Lord of Snow and Shadows (43 page)

“He is.”

“Let him speak for himself.”

“You promised me I could speak with my mother.” Gavril was in no mood to bandy words. “I want proof she is alive.”

“Not until Kazimir has identified himself.”

Gavril glanced at the doctor. “Speak to them. And be quick.”

Jushko pushed Kazimir forward.

“I—I am Altan Kazimir. All is in order.”

There was no reply. Gavril saw Kazimir nervously wipe his hand across his glistening brow.

“Very well,”
came the reply at last.

“Gavril.”
It was a woman’s voice, speaking the Smarnan tongue.
“Gavril, is it you?”

Gavril’s heart had begun to race at the sound of the distant voice. “Mother?” he said hesitantly.

“Gavril—I’m so, so sorry.”
It
was
her, he knew it, in spite of the crackling and distortion.

“Are they treating you well?”

“Believe me, dear Gavril—”
Elysia’s words were breaking up.
“I never intended this to—”

“Are you all right, Mother?” Gavril cried, clutching the glass case. “Tell me you’re all right!”

There was no reply.

“Mother!” he shouted into the glittering crystal.

“If you wish to see your mother alive, my lord, you will submit to Doctor Kazimir’s treatment.”
The man’s voice, infuriatingly calm, came through again.
“He will inform us by this device when it has taken effect. Then—and only then—will we enter into any negotiations as to the precise conditions relating to the release of your mother.”

“I want assurances that she is well,” Gavril said, his voice rough with despair. “I want to speak with her again.”

There was a pause.

“Stand by for further instructions.”

The voice ceased abruptly, and the low hum died away.

Suppose he lost all control of himself and attacked the main Tielen army? Gavril clenched his fists, willing the thought away. Nails, sharp as chips of lapis, dug into his palms. By the time he had come back to his senses, Elysia would be dead. The thought chilled him to the depths of his soul.

“My lord?”

“Don’t know—how long I can control—myself—” Slowly he felt the darkness recede. With a grimace of pain, he unclenched his fists and saw the deep lacerations he had inflicted, saw the blood well up, smearing his palms with its unnatural hue of purple-blue.

There was only one way to make sure it never happened.

“Doctor, I want you to set up your apparatus in the Kalika Tower. If you need anything, fresh water, fire, my servants will supply you. Jushko, see to it.”

Jushko hesitated, then relented.

“As you command, Lord Drakhaon.”

“We’ll review our plans in the morning. Meet me at dawn, in Kostya’s room.”

Gavril dreams:

He is standing on the roof of the Kalika Tower.

Dark mist drifts behind him, rolling in over the mountains, soft, silent, stifling, until the land beneath is obscured. There are particles of darkness in the mist, glittering like powdered crystal as they fall on Gavril’s upturned face.

Dust of dead stars . . .

Suddenly the sky is filled with wings.

Sparkling, spangled wings, luminescent, veins pulsing with jeweled fire, daemon-creatures dart and dive about him, fanning his face with their searing breath.

He opens his mouth to cry out in wonder—but the rush of air, the beat of the great wings muffles his voice and he is rising, rising into the sky—

He is flying.

Now the kastel is so far below it seems no more than an insignificant pebble on a barren shore. He circles above his home, the wind keen as ice on his skin. The others are turning, wheeling away toward the distant horizon, already far, so far away.

“Wait—wait for me—”

He wants to go with them. But some force is pulling him back down toward the kastel below, sucking him back into a whirling vortex of dark mist . . .

He woke to a gray dawn—and an ache of emptiness that he could not understand—that he had been left behind. Marooned.

Abandoned.

“You promised me news of Lilias, Lord Drakhaon.”

Gavril saw Jaromir standing over his bed, watching him.

“How did you—” Gavril’s mind still whirled with the rush of air, the throbbing heartbeat of wings.

Jaromir gestured briefly toward the tapestry that concealed the door to the deserted East Wing. “I thought it better your
druzhina
didn’t see me. After all, they still believe you killed me up on the mountain,” he added with a wry, twisted smile.

Jaromir Arkhel.
Gavril gazed at the man Eugene of Tielen had elected to depose him, trying to quell the simmering bitterness in his heart.

“What time is it?” He had fallen asleep in his traveling clothes. Servants must have come in to light the fire, but no one had woken him.

