Crowchanger (Changers of Chandris) (26 page)

“I suppose so,” Jaevan said, raising the goblet to his mouth and taking a mouthful. He winced, then drained it, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. “It is still vile, even with honey. Maybe I should give Marklin a taste to put him off his wild ideas. But I think it would be worth it, to fly like a bird.” Jaevan became wistful. “Tell me what it is like to fly.”

Casian told him. He had flown many more times than Sylas, and his first form of a great white owl with a stripe of dark grey across wings and feathers was truly remarkable. If that were his lower form, Sylas wondered, what would his higher form be? An eagle, maybe? Sylas was sure Casian could be one of the great changers given the chance. Sylas could not comprehend why Jesely had held him back.

Sylas offered a few comments, but mostly Casian spoke, with Jaevan dreamily speculating what his bird form might be. He would like to be an owl like Casian, he thought, but if that was as rare as they said, then a crow like Sylas might not be so bad. It was with Casian telling him of swooping and soaring and joining with the kye that the young prince’s eyelids drooped and finally closed altogether.

As they crept out of the prince’s bedchamber, nodding to the guard on the door when he asked if Jaevan slept, Sylas hoped that Ayriene would be back soon. For his first experience of acting as a healer without Ayriene’s supervision to be on the crown prince of Chandris was intimidating, to say the least. Even with Casian there, Sylas was uncomfortably aware of the responsibility.

Three days at the outside, she had said. He hoped she was right.

Chapter 26

T
he Aerie’s reply arrived in the afternoon while Casian and Sylas were otherwise occupied. Casian had bribed the messenger to convey the message only to him, and so it was late evening, after they had administered Jaevan’s potion, when Casian called at Deygan’s apartments.

“How dare they refuse me?” The table shook under Deygan’s fist, sending ripples across the surface of the red wine in his goblet.

Up till now, Casian had thought Deygan not weak, exactly, but certainly not anyone to fear. Now, standing before him and feeling the blast of his anger, he knew Deygan was not to be trifled with. He still thought the plan might work, however. A tired Deygan intoxicated after his nightly flagon of wine should, in theory, be more easily compelled than one in full possession of his wits.

“They say changers are always welcome in the Aerie, Sire, and that those who sought sanctuary from Cellondora denied any involvement in the act against you and your sons.”

Casian had heard the accounts of the destruction of the village from the messenger’s own lips, and they had turned his stomach. The survivors told of children spitted, women with their heads dashed open, bodies strewn through the village. Elyta had used her talent to truth-tell them, the messenger told Casian. It had happened as they said.

“They would deny it, wouldn’t they? I gave orders for the whole bloody village to be killed as an example. What sort of an example does it give if I allow them to hide at the Aerie?”

“There were old people and women among the survivors, Sire. I am sure they had no part in it.” Two of the escaped changers were far advanced in years, and had spent time in the infirmary recovering from the flight. One of the changers who had left Cellondora had never reached the Aerie. She had been old, too. The survivors believed she flew herself to death crossing the desert.

“No part, you say? Yet were they ignorant of it? If they knew of it and did nothing, they are as guilty as the rest. The whole damn village was a rats’ nest of rebels. The Aerie cannot do this with no fear of retribution or they make a laughing-stock of me.”

“The Aerie are arrogant, Sire. They believe they have as much influence over the island as you do, maybe more.” Casian hesitated. This next step would remove him from the changers forever. “Your people mutter that the Aerie were behind the attack on Your Majesty and his sons, Sire. They ask how simple desert Chesammos could have sufficient knowledge to use poison against you. They look at the healer in your court, and they ask questions.”

Deygan’s eyes hardened and Casian wondered if he had pushed his talent too far. The king was open to suggestion against the Chesammos and the Aerie, and Casian’s compulsions found fertile soil. He had not as yet established how far Deygan had turned against Ayriene, but the king absorbed the idea that Ayriene plotted against him like water into cloth.

“My people ask this? They think I am being duped by the healer?”

Casian spread his hands in a helpless gesture.

“What do they know, Sire? If you believe in Ayriene and her abilities—believe her to have acted in good faith towards you and your sons, then you know best, of course. But they wonder that she had with her a Chesammos who knew the attackers. That the Chesammos had knowledge of the poison used—”

“Enough!” Deygan roared. “The Aerie think they can outwit me. Well, I won’t have it! I won’t, I say!”

