Sun Sword - The Riven Shield Part 4

No song, tonight. Or rather, no harp, no lute, no raised voice.

She heard owl cries instead; hunting songs, primitive and plain. Too primitive for the tended and controlled gardens, the clipped hedges, the flowers arranged into whimsical, well-ordered patterns that hinted at wilderness without ever being touched by it. She had learned the names of basic edible weeds and plants as a child in the twenty-fifth holding, and none of those graced the gardens. She had never learned the names of the plants, although she knew the tree names: oak and ash, yew and rood. She couldn't always tell which tree and which name coincided, but had learned to gloss over ignorance on the rare occasions she was forced to entertain someone who wished to walk the gardens.

And she found comfort in those nameless trees at night; they housed the wild birds, their sleeping children still wary of the hands and the intentions of men. Did it matter that some of those birds were birds of prey?

It had, once.

Now, they were simply what they were.

She listened as she lay in bed, palms curled round the edge of blanket, thinking: I never hear the mice.

Morbidly, she wondered if mice screamed when they were caught by the birds whose cries and calls she did hear.

Jay, she thought. Are we still mice? After all this time, do you think we've really learned how to be anything else? Come home, d.a.m.n it. Come home.

But Jay was a continent away.

And Finch was here.

Thinking about mice. Finding an absurd comfort in the fact that these small furred creatures-and the red kits, the dwarf rabbits-inconvenient in every possible way to the House and annoying to the gardener if they chose to nest in the wrong places (and they did), persisted; they existed no matter how well coiffed and tended the natural world around them became. Lived, no matter how hunted they were by the birds whose cry she could hear, when their own dying voices were silent, always silent.

Perhaps because she needed that reminder now, she lay awake longer than she usually did. She couldn't say why, but she wasn't surprised when she heard the knock at the door, even though she wasn't consciously aware of the sound of anyone in the hall beyond it. Not consciously.

She knew it was Ellerson.

Funny, that he could be here for so little time and have already worked his way down into an awareness that owed more to instinct than intellect.

She rose quickly, shedding both blanket and reverie, and opened the door; the hinges had time to squeak a faint protest.

He carried no light; the wall sconces did that for him. Jewel had ordered them set with magestones-and once the rest of the den had gotten over the cost, they accepted this daily evidence of magery as easily as they accepted all her other orders.

She blinked; light from the hall reached her eyes, wakening vision, returning the sense that the world was possessed of and by color.

"You had best dress," he told her quietly, his voice the essence of gravity.

"Dress well or dress?" she asked, but without much hope.

"The Terafin has sent for you."

She heard another creak down the hall; saw Teller's slender face peer out from the gap between door and frame. "Finch?"

She nodded. "There's trouble. Get dressed. Dress well."

"It is not necessary to a.s.sume there's trouble, as you call it," Ellerson told her, his minute frown as familiar as the tone of his voice, the stiff line of his shoulder.

"At this time of night? This is trouble. Teller, get the others, too."

"All of them?"

"All of them. But don't bother arguing with Angel about his clothing."

"What about Arann?"

"Him, too."

"But he's got patrol in two hours."

"Him too."

Teller nodded. His head disappeared and reappeared so quickly Finch wondered if he'd even bothered to change out of his clothing before going to bed.

"Ellerson?" he said, looking past her.

Ellerson nodded.

"Do you know what's wrong?"

"I am domicis," the old man replied.

"Why is she doing this to us?" Finch demanded, between clenched teeth. Her jaw was sore with it-it was an expression she'd learned, over the years, from watching Jay.

"ATerafin-"

"Someone's going to notice this. If we report to her in the day, when everyone else does, they can take note of it, but they can't prove anything significant has happened. But this-Kalliaris must have been frowning for weeks. Doesn't she know that they're all watching us?"

He didn't ask her who "they" were. Didn't need to. Instead he said, "You are not the only people being watched." The tone of his voice was critical enough that it would have stemmed the flow of words if those words hadn't been riding on so much fear.

