Binding Spell (Tales of the Latter Kingdoms) (20 page)

“Absolutely correctly. But we have been at this for three hours. Any more, and you will either collapse, or be discovered missing. Neither of these is to be desired. Besides, you must get at least a few good hours of sleep, or we will risk another fainting incident.”

While I wished to protest, I knew he was right. Although Kadar was a heavy sleeper — and probably slept even more deeply this night, with Ulias’ spell of calming peace blanketing the castle — the risk of discovery grew with every minute I was gone.

So I rose from the stool, noting absently the shakiness of my limbs, almost as if they belonged to someone else, and said, “Will we do this again tomorrow night?”

“If possible. Maldis cannot conceal what he is from me, but I am not always able to discern precisely how long he will be gone. I do not know the identities of his victims until he brings them hence.”

“‘Hence’?” I repeated, aghast. “You mean he keeps them here, in this very castle?”

“Oh, no,” Ulias said at once. He moved closer to the bars, apparently intending to reach out to comfort me, but stopped at the last minute, as if just then remembering what would happen to him if he touched that bespelled iron. “Maldis is not bold enough for that. He speaks honeyed words in your husband’s ear, promising him power, but he knows he dare not reveal to the Mark precisely whence that power comes. No, Maldis has a house on the outskirts of town, and it is there that he takes his victims. But even though that house is on the opposite side of Tarenmar from this keep, it is still close enough that I can feel the presence of these victims, sense it when Maldis begins to drain their magic.”

“That’s…dreadful,” I said, a shiver moving over me as I contemplated what it must be like to feel someone’s life force, their magic, being slowly stolen from their soul. At the same time, however, a tiny flicker of relief came into being deep within me. So Kadar did not know of Maldis’ abhorrent practices. Yes, he was taking the counsel of someone with dubious origins, in the name of a foolish (to my eyes, at any rate) ambition, but he was not a murderer, or even a party to murder.

“It is,” Ulias replied, and something in his expression made me even colder, although I had not thought that possible. “And it is something you will have to learn to experience, whenever it is that Maldis brings his next victim back to Tarenmar.”

I
crept back
to my rooms, soul-sick and so weary I barely had the strength to return my cloak to the wardrobe where it usually hung, and to place my boots in their customary spot by the hearth. But I knew I must do these things, in case either Kadar or Beranne should notice anything amiss.

When I pulled the heavy pile of blankets up to my chin, however, I found that, tired as I was, I somehow could not sleep. Ulias’ words haunted me.

Something you will have to experience…

Could I bear it? Could I keep myself still and calm as I felt my way along the twisted skeins of such dark magic, feel it robbing someone of their own innate power? At the moment I thought such a thing most unlikely, but perhaps when the time came I would be strong enough to do what I must, even if it tore me to my very core.

Over the low crackle of the fire I fancied I could hear Kadar’s breathing from the other room, deep and regular. Again I wondered if I should simply rise from my makeshift bed and go to him, shake him awake and tell him everything, that he harbored a magic-worker of the worst sort beneath his roof, that surely he would be dragged down into darkness himself if he did not swerve from this course.

The compulsion was so strong that I sat up and began to push back my covers, and even swung my legs over the edge of the divan. But it was there that I stopped myself. The habits of a lifetime were simply too strong. I had been taught — told — over and over again that I must not reveal the truth of my magic to anyone. At best, ostracism and exile awaited me; at worst, probably death. I knew even in these latter days those proven to have mage-born powers were executed in Sirlende. No whisper of such things had come to me here in Tarenmar, but then again, I had known better than to ask. Matters were slightly more enlightened in the South, but still, if I had ever told anyone of my gifts, I would have been shunned forevermore.

No, as much as I wanted to go to Kadar, to tell him who and what Maldis really was, I knew that in doing so I would reveal myself, and in that would surely lie disaster. Perhaps I could think of some way to remove him from the dark mage’s influence without betraying my own magical abilities, but at the moment no solution presented itself to me. And even though I had begun to think — to hope — that there might be the beginnings of some regard for me in this makeshift husband of mine, I could not trust such a fragile thing to survive the shock of learning that his stolen wife herself had magical blood flowing through her veins.