“About seven in the morning.”

“Seven already?” Gavril went over to the washbasin and poured in water, plunging his face into the bowl, coming up dripping, gasping at the icy shock of the cold. He had to test Jaromir. “Jaromir, Azhkendir is under attack.” He made a play of fumbling for a towel, closely watching Jaromir’s reactions. “Eugene of Tielen has launched an invasion across the ice.”

“Eugene?”

A look of anguished concern passed across Jaromir’s face.

“No, no,” Gavril heard Jaromir mutter, almost to himself, “surely he wouldn’t venture so much just for my sake, surely not . . .”

“For your sake?”

If Jaromir was play-acting, then he was extraordinarily gifted.

“Eugene has been my mentor, my protector, my friend, ever since Yephimy smuggled me out of Azhkendir. I have spent the last years in Tielen at his court. I—I owe him everything.”

“And yet this man is holding my mother hostage.” Gavril was unable to hide the rawness of betrayal in his voice. “My mother, Jaromir.”

Jaromir looked blankly at him.

“Lilias has some kind of voice transference device in her rooms.”

“One of Linnaius’ inventions? The Vox Aethyria?”

Gavril shrugged. “All I know is that a disembodied voice has been telling me that my mother is Eugene’s prisoner and will be executed unless I do exactly as I am instructed.”

“And the instructions?”

“Read this.” Gavril thrust Eugene’s letter into Jaromir’s hand. “I am ordered to submit myself to the disabling effects of Doctor Kazimir’s elixir. And hand over the governing of Azhkendir to you.”

Jaromir looked up from the paper, his eyes clouded.

“That was Eugene’s original intention, yes, for me to replace Volkh. But that was before he—or I—was aware you were alive.”

Gavril said nothing.

Jaromir moved closer to him.

“You’ve got to believe me, Gavril,” he said, his voice low and urgent. “Yes, I knew about the Vox Aethyria. But this invasion plan, the threats to your mother, this is all news to me.”

Anger began to smolder in Gavril’s mind, dark as distant smoke.

“You should never have come back,” he said quietly. “If there’s to be a game of hostages, then you’re in grave danger.”

“So you’d use me to bargain for your mother’s life?” Jaromir said with bitter amusement.

“I’d rather have you as my ally, believe me, Jaro. But if you mean so much to Eugene—”

“I came to plead for Lilias and my son.” Jaromir gave a dry little laugh. “And I find myself a hostage.”

Gavril gazed at him, torn between his fear for Elysia and his reluctance to betray the enemy who had become his friend. He would be no better than the Tielens if he stooped to the same tactic of threat-making and hostage-taking.

“There has to be another way,” he said. “Wait for me here. I won’t be long.”

The acrid smell of Sosia’s steeping wound-herbs made Gavril’s eyes sting as he entered Kostya’s sickroom.

“Kostya,” Gavril said, leaning close to the old soldier’s pillow. “I need your advice.”

“What?” Kostya jerked awake. A hint of a smile curled his lips. “And when did my lord ever need to consult old Kostya about anything?”

“We’re at war,” Gavril said. “Eugene of Tielen has invaded us from the west.”

“War, eh?” A wolfish gleam lit Kostya’s eyes, and he struggled to sit up. Gavril leaned forward to help him, plumping pillows at his back.

“They’ve taken my mother hostage. They say they’ll kill her if we retaliate.” Gavril tried to keep the rising sense of desperation from his voice. “What do I
do,
Kostya?”

Jushko appeared in the doorway.

“Map, Jushko!” ordered Kostya with a spark of his old vitality.

Jushko unrolled a painted leather map on the bedclothes.

“They’re coming across the ice here.” He traced the route with a chipped and grimy fingernail. “And making for Muscobar.”

Kostya forced himself up, irritably shaking off Jushko’s hand when he tried to help him. For a while he stared at the map, tunelessly humming under his breath.

“Well?” Gavril said, unable to control the growing tension any longer.

Kostya turned to him. He was smiling again, a cruel, triumphant smile.

“Eugene’s scared of you, lad.”

“Scared? Of me?” Gavril echoed incredulously. “Of one man?”

“Why else take your mother hostage?” Kostya gave a dry chuckle that degenerated into a wracking cough. Jushko eased him back onto the pillows and gave him a sip of water.

