fear? And what am I, but Light given form? What am I, but the beginning of Eternity?”