Limits of Power (3 page)

Out of the corner of his eye, he saw movement near the door and turned to look. Two servants came in with one of the net-covered frames used to move the injured and lifted Tolmaric's body onto it. “Don't move him until I am with the Council,” he said. “They should hear it first, not see it. And the elves will need enough for these—” He pointed to the other bodies. Then he went to the door, where the Kuakgan had been waiting, and stepped into the hall.

“Do you blame us?” the Kuakgan asked, speaking softly. For the moment, Kieri could not think of his name.

“For what?” Kieri asked. He could think of nothing the Kuakkgani had done that day worth blame.

“It was our song to the One Tree, they say, that began the Severance and the evil that followed, when some elves rebelled against the Singer and chose destruction.”

Kieri huffed. “The Severance happened long ago, and your responsibility lies with your own acts. Today you did us more than one good service. I am not angry with you, nor do I blame you. But I would ask what you can add to my knowledge of these iynisin, as the elves call them.”

“The kuaknomi have some powers beyond ours,” the Kuakgan said. “We depend on the bond of kinship with trees and the taig and can do no more than kinship allows. The kuaknomi draw their power from hatred—from Gitres Unmaker.”

Kieri had heard the iynisin called kuaknomi before, in Tsaia. “Did you know what it was without seeing it?”

“Oh, yes. We feel the taig all the time, you see, as elves do, and the trees felt their most dire enemy near.”

“I thought fire was their worst enemy—or the scathefire at least.”

“Fire is the nature of dragons and their young,” the Kuakgan said. “The young do not burn out of malice, but joy. Kuaknomi, though, hate trees especially and delight in tormenting them.” The Kuakgan paused, looking past Kieri around the room. “Kuaknomi blood is corrosive to living things and to things that were alive. See where the carpet is blackening as with fire? And your wounded—if such blood touches an open wound, that is very bad. Do your physicians know about the dangers—?”

“I doubt it,” Kieri said.

“You and others have much blood on you—some of it kuaknomi by the smell. If you are wounded even slightly, you need treatment now.”

“I'm not,” Kieri said. A bruised shoulder was not a wound. “Can you help my physicians with the wounded?”

“We will try,” the Kuakgan said. “I will call the others. We were going to ask if we could visit the ossuary and the bones of your ancestors, but this is more urgent.”

“The ossuary? That seems a strange desire for those who live in groves,” Kieri said.

“It may seem strange, but to us…” The Kuakgan paused, frowning. “I am not sure I can explain it. When we find bones in the forest, they … they tell us things. Not only how the animal died but who has passed. I felt an urge to visit your ossuary.”

Kieri thought suddenly of the connection he'd discovered between the ossuary and the King's Grove mound. His face must have shown something, because the Kuakgan's gaze sharpened and he said, “What is it, Lyonya's king?”

“We must talk,” Kieri said. “But first I must speak to my Council. Please help with the wounded, as you can, and I will talk to you later.”

The Kuakgan was silent and motionless a long moment, then he nodded, his eyes bright beneath his hood. “I have called the others; we will do what we can.”

Kieri turned and went down the passage to speak to his Council. The mumble of conversation stopped when he entered the room; the men and women all turned to look at him.

“My lord king! You're hurt!” That was Sier Halveric, just a beat ahead of the rest.

“No,” Kieri said. “It's not my blood.” Most looked scared, startled, shocked. Across the room, Aliam Halveric's brows went up; the glance between them conveyed the years of comradeship and shared experience in war. “Sit down, please,” Kieri said. He felt the postbattle letdown even more now, but they needed his steady confidence, as they had needed it before he rode away to war. He hoped that this time they would respond better. He waited until they were seated and silent. Amrothlin came in just then, his expression strained, followed by another elf. Kieri waved them to their seats as well.

He began with a terse recital of events leading to his confrontation with Sier Tolmaric.

“Then it's true you know what the poison was?” Sier Davonin, of course. Women losing their children would interest her more than a fight in his office, however bloody.

“Yes,” Kieri said. “And there's no more danger of contaminated food here. But let me go on—what comes is as important.” He told it in order, ignoring all signs that someone wanted to ask a question. “The queen and I are alive, unharmed,” he said as he finished. “Lord Amrothlin—” He nodded to Amrothlin. “—as you know, is the Lady's son. He has told me that the elvenhome is no more. He and I will discuss later what this means for Lyonya, for the remaining elves, and for us, who have long been partners here. I counsel you all to be vigilant. If you have doubts of something you see, tell a palace official or a servant. I must go to the salle, where the bodies are laid for the night. Those who wish may pay respects later.” With a short bow, he left them and headed for the salle.

In the passage near the salle, he met Sier Tolmaric's wife, escorted by one of Arian's Squires. Lady Tolmaric's face, normally pale, was blotched with crying, her graying red hair loosening from its braid.

“My lady,” Kieri began, but she burst into more tears before he could offer any comfort. He knew it had been her first visit to Chaya—she had not come for the coronation—and he had seen her wide-eyed joy in the splendor of the court and her shyness around other Siers' wives. Now she was bereft here in this strange place with strangers all around and no husband to guide her.

She sobbed out her misery, her fears, her certainty that nothing would ever come right. “The children—they'll starve—who'll take the land? And the farms—what will I do? Salvon knew it all; he worked so hard for us—”

“My lady, listen to me,” Kieri said when the fit seemed like to go on another turn of the glass. “Your children will
not
go hungry, nor your house be taken away … I promise you, as I promised him—”

“Do you…” A gulp and cough interrupted that. “Do you really mean … you'll help?”

