Oracle: The House War: Book Six (61 page)

“More or less unhappy than the Lord of the Compact?” She knew, by Duvari’s tone, that no one would hear either his words or her own.

“Significantly less.”

She glanced at him, surprised.

“I am ill-pleased with the
Ellariannatte
and their sudden incursion into the heart of my responsibility. You must have expected that.”

“If I had thought they would grow—like this—for me, I would have. But Duvari—I am not The Terafin. I am not the forest’s lord.”

“No. If I understand what has occurred, you are guard and guardian. But you are also one of mine, Birgide. You understand the responsibilities of the
Astari
. You owe loyalty to the Kings. And at the moment, you can see what none save perhaps Meralonne APhaniel and The Terafin herself can see: the demons. I would keep you in
Avantari
for the foreseeable future—but it is my suspicion that my decision would meet with some resistance.

“Therefore, serve. I will require your presence within
Avantari
on specific days and at specific times, which will be made clear to you in future.” He glanced at her and added, “I would advise you to avoid the man who now calls himself Haval Arwood, if at all possible.”

“Why?”

“It is very easy to forget that he is a dangerous man. In part this is because he does not wish to be one. I would however say that he is far more of a danger than the demons who have infiltrated Terafin in the past. If, however, he does approach, do not attempt to harm him. You may give him a verbal message.”

“And that?”

“Tell him that, for the moment, I agree.”

She did not ask what the subject of agreement was, because she did not want to know.

“I believe we are to return to the Hall of Wise Counsel. Do you understand what is to occur there?”

“No. I assumed you wished my presence to ascertain that the Hall itself was secure.”

“The Hall—and one other—is secure. If demons arrive in
Avantari
, they will not enter the Hall of Wise Counsel. Nor, should they be foolish enough to flee there, will they leave it.”

 • • • 

The Exalted resumed their seats, the Kings their thrones. Duvari chose to stand—as was his right—between the two thrones, three steps back. The Kings, of course, noted this. The Exalted did. No one spoke against his presence.

Birgide knelt.

This time, the Exalted of Cormaris bid her rise. “It has been brought to our attention that you have been in combat recently, within
Avantari
.”

Birgide nodded.

“The nature of your opponent was demonic.”

“Yes.”

“The demon occupied a position of both trust and responsibility. He worked undetected by his closest companions. Yet you were aware of his nature instantly. We are informed that you are a member of the Order of Knowledge in good standing, but you are not, yourself, mage-born. This would be correct?” He added, looking to Sigurne.

“Birgide Viranyi is a member of the Order of Knowledge. As all members are, she has been extensively tested for signs of mage-born talent; she has evinced none. She is, however, better known in the Western Kingdoms than those who have that talent, and she has increased the visibility of my Order—and the respect in which it is held.”

Birgide was surprised, but said nothing. Sigurne was the guildmaster, but it had never appeared to Birgide that she had any interest in those who were not mages. She clearly had enough interest to at least take note of those who were externally respected.

“Thank you, Guildmaster.” The Exalted of Cormaris turned, once again, to Birgide. “My father wishes to speak with you now.”

Birgide did not ask if she had the right of refusal. In theory, she did. Theory was always tenuous in politics, and given the presence of the
Ellariannatte
, she chose not to assert that right. She was, however, nervous. Although it was common knowledge that the god-born could bespeak their parents, she had never witnessed it personally. “I would be honored.”

 • • • 

Braziers were lit.

The white smoke of burning incense filled the room. Instead of rising, as smoke generally did, it wafted toward the ground from the height of braziers set up in several places on brass tripods. Priests attended to the burning; the Exalted remained on their thrones. The Kings, however, rose.

To Birgide’s surprise, the smoke impacted the visibility of dense strands of colored light; they thinned as she watched. This meant, she thought, that the transition to the Between was a more literal transition than she had previously assumed. Then again, while men and women of power might speak—with care—of the results of such a transition, they seldom described it.

