Feast of Souls (21 page)

Now gone.

Her slender white fingers tore at the hem of her gown again, rending another few threads to bits.

All about her the blue pines of her homeland bristled, brought to this place at great expense by a king who was not ungenerous with coin, even if he was tight-fisted with his affection. Their close ranks hid the surrounding stone walls from view, so that if she half-shut her eyes she might imagine herself home in truth, wandering free in the mountains as she had done in her youth, and not in some fortified courtyard, a prisoner of royal security.

She had brought in northern craftsmen to train the trees, as was the custom in her father’s lands, carving their trunks in the likenesses of her ancestors and then leaving their bark to heal, so that it appeared they had morphed themselves naturally into such images. It was said you might know the favor your family spirits held you in by how the blue pines thrived once they bore such images, but here in the south such trees were foreigners to the land, and the harsh sun and the dense clay soil conspired to make them feel unwelcome. Or so she told herself. It would be a terrible thing indeed if these stunted trees truly reflected how her forbears felt about her, and she refused to consider it.

Danton… he gave little more than a passing nod to the ancient gods, which suited a land that had never known the harshness of the northern winter, and a people that had never offered their devotions in thigh-deep snow before the Spears of the Wrath. Danton’s people were not raised believing that if they failed to do their duty for even a night the whole of the human lands might be swallowed up by a second Dark Ages, and the Second Age of Kings would become what the First Age had… a thing men knew only from the tales in history books centuries later, and by the melodious laments of minstrels. Such men could be careless with their lives and with their gods, and forget the ancient traditions. She did not have that freedom.

In the center of the courtyard she had commanded a circle of spires to be erected, irregular stone monuments carefully carved and smoothed and polished till they rose like some vast monster’s teeth from the ground, towering well over her head. It was commanded that no drop of water that fell upon the spires should find purchase, but rather each must run swiftly down the surface to the bottom without interruption, and so she had ordered them sculpted thus, each in its own twisted, sinuous form. They were eerie, especially when one stood inside the circle of them. Danton hated them. But she was the daughter of a Lord Protector, and he knew the obligations that came with such a heritage. Here in this private place, in this proxy circle of Spears, she might prick her finger and offer up a drop of her blood to the Wrath of the gods, promising to maintain her family’s ancient contract with those who had saved mankind from utter devastation. So did the blood of the First Age of Kings, running in her veins, guarantee the prosperity of the Second Age. Danton understood that. He might not believe in the legends behind the custom, but he understood.

The thin bone pin was but an inch from her fingertip when she heard a sound behind her. That was unusual, in this place. Guards rarely followed her here, finding the place eerie and discomforting, trusting to the high walls and the King’s land beyond to protect her. Even her own children found the place disquieting, and while they had come here when they were young to attend her devotions, they rarely did so now, preferring to wait until she had returned from her worship if they had need to speak with her. Andovan alone had come here without prompting, as if recognizing that the place was his as much as hers. She had often reflected upon the fact that he alone truly understood his heritage, and its terrible burden.
You are of the blood of the Protectors
, she had said to him, stroking his blond hair as he stood beside her in the Circle of the Wrath as a young boy,
and if the time comes when the world must be tested again, then so you shall be called to the task, and you must be ready to serve
.

Now he was gone. And her other sons—her strutting, proud peacock sons—gave no more than a token nod to northern tradition. She had no doubt that if the Wrath failed and the Souleaters returned to feed upon men, they would seal themselves in this keep with their father and send out commoners by the thousands to die in their name rather than risk their own blood in battle. So had the kings of the First Age done in their own time, the legends said, all but a precious few. And they had paid a terrible price for it.

The trees behind her rustled. She turned, the tattered silk of her gown’s hem brushing at fallen needles. A man’s figure moved from the shadows into the moonlight of the clearing, and as he stepped between the twisted spires and became fully visible she let out a small yelp of surprise and then rushed into his arms.

“Rhys! I had thought you had forgotten me—”

“Shhhhh. Quiet, little sister. You know that is nonsense.”

