Exile (35 page)

Everyone was so busy fending off fires that no one paid the least attention to Draken, save his friends and his father. The flaming balls disappeared in the moonlight as they soared toward the ship, only to flare when they hit the ship or the water. Zozia had not the largest moon, not even half the size of the largest, but she burned like hell-fire in the sky. Draken looked at the black sea, suddenly reflecting no light, and turned back to his father.

“I am your King,” Khel said. “Obey my orders.”

“King? King of what?” Draken flung a sore arm toward the bay, mindless to the fiery balls hissing through the air behind him. “A dead bay and a leaky ship? Have you gone mad?”

“Take up the sword, Draken, or so help me, I’ll kill you with it.”

“Elena will slaughter the Brînians for our betrayal,” Draken said. “Do not make me do this, Father. Relent. You are no king and I’m no prince.”

Khel Szi
, whispered Bruche.
You
are
prince. Take the sword.

Draken rubbed his bristly face with his grimy left hand. His right hung useless at his side, hurting and swollen, the fingers still seeping blood where they’d pulled his nails. Blood ran from his many cuts. His lashed back protested every movement. Sunburn masked the extent of his hurts, but it wouldn’t last for long. Survival promised to be excruciating.

He reached out and his father pressed the now familiar hilt into his hand.

Some prince, Draken thought. I need a bath and a healer. He glanced again at the moons, especially Zozia, who had watched him since he’d arrived in this godsforsaken country, and walked to the ship’s rail. He drew a breath and held the sword over the water.

Light started at the tip of the blade and flashed down into the grip, sinking into his hand and wrist, flaring hot in all his hurts and burning holes in his belly. The sword twisted toward the sea, taking Draken’s hand along with it fast enough he thought he might be yanked from the deck. He grappled for the railing with his bad hand, found it wouldn’t grasp the rope at his hip.

“Bloody hell, Draken, don’t drop it,” his father snapped, the last mortal words Draken heard for a long while. A soul-shuddering hum drowned out the sounds of the people and the ship and the hurling balls, and the sword dragged him down into the sea.

Draken couldn’t have let go if he tried, but he didn’t want to let go. He never wanted to let go again. His veins pumped hot magic. As he hit the cold water, relief tore through him, erasing his hurts. Ecstasy, like he found in a woman’s arms, caressed his loins, curled around every inch of his skin. Music, finer than played in any royal court, thrilled through him.

Draken stared at Seaborn, rapt, shimmering in the sea. Something moved and sparkled beneath him. The Mother-God. Ma’Vanni…

Swim, Draken!
Bruche.

But surrounded by the white-hot rush of magic, survival didn’t seem important. He could only stare at the sword, paralyzed in the grip of divine sorcery, praying without words that Ma’Vanni would take him home. Blinded by the radiance of the magic, his eyes burned in the sea water. He couldn’t so much as blink.

The sword dragged him into wraithlike flight through the water and yet toward the moons, and sang away the last of his hurts and fears. He stared down at the bay and Brîn from high above. The hurling balls were too small to be seen. The mountains of Eidola grazed furiously bright skies. The ship was a mere thing on a vast sea which had grown intolerant of meager concerns.

Meaning came to him then, flowing through him and around him, until he knew the truth it carried. The gods had a plan, all right, a treacherous path through the war the Mance King waged against them. Utter betrayal was the only chance at peace, and it was as impossible a thing as he ever had known. Horror stole the rush away, and he was devastated when the magic abandoned him. The moons were gone and all was black. Sohalia had ended.

“Elena,” Draken whispered, and he surfaced in the water, gasping. The air froze his face and stung his lungs until a wave dragged him under.

Chapter Twenty-Three

D
raken woke to the acidic taste of his father’s wine. It all slammed back into his awareness with chilling clarity: the torture, the sword, the path the gods had laid out for him. Bruche had filled his limbs with ice, solidifying his muscles into a stiff rigor. As if Draken wasn’t cold enough already. But then he realized Bruche had been doing his damndest to wake him.

How long was I out?

Seems like half the night. I swam you back to the boat and your father brought you to shore. We’re at Seakeep.