“So my hands are tied,” Gavril said, choked with frustration, “and I must stand by and watch Eugene capture Azhkendir—then Muscobar?” And he had hoped—against hope—that Kostya would have devised some plan, some subtle military strategy to rescue Elysia.

“Did I say that?” Kostya rasped. “You must use his fear of you—and what you might do—against him.”

“But at the slightest sign of retaliation, he says he’ll have her killed.”

“There are other ways to retaliate.” The same cruel glint still lit Kostya’s fever-dry eyes. “While he and his armies are away from Tielen, who is keeping his palace and his family safe?”

Gavril stared at him.

“Surely he’ll have left his home well-guarded. Surely . . .” And then as the implications of Kostya’s words began to make sense, he fell silent, thinking, calculating.

There might yet be a way . . .

“Jushko, I want the Tielens shadowed all the way through Azhkendir.” Kostya was giving his orders. “I want reports of their movements at all hours of the day and night.”

“Bogatyr!” Jushko saluted with alacrity.

“Warn them—keep out of sight at all times. We have the advantage here; we know the terrain. These Tielen boys’re going to have a hard and dangerous climb through the southern ranges before they come down into Muscobar.”

“And Lilias Arbelian?” Gavril interrupted.

“We’re still looking,” Jushko said defensively.

“I want more search parties out there,” Gavril said. “I want Lilias Arbelian. See to it, Jushko.”

“And Jushko,” Kostya added, “pass me down my crossbow.”

Jushko glanced questioningly at the old warrior, but Kostya gave him such a furious glare that he went to the wall and took down the weapon from where it hung.

“Don’t forget the bolts,” Kostya said, running his hand lovingly along the shaft of the crossbow. “If the Tielens attack, I want to be ready for ’em.”

“You took your time!” Jaromir leapt up as Gavril came back into his bedchamber.

“There’s no news. They’re still searching for her.”

“Listen, Gavril.” Jaromir put his hand on Gavril’s shoulder, his touch warm, reassuring. “All I want is Lilias and the child.”

“Even though she fled, leaving you to the mercy of my
druzhina
?”

“She used me. I see that now. But she’s also the mother of my son. My heir.”

“And Eugene’s plans for Azhkendir?”

Gavril saw Jaromir shiver. “Azhkendir has too many ghosts. If I could take them away with me, far from here, if we could start a new life together in some distant country, Francia, maybe, or Allemande, where no one knew or cared about Arkhels or Nagarians—”

“You want me to pardon her?”

“If you don’t, your
druzhina
will pursue us wherever we go, and the bloodfeud will never be over.”

Gavril gazed at Jaromir, wondering how he could still feel so strongly for treacherous Lilias. Surely he deserved better.

“You know I’d do anything to ensure your safety,” he said. “I owe you my life. But Lilias . . .”

“Just find her, Gavril. Then I’ll go speak to Eugene. I can make him release your mother. He will do anything for me.”

Gavril nodded, wanting to believe Jaromir—yet doubting that Eugene’s imperial ambitions could be swayed by the pleas of one man.

“Lord Drakhaon!”

Jaromir glanced round uneasily as there came a rap at the door.

“Wait!” Gavril called out. What new complication could it be this time? He turned back to Jaromir. “It’s not safe for you in Kastel Drakhaon. Go back to the monastery. I’ll get word to you when—”

Jaromir shook his head. “I want to be here for her. I’ll be in the East Wing if you need me. I’ve hidden there enough times before.” He slipped beneath the gilded tapestry, and Gavril heard the concealed door click shut behind him just as his own door opened and one of the
druzhina
marched in.

“Did I give you permission to enter?” Gavril turned on him, his heart beating overfast. A few seconds sooner and Jaromir would have been discovered. . . .

“Sorry, my lord.” Beneath the overlarge helmet, Gavril saw the face of the youngest of the
druzhina,
Semyon, freckled cheeks flushed red with mortification.

“What is so urgent that you have to enter without permission?”

“Doctor Kazimir sends his compliments, Lord Drakhaon. He’s ready for you in the Kalika Tower.”

The fugitives huddled around the meager fire in the brazier, rubbing their frozen fingers together over the blaze.

“How long are we to keep skulking here in this hovel?” Lilias demanded. She was cradling a fretful Artamon—but not too close, as he was badly in need of a bath and clean clothes.