First Rider's Call (37 page)

For Zachary to forcefully bring D’Ivary to justice was to chance turning most of the lord-governors against him. Some would stand true to him no matter what, but there were too many new bloods; too new to know precisely where they stood, or how far they’d go to support their king, and a king was only as strong as the support of his vassals.

Yet Zachary could not let D’Ivary off unchallenged and unpunished. This would not only signal to the lord-governors they had free rein to do as they wished within the boundaries of their provinces, but it would seriously undermine the king’s authority and credibility.

There were a few lord-governors, Laren knew, who would not mind a weaker monarch, or a completely different monarch altogether.

The parameters of the problem were enough to make Laren’s head throb, and she knew it must gnaw at Zachary. When he had first heard the news of what had happened to the refugees, he’d called in General Harborough, ready to storm D’Ivary Province with the entire army at his back. Fortunately, Sperren, Colin Dovekey, and the general had been able to bring him around to consider less drastic measures.

Just what those measures might be preoccupied Zachary to the point it diverted his attention from other important matters. The politics of the situation frustrated him; throttled his ability to mete out justice as he wished.

The king and his party left the carpeted west wing, and entered more utilitarian corridors, their boots ringing on flagstones. Servants and other folk bowed out of the king’s way.

“Rider Ty Newland has returned from Adolind and Mirwell,” Laren told him.

“Yes?”

Their rapport had suffered ever since her misreading of D’Ivary. Zachary remained curt with her, and did not consult her at all during audiences or meetings, despite the fact her ability had been behaving of late. Mostly, anyway. It was as though he had lost all faith in
her,
not just her ability. Nothing could have saddened her more, for they had always been close.

“He says Lord-Governor Adolind is very pleased with the arrival of northern refugees. He says Adolind is experiencing what looks to be a bumper harvest this year, one like they’ve never seen, and they need all the help with it they can get.”

The news brightened Zachary. “That is certainly good to hear. Adolind usually suffers through the winter for lack of stores. And it sounds like the refugees have found much more of a welcome there.”

Laren nodded, pleased by Zachary’s positive response. “In addition, Ty brought a message from Beryl Spencer.”

Beryl Spencer was a Green Rider who, like Lynx, did not run message errands. Her special ability to assume a role, her ability to
deceive,
was much too useful to confine her to ordinary messenger duties. No, Zachary had other, more secret uses for her ability. Portraying a major of the Mirwellian militia, she had played no small role in the demise of the old lord-governor, and now kept watch on his son.

From an inner pocket of her shortcoat, Laren withdrew an envelope sealed with the emblem of Mirwell Province, a war hammer crushing a mountain.

The king actually halted to read it. His attendants and Weapons came to a stop a split second behind him, the Weapons arraying themselves all around him in a watchful attitude.

“Hmm. It appears Adolind’s good fortune has not reached Mirwell. Crops are withering in the soil.” He looked up from the message to Laren. “How can that be? They’re in the same region.”

Laren shrugged, just as surprised as he.

He read on, raising his eyebrows in disbelief. When he finished, he passed the message back to her. As she read it, she saw how peculiar the failure of crops was in Mirwell—the weather had been superb for growing, and there was no sign of widespread disease or pestilence. Mirwell should be having a fine harvest to look forward to.

As she read on, she came across the section that had raised the king’s eyebrows:

Laren looked up incredulously. “A fire-breathing snapping turtle?” If this hadn’t been Beryl—serious, pragmatic Beryl—she would’ve believed someone was pulling her leg.

“Read on,” Zachary said.

Laren did. Apparently there were other odd goings on in Mirwell. Young apples, for instance, had turned to lead and snapped the limbs of trees they were growing on. Beryl, not an eyewitness to these other occurrences, could not verify the words of the folk who came to the lord-governor to tell their stories. Beryl did add that there was much apprehensive talk among the common folk about all the strange events.
Undoubtedly it gets exaggerated with each telling,
she wrote,
making it all the more incredible.

When it was clear Laren had finished reading, Zachary strode off.

When she caught up with him again, he asked, “What do you think?”

“I think none of it is a coincidence. There is too much of it going on.”

“Like a stone deer in Wayman.”

“Yes.” She considered telling him about Karigan’s adventures in the abandoned corridors then and there, and confiding to him the extent of her own troubles with her ability, but they turned into a more crowded corridor and she hesitated. They’d be at the throne room within moments, and it wasn’t the sort of story you told quickly. Plus, she didn’t want anyone to overhear it. She decided she’d wait until after the public audience when she might get some time alone with him.

“I don’t know what we can do about it,” Zachary said. “We don’t even know why it’s happening.”

“I—” she began hesitantly. “I believe something has gone awry with magic. The nature of magic.”

Zachary cast her a questioning glance, but by now they had reached his “secret” side entrance to the throne room. He paused before passing through the door held open for him by a servant.

“We will talk more about this later,” he said.

She nodded, more relieved than ever that finally he’d devote some thought to the problem, and maybe during the process, the rift between them would mend, too.

