The Sleeping King (31 page)

“My safety?”

“Exactly. We have already established that I cannot in good conscience turn you loose to run about the countryside at risk from whoever manages to snatch you first.” He continued, “How to protect a mage of your talent, then? The Mage's Guild would develop your talent to its full extent, but it would require you to stay here in Dupree for years of training. The guild would then exploit you shamelessly, selling your skills, keeping all of your earnings to make them rich. It is a viable option, but distasteful to me personally.” He added reluctantly, “But perhaps that idea is to your liking. They would see to it you live a life of comfort and ease within a luxurious guild hall.”

Picturing herself holed up in some dusty building casting rituals for the Empire until she burned out made her shudder. Although there was a chance that from within the Mage's Guild she could find a way to restore the Great Mage. But surely the Mages of Alchizzadon had already explored all of the Mage's Guild's knowledge thoroughly.

A grim smile flickered around the edges of Hyland's mouth as he seemed to read her distaste for the Mage's Guild option. “Then there's the Heart,” he said. “As a regular healer, you would be expected to set up residence in a Heart chapter somewhere. Your movement would be restricted, and it would be no difficult matter for your mother to track you down and take you home by force.

The Heart would move to protect you, of course, but not quickly enough, I think. It is a big organization and its wheels turn slowly. Your mother could argue that you can be married and raise babes and still serve the Heart wherever your husband forces you to live.”

Raina winced at that argument. Avoiding babes was the whole point.

“As I thought,” Leland commented. “The White Heart, however, is a different story. The Royal Order of the Sun is directly responsible for the safety of White Heart healers and takes that responsibility very seriously. The Royal Order typically sends escorts with each White Heart member on their travels, in fact. At the first distress call from a White Heart member, they react instantly and aggressively. Furthermore, they retaliate swiftly to punish any who harm or hinder a White Heart member.”

As a deterrent to future harm befalling other White Heart members, no doubt. She nodded her understanding and Hyland continued.

“In point of fact, most anyone who sees a White Heart member in trouble will rise up to defend him. Were you to join the White Heart, you could be assured that no one would dare touch you and risk the wrath of the Royal Order of the Sun.”

Not even the Mages of Alchizzadon?
The thought galvanized her. “How long is one required to serve the White Heart when one joins them?”

“White Heart members serve for life.”

“What about a home? Family? Do they marry and have children like regular Heart members?”

“My lady wife was a White Heart member. But I will not lie to you. Having a family while wearing the colors poses a difficult challenge. Loved ones are a weakness by which others might gain power over you. After all, could you stand by and watch someone kill your loved ones and do nothing to protect them?”

Raina stared at him. Yet he wished her to walk that path anyway? It felt as though she were bleeding out slowly from a mortal wound.

He continued on grimly, “For most, serving the White Heart is their one and only calling in life. My wife used to say that when she donned the colors, she ceased to exist as an individual. In effect, she became the tabard and what it represents.”

Raina tried to speak normally, but her voice came out choked and halting. “And you … wish me … to do this?”

“How much do you want to avoid the fate others have planned for you?”

Enough to sign away her freedom for the rest of her life? To give herself over entirely to the White Heart, never to return home? Never to
have
a home? To be a wandering healer forever, living much as she had these past few days but wholly unable to defend herself? Ever?

Leland pushed to his feet and moved across the room to a large chest in the corner, which he opened. He lifted from it a folded cloth and shook it out, and she saw a white tabard, edged in blue and bearing a four-pointed blue star upon the breast. A white heart surrounded by white sun rays overlaid the blue star. “This is a White Heart tabard. My wife's. It also is a talisman for channeling magic.”

“Surely you do not have the authority to induct me into a special Heart order,” she protested.

“I do not. But I happen to know the High Matriarch of Dupree well. She will put you directly into the White Heart if I ask her to, particularly given your extraordinary talents.”

Desperation choked Raina. There had to be some other way … she couldn't give away her life like this!

