The Mansions of Idumea (Book 3 Forest at the Edge series) (32 page)

Mahrree sighed. “Why’d he try to catch me? He
should’ve just let me fall!”

“Instinct, I guess.”

“It wasn’t
your
instinct, apparently.”
She nudged him.

“I thought he had you. For an old man, he’s
still—”

Mahrree scoffed. “You thought
he
had
me? The
older
man has broken ribs, nearly starved to death
just last week, is crippled in his leg and you thought he could
catch me? I think I’ve set him back at least a week in his
recovery.”

“Well, now he really can’t dance at The
Dinner,” Perrin said brightly. “He was happy about that. Besides,
the crutch got its revenge. You can hardly see the gash. Creative
bit of cover-up my mother did on you with those hair clips. If it
starts bleeding again, though, we might have a problem.”

As they walked he inspected the long cut
above her ear, barely visible behind the silverwork hair clips.

“Looks like that resin the surgeon used is
holding it together quite well, which is fortunate. Stitching it
would’ve been rather unpleasant this morning. Still, if it starts
to spurt again, I’ve got extra bandages.” He patted a pocket of his
uniform jacket.

Mahrree sighed. “If there’s a problem I’ll
just tell everyone what General Cush said: I had a run-in with an
old wolf and I won.” She tried to chuckle, but it stuck in her
throat.

“That’s my wife!” Perrin again patted her
forcefully on the hand that was wrapped tightly around his arm.
“Good attitude. Think commanding thoughts.”

He was cheerful. Overly, unnaturally, and
unnervingly cheerful, trying to balance his wife’s panic.

It didn’t help.

“A good half-hour’s walk,” said Perrin when
Mahrree remained quiet. “That’s all you need. I’ll take you through
the university. The gardens are just beginning to bloom. You’ll
enjoy that.”

“Of course. Thank you. You know how I
appreciate gardens.”

But she took the distraction. She was about
to face the Administrators—the leaders she was sure were more
manipulative and conniving than anyone in the world realized, and
she was about to stand before all of them to . . .

Likely pass out again.

She should’ve just sent Perrin to Idumea
alone—

Oh,
that’s
loyal. Send her husband
alone to deal with the worry of his father and to face his greatest
annoyance. Yes, what a faithful, loving wife she was. She groaned
in silent admonishment and firmed her grip her husband’s bulging
arm.

How did he walk with such confidence? Once,
years ago, she thought him a coward, but that was only briefly
until she realized she was a far greater coward.

She glanced up into his dark, clear eyes that
focused straight ahead. His face was unreadable, but set and
determined. How could she borrow some of that resolve?

There was so much she still didn’t to know
about him, apparently. Last night’s discussion of his time in Edge
as an eighteen-year-old certainly made that clear. It was almost as
if there was the Perrin of Edge, and another Perrin of Idumea. She
found herself longing for the Perrin of Edge.

Or maybe just longing to be back home again,
and not walking in the middle of the Idumea ready to face the
scariest men in the world.

Soon they left the neighborhoods of overly
ambitious houses and gardens, and ambled across the common green to
the university. The grand buildings had been constructed with
stone, but many additions to the main building in the center had
been completed in block. One of the newer buildings had attempted
to do something else besides a square construction, making the
classroom building look like a fort.

“You know, if might be a better idea if you
would build the forts out of block than out of wood,” Mahrree said.
“I know how you hate block, but block wouldn’t burn like wood.”

“I considered that, too,” Perrin said.
“Realizing how quickly the marketplace burned. I’ll suggest block
for forts if I’m groping for ways to make myself look valuable to
the Administrators.”

Mahrree’s grip tightened again.

“Just a joke, Mahrree,” he said humorlessly.
“It’s all right . . . Ah!” This time his tone brightened naturally.
“My favorite old tree is still here.”

He eagerly led her over to the new
distraction, a large oak tree. They stopped underneath and he
pointed to some of the enormous branches.