She held him, trembling, and she wept a little. But they were tears of joy rather than pain and he knew them for such, and so he simply held her while they flowed. At last she moved back from him, drying her eyes with a sleeve on one side of her face, allowing him to brush away the tears from the other with his fingers. It was a freedom she would have allowed very few men.

“You came with a retinue?” she whispered.

He nodded. “Father wouldn’t have it otherwise. I left them at Danton’s table to eat themselves into oblivion.”

She rubbed her reddened nose with a dampened sleeve. “How did I not know, then? I should have heard of your coming—”

“Unless Danton agreed to keep it a secret so I might surprise you.” His pale brow furrowed as he studied her, seeing the signs of her pain. “You see? He is not so unfeeling. He understands that sometimes you need what he cannot give.”

She hugged him again, hugged him long and hard, and perhaps wept a bit more. He just held her quietly and let the tears flow.

He was a tall man, a handsome man, with hair so pale that in the moonlight it seemed it might have been sculpted out of freshly fallen snow. It had been curly in his youth, like hers, but he wore it in the style of the Guardians of the Wrath now, tightly twisted into dozens of slender braids that hung down straight to his shoulders. Moonlight played upon the tokens of rank and fortitude that had been bound to the braids in front, making them glitter like captive snowflakes. His skin was pale, like hers, but his frame was stockier, his broad shoulders hinting at a much more formidable wench for brood-mother than the delicate lady who had borne Gwynofar. In truth Gwynofar knew Rhys’ mother was no such thing, rather a mere slip of a girl who had caught the Lord Protector’s eye one winter evening and kept him warm till the sun rose. But the gods had visited her with fertility that night and apparently meant to bless her bastard child as well, for he had won favor with the Lord Protector, indulgence from his lady, and friendship with the true-born daughter of their household, the golden-haired Gwynofar.

Now… now Rhys was anything but a child. Gwynofar held him at arm’s length and studied him. Was it possible he had grown so much since she left, or did she just feel smaller in this foreign place? They were both much older than they had been when they had played in the woods together, making offerings to the wild pines as if the whole northern forest was their personal domain. He wore the uniform of a Guardian now, which spoke of some important promotion, but she didn’t know enough about the various ranks and initiations of the secretive order to know how to read his advancement, or to interpret the various charms that glittered about his person. The scar that had been made when he first joined the Guardians was no longer red but a livid white, and it coursed diagonally across his cheek like the war paint of some Dark Ages barbarian, drawing attention to his high cheekbones and cool gray eyes.

You are of the blood of the First Kings, as I am
, she thought.
You bear the same burden the Lord Protector does, at least in half. If the Wrath fails us, if the world is put to the test, you will stand on the battlefield beside the Protectors, while Danton and his children will shiver in their beds like frightened pups
.

No, your burden is even greater than ours… for my birth was contracted by kings, but yours was decreed by the gods themselves. They have some special purpose in store for you, my half-brother, and I pray for you nightly, for the whims of the northern gods are rarely gentle or pleasant things.

“You came here just to see me?” she asked.

“To see you, bring you news, bring back news of your welfare. Father won’t admit it, but he’s worried. He knows how you felt about Andovan.” He picked at the tattered silk on her shoulder, biting his lip softly as he offered his own silent prayer to her mourning. “So what really happened?” he said at last. “No one is telling us anything of consequence. Least of all the High King’s messenger.
We regret to inform you that Prince Andovan of House Aurelius, son of the High Queen Gwynofar, grandson of the Lord Protector Stevan of House Keird-wyn, is dead by his own hand. It is our custom in such cases not to hold a state funeral
Hardly informative.”