Choking back a sigh that was almost a half-sob, I tucked my legs back under the covers once again, and drew the blankets to my chin. The fire was warm enough. I knew the chill that overtook me then came from within, and not without.

A
t last I did sleep
, deeply, in a black oblivion that was much welcomed after my trials that day. In fact, I slept so heavily that I did not hear Kadar rise at all, nor did he disturb me as he moved past and went out into the keep to begin his day. It was only when Beranne came in sometime in the mid-morning to bring me a pot of the herbal tisane that passed for tea in these parts that I sat up at last, blinking in a bleary fashion at the equally wan daylight pushing its way past the heavy velvet draperies.

“His lordship said not to disturb you, but I thought I shouldn’t wait much longer, or it would be too close to luncheon to even bother with breakfast. Have you the appetite to eat a mite?”

I had to smother a smile at Beranne’s use of the word “mite,” which in her estimation appeared to be a large slice of smoked pheasant, half a loaf of bread, and a generous pile of dried fruit. “I think I could manage.”

So I rose from the divan and drew my dressing gown about myself, and went over to Kadar’s work table to eat. I pushed some papers and maps out of the way to do so, frowning a little. What was he doing with those, anyway? Even the beginning of winter was no time to be mounting a campaign…unless he was counting on Maldis to create a false spring with more favorable conditions for fighting.

Beranne left me alone to eat, busying herself with folding the blankets and sheets on the divan (I had long since given up trying to fool her into thinking that Kadar and I shared a bed), selecting my garments for the day, and laying them on the back of a chair. I munched away on the pheasant and the bread, interspersing bites of each with the dried berries she’d brought as well, but all the while my eyes were busy scanning the papers Kadar had left out on the table.

Of course I had studied my geography, along with all the other subjects my father deemed it advisable for me to learn, but somehow it seemed far more immediate now that I dwelt within the boundaries of North Eredor, and not safely on the outskirts of Marestal. True, South Eredor was itself not a large kingdom, and its military could not hope to match that of Sirlende. But the small kingdom was still a rich one, positioned as it was where the trading ships from both Purth and Keshiaar would put into port to restock. A natural barrier separated Purth from the South, as a southern spur of the Opal Mountains extended almost all the way to the shore, so we had little fear of invasion from that side. And as for Sirlende, well, I suppose some hundreds of years earlier its rulers had wearied of gobbling up smaller territories and decided to leave South Eredor alone. It does not hurt conquerors to appear magnanimous every once in a while.

But the North’s only real protection was its poverty…and the strength of its warriors, I supposed. Looking at those maps, I saw how fragile a land it seemed, with Sirlende on the one side and Farendon on the other, both of them large enough to swallow up North Eredor many times over. And in his notes Kadar had written,
Four months until the wedding
, and underlined the word “wedding” several times, then scrawled out “Sirlende” and “Farendon,” circling the names of both countries.

Wedding?
I frowned, even as I buttered a bit of bread. Now that I had slept enough, I found I was ravenously hungry, as if all my exertions of the night before had finally left their mark.

I cleared my throat. “Beranne?”

She looked up from her task of blacking my boots. Apparently I had scuffed them during my wanderings in the cellars the night before. “Yes, my lady?”

“Do you know — that is, have you heard anything about a marriage taking place between someone important in Sirlende and in Farendon?”

Her brows lifted. “Keeping you sheltered down there in South Eredor, were they?”

“I beg your pardon?”

An odd twitch of her mouth seemed to indicate that Beranne would very much like to smile at my ignorance but was too well-trained to do so. “His Imperial Majesty is betrothed to the oldest daughter of the King of Farendon. As she has come of age this autumn, they are to be married in the spring. The Mark is…well, I suppose it is no great secret that he is less than pleased with the prospect.”

