Dragon War: The Draconic Prophecies - Book Three (27 page)

“So what are you doing here?” she asked.

“I might ask you the same question.”

She laughed again, and her grip on the crossbow finally relaxed. “I wondered when you were going to turn the tables on me.”

“I hope I’ve demonstrated that I want to deal honestly with you now. I’d hope for the same in return.”

Janna smiled. “I don’t know. I think I still owe you some lies.”

“I can’t argue with that. I’m sorry that my mission required deceiving you.”

“You are a very curious Royal Eye. I’ve never known such an honest spy.”

“I’m no longer a Royal Eye.”

“And what? Leaving the Eyes made you suddenly honest?”

“Something like that.”

“So what are you doing here?” Janna repeated. Her eyes narrowed and one corner of her mouth twisted in a smirk. She was playing with him, dodging his questions while barraging him with her own. He already suspected that they were here at cross purposes—he to foil Kelas’s plans and she to further them. If that was the case, he didn’t want to answer her question, at least not while she still had a crossbow pointed at him.

At least, he didn’t want to answer her completely. He could say much of the truth without revealing all of it. “I came here hoping to find any notes that Kelas had left behind. Just as you did.”

Janna’s face brightened. “Kelas’s death doesn’t have to mean the end of his vision for Aundair,” she said.

So Aunn had been right. Janna had come to the cathedral to see if she could pick up where Kelas had left off. She seemed completely unaware that Nara was still working to carry out the plan, which had been hers all along. And now she thought that Aunn was a fellow conspirator. Of
course, he’d encouraged that misapprehension—he’d fallen so easily back into his life of lies.

Aunn stepped into the room, closing the distance between the door and the desk in two quick steps before she realized what he was doing. He knocked the crossbow from Janna’s hand, sending its bolt clattering harmlessly to the floor. Janna pushed the chair back from the desk and sprang to her feet, drawing her sword as she rose.

“What are you doing?” she said. Fear and confusion twisted her face.

Aunn spread his arms wide again, showing her that he wasn’t reaching for his mace. He took a few steps back, so he wasn’t in easy reach of her short, heavy blade. “I didn’t want your crossbow pointing at me when I told you that my purpose here is actually the opposite of yours. I’m here to ensure that Kelas’s plan does not get carried out and his vision for Aundair never becomes reality.”

Janna laughed again and lowered her blade. Aunn found himself warming to her ready laugh, despite himself.

“I must say,” she said, “your honesty is refreshing. What was your name again?”

“Aunn.”

“Aunn. So did you know I was here, or did you suspect someone else of planning to carry on Kelas’s work? Or did you just come to destroy all his notes and make sure no one ever could?”

Aunn scowled. She was flirting again, quirking her lips and looking sidelong through her eyelashes, as if he were back in Yeven’s face. Toying with him, trying to extract as much information as she could. “I wanted to be honest with you, Janna. But I have to draw the line at giving you information that might help you in pursuing goals that I’m opposed to.”

She laughed again, feigning delight at his words, but he saw it in her eyes. She realized exactly what he’d just told her: someone else was already carrying on Kelas’s plans. Frustrated, he walked out the door before turning back to Janna.

“Listen,” he said. “As a Royal Eye, I promised to give my life in service of the queen. Her Majesty is hardly blameless in all that’s happened, but I will not stand by and watch a thousand years of Wynarn rule get tossed aside so she can be replaced with the likes of Jorlanna d’Cannith, Arcanist Wheldren, and you. If you continue to pursue Kelas’s schemes, you will make me your enemy.”

Janna’s smile became a wolfish grin. “Oh no,” she sneered. “Perhaps you’ll bore me to death with your speeches.”

Anger boiled in his chest, and he suddenly couldn’t believe he’d ever harbored a pleasant thought about this woman. “Don’t underestimate me,” he said. “Kelas didn’t die in the storm at the Dragon Forge—he died at my hand.”

“Was that a threat? Why not fight me now, Aunn?” She stepped around the desk, sword at the ready. “I’m not going to turn back. I’ll find the others, and together we’ll finish what Kelas started. Are you going to stop me?”

Aunn pulled his mace from his belt. “I am.”