In one day, Birgide had seen—and fought—demons. She had seen Duvari injured—something that had literally never occurred during her training—or anyone’s, to her knowledge. She had planted
Ellariannatte
in the grounds of
Avantari
, and they had not only taken root there, but had instantly grown.

Their presence implied much about the nature of the forest behind the Terafin manse, and to underscore this, the Guildmaster of the Makers had come, and he had gathered leaves and retreated with them. Any of this might have led to the interview with a god, but she suspected that it was only the latter that mattered.

She could no longer see her own feet. Since she was relatively certain they were still attached, she was not concerned. But she could no longer hear the forest, either—and only in the silence of this gray, other world did she realize that she could, in fact, hear it constantly, no matter where she stood.

She was surprised to see the mists roll over Duvari; surprised as well to see Sigurne Mellifas fade from view. Even the Kings had absented themselves from this meeting; only the Exalted remained. In the thick, formless mists of the Between they seemed larger than life, the golden light emanating from their eyes a fire which, left to burn, shortened mortal lives.

And the god-born were mortal.

Emboldened by the lack of the three men who ruled her life, Birgide said, “Why am I here, Exalted?” She directed her question to the Mother’s Daughter, although it was the Exalted of Cormaris who had demanded her attendance.

“Do you not know?” was the quiet reply. “In all the years that my temple has resided upon the Isle, there have been none who have chosen the responsibilities that you have, perhaps in ignorance, undertaken.”

“No,” Birgide replied. “In the life of the Isle, I do not think the forests of Terafin existed.”

“They existed. But we were not able to walk them until very recently. I understand that you do not feel they are a threat.” The comment made clear that the Mother’s Daughter did.

“In what way are they now considered a danger, Exalted?”

“Ask that question again after the guildmaster has returned to your side. And be careful when you treat with him; he has long been obsessed with a single quest, and in you, he believes he might—at last—achieve it.”

“What quest?”

The Mother’s Daughter exhaled. “I should not speak of it. Were I not here, I would not.”

“I would counsel caution regardless,” the Exalted of Cormaris added, in a clipped, reproving tone. This surprised Birgide. She could not imagine a time in her life when she would have dared; nor could she see one in the future.

“Your counsel is duly noted,” the Mother’s Daughter replied. Her smile was gentle. It was also somewhat condescending. “Gilafas ADelios accepted guardianship of a wild child. He lost her to the wild roads and the Winter Queen, and he has searched—without hope or peace—these many years for some way to retrieve her.

“In you, Birgide, in your fallen leaves and your
Ellariannatte
, he sees the beginning of a road that will end with that retrieval.”

“I would not think the guildmaster would—”

“She was an Artisan. And it was her hand, and hers alone, that remade what Fabril gifted the first of our Empire’s Kings, in the hopes that they might continue to rule in the war that is to come.”

“That really is enough,” the Exalted of Cormaris said.

“She will know it, and far better than we or the gods, by the end—if she survives. If she does not, there is no harm in the information. She has been trained to hide and guard her secrets. Come, let us not be quibbling like children when your father arrives; he is unlikely to be impressed.”

“The quibbling of mortals,” a vast voice replied, “is merely part of their conversation; it does not concern us. Indeed, in such minor fractures of social grace, they reveal much their words would otherwise hide.”

The ground that Birgide could not see shook beneath her feet as the voice—the multitude of voices—filled the very air. The god was commonly depicted as male, but Birgide understood, hearing the roar of a crowd, that the depiction was flat and far too simplistic, for there were women’s voices in the mix—young and old, quivering and strident—and children’s voices, too. There were voices that were a thing of gravel, and voices that were velvet and honey. In a crowd of any size, those voices blended, syllables becoming as undistinguishable as the individual voices themselves.

Not so, the god’s voice. Although each sound was a precise concert of syllables, each voice could be separated from the whole. Or rather, the sensation of hearing each. Birgide had fallen silent not from awe, but the simple attempt to dissect and catalog what she experienced; this had oft been considered a social failing.