Seakeep? But what of the attacks on my father’s ship?

Not from here. I’m not sure of their origins. It seems there is some sort of rebellion in Brîn, but your father seems to have it under control.

The others?

Still on the ship.

Damn. He could have used Osias’ help in killing his father-King.

I know what you’re thinking, Draken. It’ll never work. I fair dislike the gods’ plan, but there isn’t another way—

I will kill for them because we share a common enemy,
Draken said.
But I will not do the rest.

The gods don’t take disobedience lightly. They showed you what could happen if disobey their will—

Let them fight this war without me, then.

Bruche sobered.
They need you and they know it.

Aye. I’m not going to let them turn me into something I’m not.

A prince?

Nor a pawn.

Draken opened his eyes and looked around. The cold wasn’t all Bruche. A chill wind swept off the bay, hissing through the shutters of the mean little room where he lay on a stiff cot. He’d been stripped nude and covered with a scratchy blanket.

His father stood over him. “Well?”

Draken pushed himself up to a sit. Elena’s pendant had slipped around to his back. As he straightened it, he realized his various hurts were gone. His back should have burned from the lashes; his right hand should have been broken and useless. He flexed his fingers. No pain. Was it the magic of the gods that had healed him? It must have been.

They needed me healthy to do their dirty work, he thought grimly.

Your body was able to swim back to the ship and climb aboard. Truth, the gods must have healed you. Otherwise you would never have been able to climb back aboard the ship. You could barely stand when you plunged into the water.

Draken knew his plan would only work if his father believed him a changed man, loyal to him, or at least willing to work Seaborn’s magic and betray his Queen and Akrasia for personal gain. But he couldn’t take it too far. He aimed a haughty tone at Halmar, standing nearby with a small contingent of his father’s guards. “Fools all, are you going to stand there looking at me, or am I to greet the Mance King naked?”

Bruche snorted.
You sound like Reavan.

Draken smiled inwardly at the gibe as Prince Khel snapped his fingers and two soldiers scuttled off to do his bidding.
You only know him through my memories,
Draken shot back
. If you had actually met him, you’d be even more impressed by my impersonation.

When they’d left Khel turned on Draken, a wry, ugly smile twisting his lips. “You’re giving my men orders?”

“Someone has too, it seems. And I am my father’s son.” His father’s face darkned, but Draken continued. “What is the nature of this rebellion? Brîn rises up against you, their beloved
king?
” Draken let his voice drip with sarcasm. Put him on the defensive. His own pride would compel him to give Draken the information he lacked.

“Not a rebellion,” Khel snapped back, “but the failed plot of a soon-to-be dead princling. Halmar has Geord and his
rebellion
firmly in hand.” Khel paused, belatedly considering his words, but Draken pressed onward, eager to keep his father off balance.

“Now. I’m going to dress and you’re going to take me to King Truls. I think it’s time he and I had a talk about his plans for the banes he loosed from Eidola and this war he’s trying to wage against the gods.”

His father’s pale lips parted and his tongue darted out to dampen them, a pale slug in his white face. “You really spoke to the gods.”

“I’d sorted a great deal of it out before we got here. The gods confirmed my suspicions. Where is the Mance King?”

The soldiers returned with clothes and held them up, as if prepared to help Draken dress. Khel took them. “Leave us.” He thrust the clothes at Draken. “You expect me to arm you as well?”

“You expect me to go before King Truls without the one thing that makes me worthwhile to him?” Draken pulled loose Brînian trousers over his damp legs and threw a cloak over his bare shoulders, gritting his teeth to keep them from knocking. How did these Brînians go about without tunics and piles of underclothes in the storms off the bay?

“Draken—”

“My sword, Fath—” He tempered his tone and dropped his chin. “If it pleases Your Majesty.” The words tasted worse than the remnants of his father’s wine.

After a hesitation, Khel crossed to a table and unwrapped a bundle on it. “It’s here,” he said. “Can’t handle the bloody thing unless my hand is wrapped. Burns like devil-fire, since you and it came back out of the bay.”