No doubt. I stared down at the map once more, seeing the two countries almost as a pair of pinchers that could close in on tiny North Eredor with barely a second thought. No, it could not be comfortable to think of two great nations being joined in such a way.

Perhaps I should have paid more attention to what was happening in the world, but my tendency had always been to bury myself in stories of people long dead — when I was not being instructed in magic by my father, of course. Sheltered as I had been in the South, it was of no great import to me who the Emperor of Sirlende married, or how the King of Farendon disposed of his numerous (at least, that was what I had heard) daughters.

But now, as a citizen of the land which lay between these two giants, I could see why such an alliance would be of utmost concern to Kadar…and why he might go to great lengths to stop it.

A chill ran through me then, and I wondered if that was why he had enlisted the aid of someone such as Maldis. No doubt a dark mage would have no problem at all stopping the match, if given the proper resources.

The fresh bread suddenly seemed dry as crumbs in my mouth, and I almost choked, then reached for some water to keep myself from coughing.

“Are you all right, my lady?” Beranne asked, laying aside her blacking brush and getting somewhat ponderously to her feet.

I could not answer that question honestly, and so I said only, “I must see his lordship at once. Is he yet in the keep?”

“As far as I know, my lady.” Used enough by now to my vagaries of mood, she lifted my chemise from where it lay across the back of the divan. “Let me help you get dressed.”

Truly it was probably the fastest I had ever performed my toilette, as she helped me into my chemise and warm gown of green wool, then worked out the worst of the knots in my curly hair before I impatiently pulled away from the comb and set forth into the crowded hallways of the keep. With snow once again falling, it seemed as if yet more people had taken shelter within the castle’s sturdy walls, finding what excuses they could to conduct their business inside and not out in the icy courtyard.

I could not be bothered with any of that. Pushing my way through the crowd — with the beleaguered Beranne at my heels, as she at least knew propriety did not allow me to set forth with no one in attendance — I looked this way and that, hoping that I would see Kadar somewhere in the throng.

But he was nowhere in evidence, and even though I slowed enough to inquire as to his whereabouts from the guards who always maintained a post outside the Hall of Grievances, even when it wasn’t in session, no one seemed to know where he was. I forced myself to quell the rising tide of panic within me, trying to ignore the frantic voice in my head.

He must be here. He must be, for I must find him, speak with him, before Maldis returns and they embark on whatever dreadful course of action they have planned.

And then I neared the huge double doors that were the main entrance to Kadar’s castle. The crowds were thicker here, if that were even possible, but the air around me was far colder, blown in every time one of those doors was opened.

At last I saw Kadar’s shaggy dark head, higher than that of almost everyone around him. I pushed forward, Beranne snapping angrily, “Let her ladyship through. Let her through!”

But the crowds did not part quickly enough. Through them I saw Kadar pause, and that lightning smile of his illumine his face. And before him was a man with fair hair, rare enough in this part of the world, and I ground to a halt, Beranne almost bumping into me from behind.

The cold air touching my face was nothing to the chill that shivered its way up my spine then. For all my haste, I was too late.

Maldis had returned to Tarenmar.

“
L
et us go
,” I said dully, and Beranne stared at me with lifted brows.

“Whatever do you mean, my lady? His lordship is right over there — ”

“His lordship is otherwise engaged,” I snapped, cruel disappointment sharpening my tone.

Her expression softened then, as she looked past me to see Kadar standing there with Maldis. I had tried to hide as best I could my revulsion for the so-called “advisor,” but Beranne was no fool. She bowed her head and murmured, “Of course, my lady.”

We pushed our way back through the crowd. This time I was glad of the teeming mass of humanity, glad they were there to shelter me, keep me from Kadar’s watchful gaze. Under the cover they provided, I was able to make my way back to my suite, where Tresi jumped up from her basket and came running joyfully toward me.

“Oh, Tresi,” I murmured, bending down and scooping her up into my arms.

She wriggled a bit, for, despite her size, she did not much care for being carried about — although she would have cheerfully slept on my lap every night if I had allowed her. But then, as if somehow sensing my disquiet, she burrowed in closer to me, pushing her little wet nose up against my chin.

