Roberson, Jennifer - Cheysuli 07 (50 page)

 
          
Aidan
had expected more. Sadness. Resentment. Perhaps bitterness, even after so many
years. Instead what he sensed was pride, and an undercurrent of approval. It
was almost as if Corin looked on Aidan as his own son, and was pleased with
what he saw. It was not the reception Aidan had expected.

 
          
"She
is well," he offered quietly, looking for reaction. "She sends her
greetings."

 
          
"So
does Brennan, no doubt." Laughter glinted in Corin's eyes. "I know
what you do,
harani
. Doubtless all
the servants fed you the tales… well, I imagine the follies of our youth
do
make good telling." He shrugged,
smiling warmly down at the woman at his side. "But old wounds heal, Aidan.
I loved her once, very much; now it is a pleasant, if bittersweet,
memory." One hand guided the slender woman forward. "Pay your
respects,
harani
. This woman is
Atvia's queen." Corin's brows arched slightly. "In the Old Tongue, my
cheysula
. Her name is Glyn."

 
          
Aidan
opened his mouth, then shut it. He wanted to protest that of course the woman
was not Corin's wife, because no message had ever arrived announcing the
wedding. But who was he to argue? And why? It was well within Corin's power to
marry whomever he chose, publicly or privately—and yet Aidan was left feeling
oddly flat. After so many years and so many stories, he had come to believe
Corin would never marry, because Aileen had married Brennan. It was almost as
if Corin had betrayed his mother.

 
          
He
swallowed heavily and stepped forward, accepting the woman's fragile hand and
bestowing the kiss of homage. Her warm smile and eloquent eyes soothed him
immediately, dissolving the remaining resentment, until he smiled back at her.

 
          
"Had
I known, I would have brought a bride-gift." Delicately, he offered Corin
reproach, and a chance to explain himself.

 
          
Corin,
unruffled and unrepentent, shrugged. "It was a private thing. I did not
wish to share Glyn with anyone." His tone was very quiet as the woman
returned to his side. "Few would have understood the Lord of Atvia taking
a woman who could not speak."

 
          
Perhaps
not at first. But Aidan felt Glyn's muteness beside the point. One had only to
look at her expression, as she gazed at Corin, to know what her world was made
of.

 
          
Corin's
beard hid much of his crooked smile. "When a man stops railing at his
tahlmorra
, often the gods repay him with
more than he deserves. After too many years of solitude, they sent Glyn to me.
I have learned to leave the past behind, living instead in the present." A
gesture dismissed the subject. "Now, I am assuming Keely refused to
come."

 
          
Aidan
nodded. "She said you would understand."

 
          
Corin
grimaced. "I do. I wish she did…" The dismissive gesture was
repeated. "Do you know, I think if Gisella had tried to give her daughter
to Strahan as well as her three sons, Keely would be less bitter. But Gisella
did not. Keely was dismissed as entirely unimportant, because she was a
girl." He smiled faintly. "That is the definition of Keely,
harani
: she would rather be caught in
the midst of some Ihlini vileness than be left
out
of it merely because of her sex."

 
          
"And
Shona is very like her," Aidan sighed ruefully, then set the topic aside.
"You sent word Gisella wishes to see her kinfolk. Will I do?"

 
          
Corin's
expression was odd. His tone odder still. "That is the wrong question. It
is not simply will you
do
, but
whether you will survive with your dignity intact." He gestured toward the
door. "Come with me."

 
          
The
room lay deep in shadow, for the casement slits were shuttered and only a
handful of candles illuminated the bedchamber. The commingled scent of beeswax
and death filled his nose as he entered. The door thumped shut behind him as
the serving-woman went out, leaving him alone inside the chamber. Corin had
said Gisella was not strong enough for more than one visitor at a time. Aidan,
lingering uneasily by the door, was not certain
he
was strong enough to visit.

 
          
He
had never been so close to death before. He had learned to fight, as he was
expected of a man who would be Mujhar, but he had never been to battle. His kin
were vigorous and strong; he had never watched the aged wither away until their
spirits left them.

 
          
He
had not anticipated the smell. He had not expected the emotions. He faced the
dying woman with a horrified fear of what he would see and feel, because he
thought his
kivarna
might be the
undoing of him.

 
          
When
his eyes grew accustomed to the gloom, he saw the faint outline of her body
beneath the silken coverlet of the canopied bed. The fabric was a deep, heavy
indigo, nearly inseparable from the dimness. Only after a moment of
concentration could Aidan see the differentiation between coverlet and shadows.
Gisella seemed to wear it like a shroud.

 
          
She
was propped up by bolsters and pillows. At first he could only barely see her
face, blending with the dimness, then he saw the shine of eyes. Pale, feral
eyes, like his own, fixed on him—on the intruder—with a fierce intensity.

 
          
Gods
—
I
see now why the unblessed fear us so much when they see us for the first time
—Aidan
swallowed painfully and wet dry lips.