She sighed and wrapped her pale arms around herself, trying to make the words come without tears. “He had the Wasting. Danton did not want to admit it, but everyone knew. He even brought Magisters here to study him, to try to discover some other diagnosis.” She shrugged stiffly. “But they could not, for there was no other cause. So… I have told you of his nature, Rhys. He hated sitting around and waiting for decisions to be made, he always hungered to be active, independent… it was eating him alive, to know he would die an invalid. So one night he decided he would not let that happen.” She shivered and lowered her eyes; a tear trembled on the pale lashes. “He didn’t even tell me,” she whispered. “I’d have thought he would have. But maybe he was afraid I would try to talk him out of it.”

“Would you have?” he asked softly.

She bit her Up for a moment. “I don’t know, Rhys. What hope could I give him? The Wasting has no cure. It’s a terrible death, especially for a youth who hated so much to have to sit still for anything. Still I would have… I would have thought he would want to talk to me first… I would have wanted to say good-bye, at least.”

She turned away, toward the Spears. The night was silent.

“You didn’t come with the mourners father sent,” she whispered. “I’d hoped you would.”

“I had duties.”

She nodded, accepting that. As much as she would have valued Rhys’ company when Andovan died, his standing as a royal bastard might have sent the wrong message had he been included in the formal Deathcall. Danton disdained his own bastards and did not want them having any illusions about royal inheritance, thus he did not encourage them to attend his court, as was done in some other places. If Rhys had come with the Lord Protector’s official mourners Danton might have deemed it an insult.

A short time later, however, and by himself, to pay a social call upon his half-sister—that was acceptable. Danton was probably relieved that someone else was taking on the burden of comforting her. Gods knew he was no good at it.

“So tell me news of home,” she begged. “Good news, please.”

A shadow passed over his face. She felt her own heart skip a beat. “Rhys?”

For a long while he was silent. Finally he said, “The signs are ominous. I would be lying if I told you otherwise. I am sorry.”

She straightened her back. She was a Protector’s daughter, and must meet such trials with resolute strength. “Father hinted at such,” she said quietly. “But he would not give me details.” She put a hand on his arm. “I know I can trust you to be honest with me, yes?”

His eyes met hers. How deep they were, how dark in the moonlight, glittering like ice on the surface but shadowed with black secrets behind that.
He is truly a Guardian now
, she thought. She watched him as he struggled with himself over which secrets to keep and which to reveal, weighing his various obligations one against the other. That, more than anything else, told her how terribly wrong things were.

“What would you say,” he asked finally, “if I told you I had touched a Spear?”

“I would say that if the Guardians deemed it necessary—”

“I don’t mean with the Guardians.” He placed his hands on her shoulders. “Alone, Gwyn. No Guardians to flank me, to lend me strength, no Magisters to steady my hand… nothing.”

She drew in a sharp breath. “That is… that is… not possible.”

“So we are taught,” he said quietly.

“When was this?”

“Early this spring. I was near to the edge of the forbidden lands, returning home, trusting to my horse to keep to the proper path. Animals are even more sensitive than we are to the power of the gods; he would not have turned northward without a spear prodding his flanks. Or so I thought. But at one point I looked up, and there in the distance I saw a black spire outlined against the horizon. He had brought me that close to a Spear, that I could see its shape clearly.” He paused, his expression grim. “Horses will not do that of their own volition, Gwyn. Not ever. They fear the Wrath even more than demons do, and we often have to leave them behind when we approach the Spears, lest they go mad from terror. But this time, the horse I rode did not even seem to be aware it was there… no more than he would be aware of any natural pinnacle of rock.

“That close to a Spear I should have been able to feel its presence, yet I could not. I should have been able to hear the screaming that emanates from the root of it, where the earth lies scarred from its terrible wound… I should have instinctively felt the urge to flee at any cost, and had to fight that urge with all my strength even to gaze upon the thing. But it was not so this time. So perhaps, I told myself, my first impression was mistaken. Perhaps this was not a Spear after all, but some natural monument in the same form. That was a simple explanation, and a far preferable one to my mind.

“I turned my horse toward this oddity of nature, determined to examine it. Yet as we came closer I began to feel what I had expected, the touch of the gods upon my spirit… only weaker than it usually was. Weaker than it should have been.