Leland handed the tabard to her. “Put it on and you shall be safe.”

She looked up at him, stricken. “But at what price, my lord?”

“Only you can answer that.”

“If you had a daughter my age, would you ask this of her? That she sacrifice the rest of her life to this cause?”

He sat down heavily in his chair as if she'd struck him a grievous blow. “Ahh, child. You know not what you ask of me.”

She gazed at him in anguish. He gazed back at her, his wise eyes sad unto the very depths of his spirit.

She managed barely a broken whisper. “But I'm only sixteen.”

 

CHAPTER

14

After that one stunning conversation with Talissar, Gabrielle did not see the kindari consort again for some time. It was almost as if he avoided her. But she supposed that made sense. He did say that he and his co-conspirators moved slowly so as not to get caught.

But all of that changed when, yet again, she found herself drawn toward the wild garden. There was something about it that called to her. A compulsion to lose herself in its dark, mysterious shadows and thickets.

“Lady Gabrielle,” Talissar's deep voice intoned from behind her one afternoon, late. “I feared I might find thee here.”

She waved her guard off a little ways and turned to the kindari elf, curious as to why he chose to show himself here and now.

His voice low, charged, Talissar asked, “Hast thee ever been alone with Lord Tyviden Starfire?”

The question was a startling non sequitur. Rumors hinted that Starfire had been banished from court many years ago. “I beg your pardon?”

“I do not accuse thee of any impropriety,” Talissar hastened to add. “It is just that this was a favorite rendezvous point of Starfire's.”

Thunderstruck, Gabrielle glanced fearfully around the total isolation of this wild corner of the Garden of Nations. Talissar had alluded to something similar the last time they met here, about a High Lord compelling women to come out here to meet him.
The dancing
. Her irresistible impulse to come out here alone and begin taking off her clothes—

“I see worry in thine eyes, Your Highness. Hast been alone with him, then?”

“Surely, if he influenced my mind, the effects would have worn off long before now.”

The elf shrugged. “Kothites are timeless beings. Why would their powers not be the same?”

She admitted reluctantly, “I encountered him a long time ago. And we were not entirely alone. But he did … seem rather fascinating to me one night—”

“Of course,” Talissar breathed in sudden comprehension. “I have long wondered what provoked thy knight to strike a Kothite noble. He saw Starfire attempting to influence thy mind.”

Gabrielle's eyes widened in distress. “Are you saying that I come to this place because Starfire wished it so?” And had Starfire also enjoined her to remove her clothes and dance naked in the forest? Did he laugh into his cups over a queen humiliating herself thus, even now? And then the rest of his words registered.
What knight?

Talissar replied slowly, “I cannot be sure he is responsible. But take this.” He removed an ancient-looking and exquisitely decorated gold amulet from around his neck and held it out to her. The medallion was embossed with eight sharp points, four large and four small, arranged in a compass rose. In the center, a large, green gem was mounted. She passed the pad of her thumb across it and a faint warmth emanated from the smooth stone.

“This is an Octavium Pendant. Symbol of the Eight,” Talissar explained quietly. “Seek this symbol if thee ever hast need of me … or,” he added significantly, “… of a friend.”

She looked up at him sharply. He spoke of his conspirators, then. She nodded her understanding.

“Wear it awhile,” Talissar suggested. “Its magic protects the mind from intrusions. See if thy compulsion to come to this place remains. If it does, then thee willst know it to be of only thine own desire.”

“And if not?”

“Then thee hast just cause to worry that Starfire hast somehow influenced thy mind.”

The pendant dangled, heavy, around her neck. She could swear faint warmth from it penetrated her clothing.
Starfire
. Without warning, the name rolled across her mind along with a flood of memories. A night at court long ago … a fist thrown …
Darius
.

She reeled so violently that Talissar caught her arm in alarm to steady her.

“Is aught amiss, Your Highness?”