 
          
Her
hair was mostly gray, dark, mottled gray, but her face was outlined by
silver-white. She wore it loose over thin shoulders; twin ropes of cord against
indigo silk. Her skin, once Cheysuli-dark, had yellowed with age and illness,
her face was all of hollows. Aidan, unsettled, wondered what illness would take
her to the grave. Mere age only rarely ravaged a Cheysuli so virulently. Generally
his race died gracefully.

 
          
Aidan
stopped at the foot of the bed.
She is
mad
, he reminded himself.
A sick,
dying, mad old woman
—

 
          
The
pale eyes did not so much as flicker. "Which one are you?"

 
          
The
flat tone was colorless. Aidan did what he could to put life into his own.
"Aidan," he told her. "Aidan of Homana; Brennan's son.'"

 
          
Gisella
smiled. Her teeth were displayed in a feral clenching. "Yet another son I
have not seen."

 
          
He
was careful. "You have Corin."

 
          
Her
voice rasped. "Who?"

 
          
"Corin."
Aidan drew in a breath. "Your third-born son. Corin, now Lord of Atvia—"

 
          
"My
father is Lord of Atvia. Is Corin my father?"

 
          
Oh, gods
—"Corin is your son."

 
          
Querulous,
now. "Who are you?"

 
          
"Aidan."
He began it yet again. "Aidan of Homana—"

 
          
"Brennan's
son; I
know
." Teeth showed
briefly. "They tell me things, all of them… and then tell me again and
again and
again
—do they think I am a
fool?"

 
          
"No."
Aidan briefly sought a chair out of the corner of his eyes, then dismissed the
impulse immediately. He did not wish to remain with Gisella that long. He
wanted to leave as soon as he decently could.

 
          
"And
will
you
be Mujhar?"

 
          
It
snapped his attention back. "Aye. One day."

 
          
Pale
eyes glittered. "But Niall still lives. Still rules.
Niall
still rules…" Gisella put thin fingers to her mouth and
stroked withered lips, as if recalling all too graphically once she had shared
a man's bed. "Niall," she said softly.

 
          
"My
grandsire." Aidan surreptitiously glanced back toward the door.
"Perhaps I should come back another time—"

 
          
"Come
here. Come
here
. Come closer. Come
here
."

 
          
Against
his will, he responded.

 
          
Gisella
stared up at him. He stood there, letting her look, and fought down the impulse
to run. His
kivarna
was afire with
the confused welter of her emotions, so tangled and black and incomprehensible.
She was mad, all too obviously mad, but there was more to her than that.
Underneath the layers of confusion was the girl she might have been, once, had
Lillith not twisted her. A childlike, innocent girl, trapped in a woman's body,
but nonetheless innocent. She was not and never had been fit to be queen. But
neither had she deserved the meticulous, deliberate reshaping of her spirit.
Lillith had destroyed the innocence. Lillith had destroyed Gisella in a quest to
destroy Homana.

 
          
Gisella
pointed to him. "You."

 
          
He
waited.

 
          
"Cheysuli,"
she said. "They told me. Lillith. My father. They
told
me—" She smiled. "Cheysuli, Atvian. Erinnish,
Solindish, Homanan. All necessary to complete the prophecy."

 
          
She
was, uncannily, lucid. Aidan stared at her.

 
          
"They
bind the Houses and mingle the blood—my blood,
your
blood,
their
blood…
to make the proper child.
The child
.
The boy who will become king over all the lands; a man combining the blood of
two magical races and—and—" She tilted her head, frowning faintly.
"Peace."

 
          
Aidan
nodded. "The prophecy, granddame. Two magical races and four warring
realms, united in peace."

 
          
"
Tahlmorra
," she murmured.

 
          
Again
Aidan nodded. "We each of us have one."

 
          
Her
eyes sharpened. "Do you?"

 
          
"Of
course."

 
          
Slowly,
she shook her head. "No. No. No."

 
          
"Granddame—"

 
          
Gisella
glared at him. "Lillith told me about it… a
tahlmorra
is nothing more than a binding made up long ago by men
calling themselves the Firstborn so they could make people think them greater
than everyone else."

 
          
"Granddame,
Lillith lied—"

 
          
"Give
them a prophecy, she said. Give them a fate and call it
tahlmorra
, something to bind them so strongly they will never break
away… something to turn them into nothing more than servants, but leave them
their pride so they will believe themselves better,
better
… better than everyone else so they will
keep
themselves bound—"

 
          
"No
granddame—"

 
          
"Lillith
told me," she said plainly. "She told me the truth of it: the
Cheysuli have been made what they are by the connivance of the Firstborn, who
saw the power of the Ihlini and feared it. So they fashioned themselves an army—Lillith
said
—but called it a race, to use the
Cheysuli as their weapons. They turned warrior against sorcerer; child against
child—"

 
          
Aidan
overrode her. "Granddame,
she lied
."
He waited until she stared at him, outraged. More quietly, he went on.
"You are ill and angry and confused… granddame, Lillith did naught but lie
to you, all these years ago—"