Draken took his sword from the wrapping. It gleamed white like it had been freshly oiled and it showed no harm from its dipping in the sea. Calm swept through him. “Feels fine to me.”

“I can only hope our blood-right will not mean your death. The gods willing, their counsel will save you.”

Draken lowered his brows. His father hadn’t quite sounded himself. Halmar stepped back into the room. “He is ready to see you now, Khel Szi.”

As Draken and the burly soldier followed Prince Khel out the door and toward the tower, Bruche asked,
I wonder if your father noticed that Halmar was looking at you when he spoke?

***

Black as a bedroom window after a nightmare, the tower loomed overhead, shadowing them from the direct crimson moonlight, though it shone bloody in the skies behind it. Elena’s banner of white Sohalia moons arranged on a field of green hung above the seaside gates. It twisted on its cord, spinning and flapping disconsolately. Icy winds sluiced through Draken’s cloak and it whipped behind him as they entered the tower. They climbed a few steps and entered a small round hall. Only one man stood in the middle, looking almost slight in the dim torchlight encircling the walls.

“Reavan,” Draken muttered in disgust—mostly with himself. “I should have known you’d snake your way into the middle of this.”

Reavan approached. Draken had never before noticed how gracefully the Lord Marshal moved. The lightness of his step reminded him of Osias. And before he could define his realization, glamour washed from Reavan as if he emerged from a fog. His dark hair burnished into silvery tresses. His eyes slanted and his cheekbones re-sculpted themselves; the Mance-mark darkened on his forehead. His limbs narrowed and his grace swelled into a familiar elegance. He fair glowed in the darkened hall.

“At last we meet in truth, Draken, Night Lord and the rightful
Khel Szi
. I am King Truls of the Mance.”

As he reached out, his sleeve slipped back to reveal his fetterless arm. Draken set his jaw and took it, his fingers curling around the warm, strong forearm.

“What did the gods tell you?” Truls asked.

Draken narrowed his eyes and committed to blunt honesty. “About what you’d expect. I’m to get close enough to you to kill you.”

Truls spread his arms. “Here we are. And yet you do not strike.”

“Truth? Right now I don’t like the gods much better than I like you. I’m still weighing my coin against the grain, figuring a sensible price, as it were.”

Truls’ eyebrows climbed and he fashioned a cold smile. “So I’m to believe you would fight against your Queen and the rest of your people, against the very gods themselves?”

“They aren’t my people and this war isn’t against them.” Draken gestured with the sword. “But I’d be a fool not to ponder my options when I wield the only weapon that scares the gods.”

“Of course it hasn’t escaped your notice that it’s the only weapon that can kill me, as well, has it?” Truls said.

Draken made a show of examining his sword, twisting it so it captured the torchlight deep in its blade. “Aye, I suppose it is, at that. But what good does it do me if you kill so many people the gods weaken and fail?” He snapped his gaze up to Truls’ face. “Truth? I’d like to make a bargain with you. I curry no favor with the Seven Eyes. They abandoned me here and cursed me with this sword and it’s been naught but a thorn in my foot since I first laid eyes on the thing. I’ve spent my whole life an enemy of Akrasia. That said, I see no point in killing masses of people. It unnecessarily… complicates matters, aye?”

“We need people to die to draw the gods to the fight, to weaken them,” Truls said. “Their strength lies in the strength of our faith in them. Break that faith, break their grip on us, and break the very gods.”

“Why? It seems a fair deal of trouble when the sword can kill them—”

“How?” Prince Khel broke in. “How do you kill the gods with the sword?”

Draken blinked at both Truls and his father. “I thought
you
knew.”

“You were never an advisor in the wars of your home country,” Truls said. “You understand why that is, don’t you? You’re just a simple soldier. Strong, aye, with a good swordhand inside to work you, and the blood in your veins to work the magic.
That
is your precise worth. Your cousin-King knew it, and I know it. Truth, I am glad to have your sword and you. But leave the strategy to me.”

Draken stiffened and Bruche flooded him with cold. In perfect accord, they swept Seaborn up in an arc destined for Truls’ throat.

Truls lifted his hands and Draken froze, the sword thrumming against the air.