“When I first saw that oak at the
amphitheater in Edge, I immediately felt at home. It reminded me of
this one. Another cadet and I used to climb this tree carrying some
of the small hard breads they served in the hall. Nasty little
things, like something Jaytsy would bake up. We would sit up there
at night waiting for the students to meet the neighborhood girls.
They’d sit under the trees to kiss, thinking no one could see them.
That’s when we got in some target practice.” He chuckled.

Mahrree just marveled at yet another new
thing revealed.

“The real trick was to sail the breads so
that they didn’t hit any other branches and lose their trajectory.
We knew we were successful when we heard a thud followed by a
‘Hey!’ I tried for the most ‘opportune’ moments, if you know what I
mean. I like to think I save many girls those nights, even if I hit
a few. They likely needed someone to knock some sense into
them.”

Mahrree stared at him. “How is it we’ve been
together for sixteen years and only now I’m finding out these
things about you? What’s next? Did you used to be the youngest
Administrator?”

He chuckled a little nervously. “I guess the
surroundings just bring back the memories. I have to admit, not all
of them were bad. There are some advantages to this place. Look at
that statue.”

He pulled her along up a small hillside, his
voice suddenly filled with youthful excitement.

“Isn’t it amazing? Took the sculptor three
years to create that horse alone. And the rider on top? Another two
years. What people can carve . . . I use my knife for the wrong
things.”

Duly impressed, Mahrree gaped at the
larger-than-life statue of King Querul the First carved out of dark
stone, perched on a horse that balanced on a wide pedestal.

“Sculptors!” she exclaimed. “I forgot they
have sculptures here. I’ve never seen something so fantastic! You
told me all about statues, but there’s nothing like this in
Edge.”

“I know. I live there, remember?”

“We should bring the children to see this,”
Mahrree breathed, moving closer to it. “I wonder that they keep a
statue of
him
here, though. Doesn’t it bring up bad
memories?”

“Well, that’s the point,” Perrin agreed as
his wife gingerly touched the platform. Her eyes traveled all over
the wondrous creation. “The statue’s here on the Command School
grounds to remind students of the excesses and indulgence of King
Querul and all those that followed him, to remind that we never
want to have a king again. It’s here more as a memorial to the man
who carved it, though. He died just as he finished it. Slept only a
couple of hours a night for years as he worked, and spent all his
time trying please the king. The sculptor was a friend of
Terryp’s—”

Mahrree’s eyes widened.

“—and he was inspired by the carvings Terryp
found at the ruins. He was the first one to attempt sculpting
stone. Obviously he had a gift for it. This was his last and
greatest masterpiece.”

Mahrree spun to look at Perrin, and her head
swirled dizzily. “Oh, ow,” she muttered and held her temple, but
the pain wasn’t enough to quell her enthusiasm. “The statue’s one
hundred fifty years old? That’s ancient!”

She stepped onto the raised dais that held
the platform for the horse. Tenderly she ran her hand up the
horse’s back leg. “Do you realize what I’m doing? I’m touching the
statue that was carved by a man who mostly likely shook hands with
Terryp.”

Anything remotely connected to her favorite
historian and adventurer was a fantastic and rare treat. She
strained to touch the haunches of the horse and wished she had a
way to reach the rider on top. The dark stone seemed soft somehow,
perhaps because it was so smooth. She caressed the leg longingly
and was about to move to the next when she heard her husband clear
his throat.

“Uh, Mahrree? I don’t have any hard bread to
throw at you right now, but if you’d like I could leave you two
alone for a moment. But please remember, you are a married woman,
and in a public place. Woman, just how much blood did you lose this
morning, anyway?”

She reluctantly pulled her eyes away from the
sculpture to shift her gaze to her husband. He was squinting, his
lips parted, and his hands on his waist in complete bafflement. She
absent-mindedly patted the rump of the black horse.

“And here I thought you hated horses.”

“Sorry,” she guffawed, but kept a hand on the
horse’s perfectly chiseled knee. Or ankle. She wasn’t sure. “But
really think about it, Perrin; this is a piece of our past—a
tangible link to Terryp and those who lived at his time. And we can
touch it, and see it, and know that others were most definitely
here before us!”