She reached into the bottom of her silk purse and rummaged until she came up with the strange ring she had carried around all these years, a bent and broken signet bearing the heraldry of Haraland upon it. Regalo hadn't recognized the ring, either. She had only known for all these years that it held a strange attraction for her. She could never bring herself to cast off the odd bauble.

The signet ring was his. Darius's ring. Given by him to me the night he was banished from court
.

“How could I not remember?” she whispered, shaken to the core of her being.

“The Empire takes away memories. Takes history. Takes identities. It is how they steal hope from their subjects.”

They stole my faithful knight, too, for the sole crime of loyally protecting me.

Something of her thought must have crossed her face, for Talissar smiled sadly in sympathy. Then he changed subjects abruptly, asking, “Perchance, rumors are true that inquisitors hast been seen in Haraland with psionic hounds?”

The magical beasts, bred to sniff out people with psionic abilities, had indeed passed through Haraland with their handlers. “Aye. Half a moon cycle past,” she answered. “They stayed with us only a few days. They rested and resupplied, and then went on their way to the east.”

“It is well that thy husband's thoughts and those of his subjects draw little interest from such guests.”

“Indeed,” she murmured. Talissar's meaning was clear. Regalo's mind must remain uncluttered with certain pieces of information so that inquisitors and mind sweeps by the Emperor yielded nothing to raise suspicion.

The elf spoke quietly and quickly. “Hast thee knowledge of a young woman, raised to noble rank, a female falcon avarian by the name of Syreena Wingblade?”

“I have heard of her,” Gabrielle murmured. The avarians were a race of bird changelings not much in favor with the Empire. “Did she not start life as a common indentured servant and rise through the society rather spectacularly to attain a title or something like that?”

“Exactly. She is held up by the Emperor as a shining example of how a peasant can become an important and titled personage.”

Now that he mentioned it, she did remember Maximillian lauding the avarian to the court some months back and calling for minstrels to write songs about her to be sung in pubs and palaces across the land.

“She must needs go to Dupree,” Talissar announced.

“For what purpose?” Gabrielle asked curiously. “Is there trouble in the colonies?”

“I do not know,” Talissar answered. “Sometimes, it is best not to ask. Better that most of us know only one small piece of the larger puzzle.”

Ahh.
This was the work of the Eight, then. She asked cautiously, “Is a posting coming available to the colonies, then?”

“Again, Your Highness, I do not know. That would be a question for thy husband, I imagine.”

She nodded her understanding. She was to influence Regalo to argue in the Council of Kings in favor of posting the young avarian noble to Dupree. It sounded harmless enough. Certainly not the sort of thing that anyone could label treasonous. And it would not raise any suspicions, not even from her husband. “I will ask him,” she answered simply.

Talissar gave her a short, formal bow and said loudly enough for her guard to hear, “It was a most pleasant surprise to encounter thee, Your Highness. Please give my warmest regards to thy lord husband.”

“Of course. And please send Haraland's regards to Queen Lyssandra in Quantaine.”

They traded formal bows and passed on their separate ways, him quickly and she more slowly and thoughtfully.
So.
It had begun. She knew not what “it” might be, but the Eight were active, and that meant some plot was afoot. In the colonies no less.
Interesting. Very interesting indeed.

*   *   *

Raina stared miserably at the White Heart tabard as Leland said persuasively. “Keep it. You don't have to put it on now. Think about it for a while. It is a big decision and one not to be made rashly or in haste.”

Reluctantly, she held the cloth in her lap. But she was bloody well not putting the thing on! “You cannot know the Heart would even have me as a member, let alone a White Heart member. I thought members of the Royal Order of the Sun and the White Heart had to serve in the regular Heart first and earn their way into the other orders.”

Leland grinned at her. “You're an arch-mage. Do you have any idea how rare those are?”

Apparently not, for they were commonplace in her family. Yes, she was considered to be particularly talented among her kin, but not so much more so than the others that she was “rare.”