“Indeed, Sire. It does seem to me, though, that Sylas was used as a dupe in this. He has a genuine affection for your son, and I do not believe him directly involved.”

Deygan waved his protestations away. “The boy is of no importance. If he pleases you for the moment he can be dealt with later. It is the masters who are a danger to me. Do you have the men ready, Casian? Are they ready to march on the Aerie?”

“They are, Sire. Three companies of foot and horse will be ready to march in the morning, and the machines with them. If the Aerie will not hand over the traitors we will take them by force.”

“Thank the Creator I have a loyal liege man who has set aside his own unfortunate nature to serve me. If they surrender, Casian, you shall lead them. I will have Donmar’s head on the Banunis city gates and you will lead an Aerie loyal to me, and answerable to the King of Chandris in perpetuity.”

Unfortunate nature, indeed! Deygan had tried to persuade Casian to renounce changing altogether. While Casian had, he hoped, given the indication of agreement, he had stopped short of promising that he would no longer transform. It was too useful to him, and besides, he enjoyed it. The sensation of flight, as he had explained to Jaevan, was truly indescribable to one who had never experienced it. He did not intend to set it aside, even for Deygan, but he would have to be discreet about its use. Everything was coming together nicely. Very nicely indeed.

The banging on the bedroom door came in the middle of the night, and at that time it was bound to be bad news. Sylas was first to wake.

“Just a minute!” he called, extracting his arm from where it had wedged between his body and Casian’s and shaking it back to life. He grabbed a sheet and wrapped it around his waist. Rubbing sleep from his eyes, considering lighting a fire bowl and thinking better of it, he went to the door and unlocked it.

A pair of guards stood there, the one at the back with a lantern, both with unsheathed steel in their hands. The three-quarter swords the king’s guard used in the castle, not the broadswords worn outside and on ceremonial duties, but no less lethal.

“We are to take you to the king, changer,” the man at the front said. “You too, Lord Casian.” His voice was deferential towards Casian, but the tone he used with Sylas implied trouble.

“What’s the matter?” asked Casian, finger-combing his hair and rubbing a cloth damp from the pitcher of water at his bedside over his face.

“Something wrong with Prince Jaevan,” said the guardsman. “King said to bring you right away. Don’t know any more than that, sir.” He looked past them to the crumpled bed behind and Sylas had a feeling he knew exactly how things stood. Doubtless they thought he was Casian’s whore. The difference in social status between them would make the alternative almost incomprehensible. But Casian loved him; he was sure.

“Can we at least dress? Make ourselves presentable for the king?” Casian’s tone altered subtly and the guardsman shifted from one foot to the other.

“Don’t see why not,” he said. “Your lordship and his friend will hurry though. The king will not be kept waiting.”

They tugged on smallclothes, breeches and tunic, and Sylas too drew a wet cloth over face and neck. He would have liked time for more before seeing the king, but from the guard’s manner speed was required, especially if there was trouble with Jaevan. Sylas’s stomach felt like he had swallowed a rock. His legs were heavy walking to the door, weighed down by a leaden mass of dread, and his fingers could barely grasp the door handle for shaking. Casian squeezed his shoulder.

“It will be fine. Probably Jaevan had a nightmare and the king is overreacting. Too much wine before bedtime.” He smiled weakly. Sylas wasn’t reassured. Casian didn’t believe that any more than he did.

The guards fell in behind them for the short walk to Jaevan’s apartments, Sylas as acutely aware of the weapons as if the points were pricking the small of his back. His stomach rolled and he tried to swallow past a lump in his throat. Casian gave him another encouraging look. “Fine, remember,” he said.

Sylas would have liked a touch to reassure him, a squeeze of the hand or Casian’s hand laid on his shoulder, but he would not dare with the guards there. Sylas took what comfort he could from Casian’s presence—his confidently erect posture at Sylas’s side.

When they entered the room it was clear things were anything but fine. Jaevan thrashed on his bed, sobbing wildly, while a pair of servants tried to restrain him. Deygan took two quick strides to stand squarely before Sylas. For a moment Sylas thought the king might strike him, but his long pale forefinger stabbed towards Sylas’s face.