"No-we're the only insignificant people being watched." She hadn't meant to sound so bitter; she almost never did. Shame warred with fear, and fear won. "G.o.ds, this is so easy for them. They've got money, they've got experience, they've got friends in all the right places-they've even got the House Guards all carved up between them, and she isn't dead yet! They've got everything."

"Finch," Ellerson said, reaching out to touch her shoulder.

She looked up at him, eyes wide, the difference in their height startling to her. Had she shrunk?

"ATerafin," he added, when he was certain of her attention. "Do you truly believe you are without your support? Captain Torvan of the Chosen visits only one of the Terafin House Council on a regular basis."

"Jay," she said at last. "But Jay's not here."

His grim silence was reproof enough. She was silent for a moment. But when she spoke, her voice was level. "I'm sorry," she said quietly. "You're right of course. But I-"

His hand, where it rested on her shoulder, tightened a moment. She met his eyes.

Was surprised to see his smile. "No one who has responsibilities that they take seriously is completely without fear. No one. But I have never met a man-or a woman-who can meet those responsibilities well when fear rules them. Jewel ATerafin trusted-and trusts-you. If you cannot trust your own judgment in this, trust hers.

"Or mine, if it is of value. I admit that I was hesitant to return here. I am retired. I have . . . enjoyed my retirement immensely. But having begun, I remember what being a domicis means to me, and I am honored to serve your den."

"And how long will you stay? How long this time?"

"I will stay," he told her gently, "until I am no longer needed. Come. The others are waiting."

She looked up then. Everyone-except for Carver-was standing, silent, in the wake of his words. She wondered how much they'd heard. Carver joined them, struggling to get his elbows free of the neck of a shirt he was too lazy to unb.u.t.ton.

"Ellerson?"

"Yes?"

"Who delivered the message?"

And a familiar figure stepped out of shadows that Finch knew weren't natural. Jay had paid a lot of money to see to that.

"Morretz?"

He stared at her a moment, as if appraising her, but his expression gave none of the result of that appraisal away.

"I did, ATerafin. I understand your fear. I understand your caution. I am here to make certain that-inasmuch as it can be-your pa.s.sage to the shrine remains undetected by any of the would-be rulers of this House."

They had talked to Morretz. To Torvan. To Arrendas. They had spoken with Devon, and with Gabriel; they had become, in all things, Jay's subst.i.tutes. They had learned, clumsily, but with a determination that desperation underscored, to navigate the byways of the powerful, dancing carefully along the edge of the increasing hostilities between the four men and women who desired what only the den knew Jay already had-the legitimacy of The Terafin's choice.

Those hostilities had left the injured, the broken, and occasionally the dead, as evidence of what happened when too much ambition met with too much ambition. Had it been up to Finch, not a one of the four would now have the Terafin name behind them.

But The Terafin did not condescend to notice what could not be ignored. It hurt Finch, inexplicably, to see that, to accept it for what it was.

She shook herself.

Since they had understood the full meaning of Jewel ATerafin's vision, since they had realized that The Terafin was to die before Jay's return, they had not spoken with The Terafin. They had listened to her, when she had come to tell them of the demon attack in the Common; they had listened to her again, when she had finally decided that the personal investigation-the sifting through rubble, the tending to the injured-would be brought to a close. But they had not been required to speak; had not been required to meet her gaze and acknowledge their understanding.

Until tonight.

It was funny.

Finch was easily the smallest, physically, of Jay's den. How a bunch of grown men could huddle behind her wasn't clear-but they were all trying exactly that, with the single exception of Teller. If Finch had loved him before Jay left-and she had, she always had-she had never understood why he was obviously the most valued member of the den. It had stung, sometimes; still did, when she was feeling low enough to pick at it.

But she understood it now. Silent, he was still present, and when she reached the shrine of Terafin and hesitated a moment at the rounding curve of low, stone steps, he smiled at her briefly, squeezed her hand, and stepped forward.

The sound of his step against smoky, marbled stone brought her back to herself; she looked up, past his back-he'd left room for her at his side-to see the woman who waited for them.