The Exalted of Cormaris raised both chin and face; the Exalted of Reymaris and the Mother lowered their heads. Birgide did neither; she watched the moving folds of mist as if they were a curtain—and at that, one made by a madman. Her wait was rewarded, in a fashion, as the curtain finally parted.

The god was, in her estimation, eight feet in height, or perhaps even nine. His face was not one thing but many; it was very like his voice. It should have been disturbing; it was instead strangely compelling. In watching the shifting structure of jaw and lip and cheekbones, of forehead and hairline, of skin color and even gender, Birgide thought that gods might not be so terrifying: they encompassed so much more than a single, wayward woman, surely their understanding was equally vast? Who could judge so readily something that was part of their essential nature?

He met her eyes because she had not lowered them, and she almost repented of her curiosity, then. She could not, however, lower the eyes he now met; he held—he demanded—the whole of her attention. He acknowledged his son; she heard him speak. But he walked between the Exalted and past that son, to where Birgide now stood, pinned.

“So,” he said. “It is true. What did you offer, Birgide Viranyi?”

She lifted her hand. In the fog of the otherworld, she could see the scarring that fire had caused; it was a glowing, pale light—not gold, not white, but some color that hovered between the two.

“You have chosen the path of pain,” the god said.

“Pain,” she replied, without thought, without filter, “is what I know. Pain and the peace of the forest.”

“There is no peace to be found in the wilderness; not for you and your kin.” The god bent—he would not kneel. He reached for the hand, cupping its back in his giant’s palm. “You serve.”

She nodded.

“I see The Terafin’s name in this mark. Do you understand what she is?”

“No.” Birgide wanted an honorific with which to address a god; none came to her, and she therefore offered none. She was afraid, now. But then again, fear was familiar; it was her earliest emotion. Everything else had come later.

“My son tells me that an Artisan approached you.”

Since Birgide had been standing beside that son and had not once heard him speak, she frowned. But she answered. She did not think the ability to refuse was in her. “Yes.”

“He asked your permission to take the fallen fruits of your domain into his keeping.”

“Yes.”

“Do you understand why it was you he approached?”

She started to say no, but the word froze on her tongue, and she could not speak again until she had swallowed it. “I did not consciously understand it,” she said, instead. “Nor do I now. But he required my permission to take the leaves, although the leaves did not require my permission to fall.”

“Tell me, Birgide, do the trees in your forest converse?”

She blinked.

“Do they converse with you?”

“Not—not in words, no. I have made the study of plants my life.”

“And you have made the study of the
Ellariannatte
your life’s work.”

“Yes. Before Terafin, that work was considered as realistic as unicorn hunts. It was tolerated, sometimes affectionately.”

“That work, as you call it, is why you are here now. You are, to my knowledge, the only mortal who is not Sen whom the wilderness has chosen to bespeak. You are harbinger, although you do not understand it, of war and death. There will be no peace in your forest, Birgide, if you falter at all. We are concerned.”

She was silent.

“We have never seen the position you now hold given to anyone mortal, save the Sen. But we see it in you now; you are Warden.”

“I was not given a title.”

“No. And a title is not required; it does not materially change who—or what—you are. Those who see it will know; those who do not will never take the necessary information from the title itself. Gilafas ADelios is an Artisan. He will see you. He will see what you represent. But he is not the only one.

“Those who walk the endless wilderness will see and know you as well. You are not Warden of the entirety of the hidden path; none could be, and survive the burden and the price demanded. But in the city in which my children are at the height of their power, it is unnecessary.

“I would ask you to lay the burden you have undertaken down, if I thought it a possibility. You will not. Nor will the forest now revoke what it has accepted unless you fail in your duties. But you are too mortal, Birgide. Your concerns are too small and too quotidian. You are wed to your concepts of justice, of power, of necessity. You must learn to expand them if you mean to be effective.”