“What did you give my son, damn you? You and your friends didn’t manage the job last time, so you’ve had another try, isn’t that it? You should have swung along with them and damn what the healer said. Tell me what you’ve bloody given him, or Creator save me, I’ll strangle you myself!”

When Sylas protested that the potion was completely safe—that he had prepared it under Ayriene’s supervision—Deygan swore so loudly that Sylas was scared he would carry out his threat. Casian moved smoothly past Deygan, talking reassuringly to Jaevan, trying to comfort him, but Deygan rounded on him next.

“Do you think I haven’t tried that? He won’t listen to me. His own father. Just wails and throws himself about. Damn me, I’m not even sure he can hear me. He’s gone mad, Creator save him.” Deygan collapsed into a chair and buried his head in his hands. “My boy. My dear boy. What have they done to you?”

Sylas tried to go to Jaevan, but before he could reach him Deygan was on his feet. “Don’t touch him! Don’t go near him! Don’t you think you have done enough damage, Chesammos bastard?”

It was on the tip of Sylas’s tongue to remind King Deygan that he had helped Ayriene save Jaevan from the esteia—that without Sylas’s intervention, Jaevan would have died days before. He bit back the words. The king was hardly rational at the moment, and reminding him of the poison incident, and Sylas’s supposed part in it, might not be wise.

“Then why did you call me from my bed?” said Sylas, as calmly as he could manage with the weight in his stomach growing heavier by the moment. “Did you bring me here to shout in my face? I am a healer. Am I to watch him suffer, or try to help him?” He pushed past the stunned king to Jaevan’s bedside. Kneeling, he took Jaevan’s head in his hands and made the prince look into his eyes.

“Hush, my prince. Whatever ails you, I am here now. All will be well, trust me.”

Jaevan’s sobbing lessened somewhat, and he settled, his eyes fixed on Sylas’s face. Crooning as if to a child, Sylas shushed him, waving the servants away. They backed off, exchanging nervous glances. Sylas wrapped his arms about the boy, marvelling at how slender his body was, how frail he felt. Jaevan had eaten only lightly since Rannon’s death, but Sylas had not appreciated how thin he had become, until now.

“Get your filthy hands off him, you—” Deygan began, but broke off, Sylas vaguely aware that Casian had moved to interrupt him. He could hear Casian’s voice speaking softly, but urgently, asking Deygan to at least let Sylas try.

Jaevan gradually calmed in Sylas’s arms until his crying stopped, apart from occasional wracking sobs from deep inside. His body still shook, but little by little the trembling diminished until the prince regained control. Sylas reached for a cup of water and held it to Jaevan’s lips, ignoring the renewed protest from Deygan. Sylas accepted a damp cloth offered by one of the servants and wiped the tear streaks from Jaevan’s face. “There now, my prince. All will be well. It was just a nightmare.”

No nightmare Sylas had ever heard of would produce that sort of reaction. A child, tormented by monsters and unknown fears alone in the dark would have been comforted by his own father. Jaevan had been hysterical. Beyond hysterical. He had been scared out of his wits. Sylas needed all his concentration to stay calm, or he would have caught Jaevan’s mood and whimpered like a child.

Jaevan shook his head, his face still terrified, his skin paler than pale.

“No,” he whispered.

“What was it then, if it wasn’t a nightmare? Was it that Destroyer’s brew the Chesammos gave you?” Deygan loomed over the other side of the bed.

The prince cringed away from his father, pressing himself back into his pillows. “No,” he repeated.

And however much they encouraged him to tell them what had brought on such an extreme reaction, that was all they got out of him. His lips pressed tightly together, he refused to utter another word. Only when Deygan tried to send Sylas away did he respond with tears, threatening to repeat the hysterical sobbing when his father ordered the guards to take Sylas from the room.

Finally, reluctantly, Deygan allowed Sylas to spend what was left of the night in the chair beside Jaevan’s bed, dozing sometimes and waking often to check on the prince, who cried out several times in his sleep, seeming to see again whatever had caused him so much distress. Casian and a guard remained too, and before dawn a second guard came to the room. The two soldiers escorted the dazed Sylas away—to where, he did not know.