“Yes,” Kieri said. “A king keeps his promises, and I have promised. Before a witness here—” He glanced at Arian's Squire, who spoke up on cue.

“I witness the king's promise,” she said. “Now, Lady Tolmaric—”

“You should not go in yet,” Kieri said. “It would distress you—and where are the children?” He knew that one son and two daughters had come, as wide-eyed and shy as their mother.

“At—at the house. This—this lady, this Squire said the queen had sent word, so I would not hear it from gossip, but I do not listen to gossip, sir king, truly I don't. And she said I should wait, but I could not, I must come, he was my husband. Oh—” She broke into sobs again. “Oh, what will I do?”

“You will listen to me,” Kieri said with more force. Her mouth opened, and she stared but was quiet. “Listen carefully now. A dangerous being killed him, and the killing defaced him. What was done to his body was evil. You should not go in now but wait until those whose business it is have sewn him into a shroud for burial.”

“But I must see his face one more time—must kiss his hands, his feet—”

“No, you must not. Remember his face as it was. Hold that memory and do not degrade it with how he now appears.”

Her eyes were wide, fixed on his. “But … it is what a wife should do … it is what his mother did when his father died. What my mother did…”

“Yes, if his death was natural. This is not. Trust me, your king, to know what is best. You will have enough distress when you see him in the shroud, for the evil that was done distorted what was left. You must not remember him as he is now.”

“Then what—how long—?”

“Your children need you. Do you have servants in the house where you are?”

“N-no. It is not our house; we paid to use one for three hands of days. No need for servants; I can cook as well as any.”

“Yes, but you should not be alone now.” He sent the Squire to arrange an escort and someone to stay with Lady Tolmaric for a day or so. As soon as Lady Tolmaric and the two servants headed back to her rented house, Kieri went on to the salle.

T
here he found Arian with her father's body. Dameroth's bloody clothes had been removed, his body washed and clothed in white. Arian sat on a low stool, one hand on his forehead. As Kieri walked toward her, she looked up but did not speak. One of his Squires fetched a stool for him, and he sat beside her.

Arian crooned some tune he did not know, but he could feel power being used. She reached her other hand out to him, and he took it. He glanced around. The other dead elf, the one he did not know, had also been dressed in a white robe. Elves were still working over the Lady's body, wrapping her in silvery lace with fresh flowers woven through it.

Arian's song stopped. He glanced at her. “I knew him so little,” she said. “When he quit coming … the years passed, and I was busy, and then my mother died. I did not even know all of his name or all of mine. Or why I was not told before. He said he would tell me later.”

“I'm sorry,” Kieri said. He could think of nothing else to say.

“At least I had him when I did. More than you had of your parents.” She drew a deep breath and faced him squarely. “I sent one of my Squires to Lady Tolmaric, when I found she was not in the palace.”

“That was well done,” Kieri said. Tolmaric's contorted form, now sewn into a shroud, lay against one wall of the salle. “She wanted to see him. I convinced her to go back and sent servants with her as well.”

“What will you do for her?”

“Find out if they have a good steward, and if not, find her one. Make sure she has land to plant.”

Arian was looking at her father's face again. “I cannot believe he is utterly gone, that there is no place for their spirit to dwell. They are so alive when they are alive—”

“We are not like you, lady,” Amrothlin said. Kieri had not heard him come in. Amrothlin looked at Kieri. “It is time to return them.”

“At night? Will you not wait until dawn?”

“No. In our custom, as soon as it may be, it must be. For the sorrow of their violent deaths, we clothe in white, but still it must be swift, the return to the taig. And—lord king—I know I said yes when you suggested they be laid on the mound in the King's Grove, but—but that is not right.”

Kieri's memory of Midwinter night came to him again. “You fear what is below,” he said.

“She deserves better,” Amrothlin said, not answering directly. “If not the high mountain she loved, then a glade she loved almost as well. Two days' journey, carrying her without the aid of the elvenhome, and a day and night of singing, and two days' return. I swear to you, lord king, I will return here in five days, six at the most, if you permit.”

Kieri nodded. He had many questions for Amrothlin, but this was not the time to press them. “What of the others?” he asked.

“We would take them there as well, but if the queen wishes—if the king wishes—the queen's father could be laid straight nearer.”

Arian shook her head. “My father died trying to save the Lady's life; he should lie where she lies.”

Amrothlin bowed deeply. “Arian daughter of Dameroth, you are a daughter of the taig as well. I thank you. Forgive me for my earlier discourtesy.”

Arian nodded without answering, stroked her father's face one more time, and folded her hands in her lap.

“Very well,” Kieri said. “Know that you take my sorrow as companion—for the Lady's death and for the deaths of these others. Will you at least tell me the name of this one?” He gestured to the other elf. “I want to honor them properly when I tell of this day.”

“Silwarthin,” Amrothlin said. “I have known him since my own childhood.”

“I am sorry,” Kieri said. He could not think of more to say that would not diminish the moment.

He and Arian rose and moved back as more elves came into the salle carrying frames of branch and vine. Though Amrothlin said the elvenhome had passed away, a similar silvery light brightened around them as they lifted the bodies onto these biers and then the biers onto their shoulders. Four each carried Dameroth and Silwarthin, and eight carried the Lady, with more elves before and behind. Kieri and Arian followed this procession out of the salle and across the palace courtyard to the gates and there halted, seeing the glow of it vanish into the trees across the way.

Now only Tolmaric's body remained in the salle, a single King's Squire keeping watch. “Now,” Arian said, facing him, “you will take off that mail and let us see if indeed you have no wound.”