Her demeanor changed so quickly that he thought for a moment he was facing the changeling after all, but it was still Janna before him—the laughing, flirtatious Janna of a moment before. She toyed with the hilt of her sword as she took a step toward him, looking coyly up at him.

“But why?” she said. “Why do you care so much for the queen? Why cling to your old loyalties when Aundair could be so much more?”

Aunn knew she was trying to distract him as she advanced within reach of him, but whether she meant to or not, she had struck a nerve. He had admitted it himself—the queen was not blameless in this whole affair. She hadn’t ordered the construction of the Dragon Forge, but she had willingly accepted its use in destroying Varna. She had been goaded into attacking the Eldeen Reaches—largely through his own actions—but she had only done what she had always wanted to do. The barbarian invasion just gave her a pretext. In short, the queen was already a pawn of the forces that wanted control of the nation, which begged the question of why Nara wanted to overthrow her at all. Why replace a government she already controlled with an illegitimate government that would draw the ire of the rest of Khorvaire?

Only two possible answers made sense. One possibility was that Nara wanted to reignite the Last War, probably believing that Aundair could win it this time—that a new ruler could govern not just Aundair but all of Khorvaire. That had been Haldren’s goal, after all, and when Janna spoke of Kelas’s vision for a glorious Aundair, he suspected that’s what she had in mind.

But if that was what everybody seemed to believe, then in all likelihood the other possibility was the real truth: it was all about the Prophecy—which, as always, made his head spin. But he was finally beginning to glimpse the still center of that whirlwind.

Janna watched his face with evident interest, as if she was trying to guess the thoughts running through his mind. She was close enough to strike
with her blade, but she hadn’t yet, perhaps waiting for some kind of answer to her question.

It was Aunn’s turn to laugh. “You won’t sway me, Janna. Kelas’s vision wasn’t what you think it was. Pore though his papers—see if you find anything about the Prophecy, or any clue who he was working for. I’ll bet you won’t. Go ahead and chase the dream he sold you, and play right into their hands.”

Janna’s brow furrowed. “Whose hands?”

“When you figure that out, you find me.” Aunn turned his back on her and strode back around the corner, down the main passage, up the stairs, and out of the cathedral.

S
lowly, Cart began to understand.

Havrakhad spoke in his mind, words that soothed and guided him. He saw visions amid the explosions of golden light that replaced his sight—visions of memory and history, portent and nightmare. His mind was a stormy sea of emotion—raw terror, exultation, steely determination, love—but Havrakhad’s voice coaxed him up above the storm, to float above the waves and ride them through the tumult. It was no different, really, from the discipline of a soldier, fighting on despite the fear and pain, careful not to be carried away by the surge of joy that came with each small victory.

He couldn’t express or explain what he came to understand, but he knew that it left him changed.

“Listen carefully, Cart,” Havrakhad said to him at last. It had been hours—he had no idea how many hours. “In a moment, I will remove the quori’s eye from your mind. But before I do that, I have to restore your own sight. When I do, you must not turn and look at me. You
must not
. It will try to make you turn, but you must resist. Use what you have learned, and resist it.”

“I understand.”

“Not yet, but you begin to. Are you ready?”

“Wait. Where’s Ashara?”

“I’m here.” Her murmur came from across the room. She sounded sleepy. What had she been doing while Havrakhad was in his mind? Cart realized he had no idea.

“Will you sit beside me?” he asked.

He heard rustling and her soft footsteps, then she sank onto the couch beside him and put a hand on his arm.

“Are you ready?” Havrakhad repeated.

Cart nodded slowly.

“Then open your eyes.”

He felt Havrakhad’s hand at the back of his neck, and then his vision returned like a slow dawning. He saw Havrakhad’s apartment, spare and clean, washed in morning light filtered through gauzy curtains over the windows. Ashara leaned into his view and smiled at him.

He had to turn and see Havrakhad. He knew—with all his being he knew—that if he turned, he would see not the beautiful man he knew as Havrakhad, but a monster veiled in flesh. Everything about Havrakhad was a lie. He fumbled for his axe, ready to turn around and strike the monster down.

“Cart?” Ashara was still holding his arm, looking up at him with worry on her face. Her hair was a tousled mess, and her eyes were swollen from sleep.