“Yes,” Perrin said cautiously, as if
evaluating a previously undiscovered creature.

“You don’t get it, do you?” she said. “It’s
real!
This connection links us to the Creator who was here!
Terryp and his friend who carved this may have known someone whose
grandfather had a grandmother who was one of the first five hundred
families the Creator brought to this world. Something like this
makes it all real!” She gripped the leg of the horse with both
hands as if she could pry it loose and take it home with her.

Perrin’s squint turned into a wince.

“It’s so easy to forget the past, where we
came from, who we are. But things like this reach back almost
halfway in our time and link us—”

“All right, now you’re babbling,” Perrin
interrupted her. He gently pried her fingers off the statue,
leaving her flummoxed as if waking her from a vivid dream. “We
really should’ve used Cush’s carriage.”

Taking her by the shoulders, he pivoted her
into a new direction. “The last thing you need to do in front of
the Administrators is babble uncontrollably.”

“Oh,” Mahrree said simply, coming around. “I
almost forgot where we’re going.”

For the briefest of moments she
was
somewhere else, in a faraway dream that was actually real, a way to
go back into history and—

“How much further?” she asked, trying to
bring herself reluctantly into the dark present again.

“Over this rise between the two dorms you’ll
be able to see the Headquarters. Are you all right, I mean, in the
head and everything?” He looked at her askance. “Because this
really wouldn’t be a good time to—”

“I’m fine, really.” She patted his arm. “I’m
sorry about that back there. I just really didn't expect to see
something like that statue. I guess there are all kinds of
surprises I never knew about in Idumea.”

“Well, if all goes well this morning, my
mother has plenty of more surprises for you in the afternoon,” he
said in a mollifying tone.

“And if things don’t go well?”

Perrin was silent as they started walking up
the rock steps to the top of the small rise. “I really don’t know,
honestly. But I feel things will be fine. Don’t you?”

Mahrree nodded. “And last night I said people
who act solely on their feelings are thoughtless. But that’s all I
have to go on right now, and I feel calm. Maybe it’s the blood
loss.” She chuckled as they crested the hill, where she stopped and
gasped.

“Oh, my.” She rooted herself to the ground to
take in the view.

She’d expected the Administrative
Headquarters to appear as dreary and dull as the schools in Edge:
gray block walls, the death of all imagination. But what lay before
her was astonishing.

The building itself was enormous, only a few
minutes’ walk down the small hill, three full levels high,
extending on either side of the main doorways, almost like the Shin
home—probably because they were both designed by King Oren—but
enlarged exponentially. Great columns, eleven on either side of the
doorways, were carved out of white stone and helped support the
triangular roof which peaked and extended over the front of the
building.

The rocks used in the construction of the
walls themselves were unusual shades of red and orange, set in
precise patterns. Only from the distance of the hillside could the
design be fully appreciated; the whole of the walls was a warm
orange, with a swirling maze of deeper reds like curling tendrils
that led the eye from one end of the building to the other. It was
if an enormous and lush burgundy vine had gently grown over the
pumpkin colored building.

The peak of the roof held a large triangle of
white stone, its surface carved in a similarly swirling pattern.
Each level had a row of tall windows edged in white carved rock to
repeat the stone of the pillars. A long cobblestone drive led up to
the great front doors and the dozen broad white steps.

Swarms of people went up and down the steps
and through the massive double oak doors. Carriages and coaches
disgorged their travelers before the white stairs, and vehicles
traveling the opposite direction sucked them back up again, giving
the impression of streams of ants arriving and leaving a grand
pumpkin festival.

“It’s beautiful!” Mahrree whispered, unable
to walk any further.

“Hm, I suppose,” Perrin said casually.

“Really? That’s all you can say?”

“Well, I remember watching them build it when
I was at the university. King Oren started it but ran out of
support to finish it. When the Administrators came to power they
completed it as their headquarters. I guess the mystique of the
place has worn off on me over the years. Still, there isn’t
anything in Edge to compare with it, now is there?”