The woman who ruled them all.

There was light, in this place. It perched in torches against the pillars that supported the domed ceiling. Someone had thought to fashion those torches into the shapes of birds, works of bra.s.s whose wings, from tip to tip, were polished and gleaming beneath the fires they carried. No magestones here; no even light; one of the groundskeepers or the gardeners must have carried oil, gla.s.s, and cloth when they came to this place; someone must have brought stools and ladders, rags; someone must have taken the time to light these lamps, and to gutter them, and to clean the residue of their burning from the backs of the creatures that held them.

And not just once, but over and over, each act deliberate and ephemeral.

Although she had always liked magestones, it seemed fitting that such effort and laborious care be offered here, beneath this simple dome, yet above the gra.s.s that surrounded the flat, rising steps. What time could not take from the stones mages made, it would take from the lamps, from the oil, from the labor of men-and the labor of men would again be called. And if the men who performed this maintenance were different, the fire didn't care.

"ATerafin," The Terafin said.

Finch nodded quietly; her nervousness deserted her as she cast one last glance at the natural fire that flickered in ordinary lamps.

She climbed the steps to join Teller, who waited for her in silence. When The Terafin did not speak, Finch turned and gestured wordlessly for the others to follow; only Angel lingered upon the path enclosed on either side by lamp, gra.s.s, pillar.

"Angel never accepted the House name," The Terafin said softly. There was a hint of question in the words.

"No. And he blackened Carver's eye when Carver did." Realization of whom she was speaking to followed-rather than preceded-the words; her tongue stuck to the roof of her mouth for just a moment.

But The Terafin's response was an unguarded smile. "He didn't wish to compromise his integrity by swearing an oath to serve the House when his loyalty was simply to one of its members?"

"Something like that."

"And if she ruled the House?"

Teller stiffened; Finch caught the sudden lack of movement-startling even though Teller was not the most animated of people-with the small part of her attention that wasn't focused on The Terafin.

Ellerson, she thought, why aren't you here? She wasn't up to a protracted conversation with arguably the most powerful woman in the Empire. Or at least not a politic, intelligent one.

Teller came to her rescue.

"If she ruled the House, he wouldn't need to accept the name; she already owns everything he's willing to give away. Angel's never been one for empty gestures."

"No," The Terafin replied. "And the rest of you?"

He shrugged, although his expression was completely serious. "For the rest of us, it wasn't empty. Jay wanted the name, and because she wanted it, we wanted it. Except for Angel. And Arann," he added, almost grudgingly.

"Arann." She found him easily on the crowded flat of the floor that encircled the altar by which she stood. Her expression shifted, a subtle motion of lines, a narrowing of eyes, a compression of lips. She nodded slightly as she met his eyes, and he came-albeit awkwardly-toward her.

He did what they had failed to do; knelt before her feet, bowed his head.

Finch was suddenly aware of the sword that hung by his side-had to be; it sc.r.a.ped against the surface of marbled stone like fingers against board. No one else wore one. Carver and Angel had taken lessons, but the weaponsmaster Jay had sent them all to had chosen instead to focus on the skills he felt they did have: long daggers, short daggers, thrown weapons.

But Arann had joined the House Guards almost right from the start. Jay had hated it. Had been proud of it, and had hated it.

And he knew. Funny, it had hardly bothered him at all when she'd been here. But Finch knew him well enough; he'd gone to his knees tonight, but it was the first time in years that old split loyalties chafed at him.

The Terafin knew it as well.

She'd known Arann for a handful of years as a polite, but respectful half-stranger, but she could also see what Finch, who was almost blood-kin, could see-and no less clearly. That, Finch thought without rancor, was why she was The Terafin.

Arann rose as The Terafin gestured.

"Well," she said, "are you hers or are you mine?"

He was not a wordsmith.

But he was not a coward either; the fear of being forced, after so many years, to choose was more terrible than the event itself. He squared his shoulders, shedding weight in the process.

"Both."

"Is that a suitable reply?"

"It's the only one I have, Terafin."