She’s in league with him, he thought. Panic seized his mind, and he crouched, ready to whirl and confront the monster.

“Use what you have learned, and resist it.”

Cart stopped and straightened his legs. He felt the panic in his mind, but he rose above it—he observed it and then discarded it. He felt Havrakhad’s fingers on his head, probing gently into his mind, and the panic slowly subsided.

Then another jolt of pain stabbed through his head, and the fear and doubt were gone. “It’s gone,” he said.

“Yes.” Havrakhad came around the couch and into his field of vision. He looked more exhausted than Ashara did, but he smiled. “You did well.”

“Thank you,” Cart said, then he looked back at Ashara. “And thank you as well.”

Wrapping her arms around his waist, she rested her head against his chest. He encircled her in his arms and held her.

“I’m sorry,” Cart told Havrakhad. “We’ll go, and let you rest.” Cart stood and lifted Ashara to her feet.

“Il-Yannah
shines in you, Cart,” Havrakhad said, walking them to the door. “Not in your axe or the strength of your arms.”

Cart nodded and clasped the kalashtar’s hand, Ashara gave a slight bow, and they stepped out into the stairwell of the apartment building. Ashara sighed and took his arm, and they walked together down the stairs.

“Where to now?” Ashara said.

“Do you need more sleep?”

“No. I slept just about the whole time we were there.”

“How long was that?”

“All night. What did he do to you?”

“He taught … or showed me—” Cart shrugged. “He opened my eyes.”

“After he blinded you.”

“Hm.” That was literally true, but at a different level, Cart felt like he had never learned to see before he met Havrakhad.

“So what now?”

“How about some breakfast?”

“What an excellent idea. I know just the place.”

“Then lead the way.”

Ashara held his arm as they walked away from the apartment building with its streaming banners and back in the general direction of Chalice Center. When they left the narrow residential streets and walked along more crowded roadways, though, Cart noticed hostile stares directed at them. Ashara didn’t seem to mind, but Cart was uneasy. He patted her hands on his arm, then gently extricated himself from her grasp.

“Who cares what they think?” Ashara said.

Cart didn’t want to look at her, so he let his gaze range over the wide street, with its row of trees down the center, bare as winter drew near. “In my experience, I find it better to avoid giving offense than to deal with angry people. Especially when they get violent.”

“Violent? Because I’m holding your arm?”

“People get violent when I walk into their favorite tavern. Or because I’m on the wrong side of the street. Or because someone’s brother died in the war and somehow I’m responsible. People don’t need good reasons to be unreasonable.”

Ashara laughed at his choice of words, and Cart hung his head. She could take the matter lightly, because she had never known the reality of life as a warforged. Quite the contrary—as an heir of House Cannith, she had enjoyed the servitude of the House’s warforged creations for most of her life. She could still rightly command Cart’s loyalty, as much as she wanted him to think of her as a friend.

She tried to take his arm again, but he pulled away. They walked in silence the rest of the way to Ashara’s choice of breakfast locations—a bakery in Chalice Center. Cart didn’t notice its name.

*  *  *  *  *

Cart sat with his arms folded across his chest and watched Ashara eat. The sting of her laughter was fading, and he was trying to remind himself to
rise above it, to observe the storm of his emotions without being carried away by it. He liked watching people eat, except when they ate things that didn’t seem to fit in the category of food—clams, mushrooms, potatoes. He particularly liked the way the muscles of Ashara’s jaw flexed as she chewed, and the obvious pleasure on her face as she licked the dusting of cinnamon and sugar from her fingertips.

Her smile vanished as her eyes fell on something behind him, by the door. The smile returned a moment later, but different, perhaps forced. Cart heard footsteps behind him.

“Hello, Harkin,” Ashara said.

Cart turned in his seat to see the blond Cannith heir standing behind him. He didn’t return Ashara’s smile.

“I thought I might find you here.” Harkin seized a chair from another table and sat between them.

“What do you mean?” Ashara asked. “We were going to meet for luncheon.”

“You were quite the scandal in Fairhaven this morning, walking arm in arm with your warforged like lovers.”

Ashara’s face turned crimson. “Why is it anyone’s business what we do?”