 

The audience proved to be as crowded as usual, with the typical kinds of supplicants. There was, however, an unusual buzz in the air, some layer of anxiety among the people, and it put Laren on edge. The scuffing of hundreds of feet on the floor, the whispers and murmurs among those waiting in line, and the heat and reek of all those bodies grated on her, began to make her head ache.

False,
her ability told her.

She groaned inwardly. It was happening again.

She tried to pull up her barriers, but they were so flimsy they would not stay in place. Her ability pronounced judgment on anyone and anything at random, often contradicting itself.

“I seek the king’s blessing on the marriage of my daughter,” a man was saying.

Zachary smiled. “You do not need the king’s blessing.”

“But it would mean so much to us—she is our only daughter, and it is a special event.”

Laren must have made some audible noise of irritation, for Zachary glanced at her. “Captain?”

She gritted her teeth, and waved him off, a rather disrespectful breach of etiquette, but she couldn’t focus well enough to explain.

Zachary flashed her a perplexed look, finished with the man, and turned to the next supplicant in line, a woman who fretted at her handkerchief.

“My husband,” she began, “he has—he has lost his good sense.”

“How so?” Zachary asked.

“It began with the rainbows,” she said.

“Rainbows?” Colin Dovekey sputtered.

“Yes, sir. Twenty-five, at last count, crossing our land.”

“I find that a bit incredible,” Colin said.

“We counted them twice,” the woman assured him. “They arched over one another. Some were triple-arched.”

Laren growled, and Zachary flicked another glance at her.

“It was the most amazing and beautiful sight,” the woman said. “We just stood in wonder gazing at it. Our neighbors and the townsfolk came to see it. Some said it was a miracle of the gods. My husband took it to mean
he
was the chosen one of the gods.”

Zachary appeared to be at a loss for words, but Colin was not. “Er, what is it you’ve come to ask of the king?”

“Stop!” Much to Laren’s embarrassment, her voice had rung out loud enough for anyone nearby to hear. “Sorry,” she told the king. Her neck muscles were so taut her dull headache was turning into a maelstrom that made her ears ring.

The woman began to answer Colin’s question, explaining how the rainbows appeared every day in different configurations, and how the folk who traveled from miles around came to pay her husband their respects.

“They leave currency, food, flowers—whatever little they own. My husband has become unbearable to live with. What I ask of my king is—is to stop the rainbows.”

“Stop the—?” Zachary said in astonishment.

Laren would have liked to have heard his response, but shutting off her ability took all her concentration. The clamor of the throne room—the voices and shifting feet—grew more pronounced. The pain in her head enclosed her in an opaque haze, separating her from everyone else.

The endless stream of her special ability’s declarations burst her barriers and rushed into her mind like flood waters, and then all she knew was white noise and drowning.

In the days following the captain’s collapse, Karigan found herself up to her elbows in paperwork. With the captain out of commission and Connly still absent, Mara had assumed the captain’s duties, running off to one meeting after another, and attending the king.

Karigan ended up with Mara’s old duties, with other Riders pitching in when they could. Fortunately, her time spent working with her father scheduling merchant trains, inventorying stores, handling payroll, and tallying the books served her well, though she had to work somewhat from scratch. All the most recent records were stored in Captain Mapstone’s quarters, and the captain would admit no one, not even Master Mender Destarion.

Karigan did have to admit, one late night as she pored over sheets of paper spread out on the table in the common room of Rider barracks, that some things in the messenger service were more difficult to deal with than in the world of commerce. For instance, her father’s wagon trains traveled fairly standard routes, depending on the season, and stopped at the same fairs annually. It was all very predictable.

The messenger service was not. There was no telling when the king might need to send a message, or where the message must be delivered. It could be the next town over, or over the Wingsong Mountains to the coast of the Eastern Sea. The challenge was scheduling available Riders in such a way so as to be prepared for either contingency.

Sometimes there just weren’t enough Riders available, which meant Karigan must prevail upon the light cavalry to fill in. And they felt such work beneath them.

Karigan rubbed her bleary eyes, fighting off a yawn. It was getting to a point where the words on the papers were turning into squiggles she could make no sense of. Trying to figure out what needed to be done to keep the Riders functioning at least kept her mind off ghosts and floating mirrors. In fact, those things seemed far off, and far-fetched. Fairy tale-like. She had more immediate and
real
concerns to deal with.

The door to Rider barracks creaked open, admitting a rush of fresh, late summer air. The scent of dew on green growing things revived Karigan somewhat. She guessed it could only be Mara wandering in at so late an hour. What hour was it anyway? She had lost track of the time long ago.

Mara, as Karigan had guessed, entered the common room, looking as weary as Karigan felt. “Good thing there was a new shipment of whale oil today,” she said, eyeing the two lamps Karigan used to illuminate her work. Mara stretched her hands high above her head and there was a distinct popping of joints. With a sigh of relief, she flopped into an armchair.