“My lady,” Beranne said, and I turned. She watched me in some concern, arms crossed over her breasts. “Why such haste? Is it not something you could speak to his lordship about when he returns this evening? For you know he always comes back to escort you down to dinner.”

Which he did, almost without fail. It was yet another of the things that had helped to endear him to me — so careful he was to show me the little courtesies, to prove to everyone that ours was a true marriage of love and respect. Now, though, it seemed as if an eternity stretched between now, when it was barely noon, and the time when we would take our evening meal, some six hours hence. So much could happen in that amount of time, and yet I knew there was nothing I could do. With Maldis returned, the two of them would be closeted together for much of the day, and of course I could not speak to Kadar if the dark mage was anywhere around.

I supposed I should count myself lucky that he had not detected my magical abilities, but I had been careful, and his dubious energies had so far been directed elsewhere. His opinion of me was, I thought, quite low, as he seemed to consider me a shallow, empty-headed chit jealous of the time he spent with Kadar. As that opinion suited me at the moment, I had done nothing to alter it. If Maldis thought me a silly young woman not worthy of his attention, then he would continue to ignore me, a situation I thought could only be for the best.

“I know, Beranne,” I said, and set down Tresi, as she had begun to wriggle so much I knew she was getting fine grey dog hair all over the bodice of my green gown. I brushed ineffectually at the fabric before adding, “It is just — something of some importance occurred to me, and I wanted to speak to him in private. And now I fear it will be too late before I have the chance to see him alone again.”

Beranne somehow managed to appear both sympathetic and puzzled at the same time, no small feat. She said, “Ah, well, we will have to hope that it is not as you feared, and that there will still be time. Not that I don’t blame you for not wanting to speak in front of that — ” And she broke off abruptly, as if suddenly realizing she should not be speaking of her betters in such a manner.

Of course I cared nothing for such niceties. Indeed, it heartened me a little to realize she had very little use for Maldis of Purth as well. “What is it, Beranne? Do not feel as if you must guard your tongue in front of me.”

Her lips pursed and she glanced over her shoulder, almost as if she expected to see someone looking in on our conversation, even though the door was shut and the heavy draperies pulled closed as well, to ward off as many drafts as possible. “Well, although I know it is not proper to say such things, when the man is now right hand to the Mark, I cannot help but think he is a very poor sort of person. I’ve heard things…”

“What?” I asked eagerly. Had Maldis slipped up somehow? To be sure, it must be difficult to hide such foul acts as he was committing to feed his own counterfeit magical abilities. Hope grew in me as I thought perhaps I could gather some proof to give Kadar that his counselor was perpetrating vile deeds within the boundaries of his capital city.

Her mouth pursed in disapproval. “Not that I’ve seen anything myself, my lady, but several of the maids have whispered that he seems to consider them fair game. The pretty ones, of course, have complained the most about his roving hands. But it doesn’t seem to have gone much beyond that, thank goodness. I wouldn’t want to be the one to bring
that
to his lordship’s attention!”

This intelligence took me aback. Of all the perfidy I had been expecting, groping the maids seemed a very commonplace evil. Not that this excused it, of course, but such a thing went on far too often in the great households, or so I had heard.

Still, it was something. And better I should go to Kadar with this concern, rather than wild accusations of Maldis being a worker of dark magic. “I shall speak to his lordship of it.”

“Oh, no, my lady!” Beranne said at once. “I do not think that is wise.”

“Whyever not?”

“Because it’s the ones who complain who end up being dismissed,” she said frankly. “Perhaps you have no experience of such things, but maids are easy enough to come by, and if one or even two should prove difficult, well, it’s a simple thing to replace them. You would not wish to bring such a hardship upon them, with winter here and no way of knowing whether they could find another position?”

Of course I had not thought of that. Back home we had a girl come in to do the heavy scrubbing twice a week, and of course there were the seasonal workers who arrived for the harvest as regularly as the equinox itself, but we had no one who lived with us in our employ. Too chancy, with two workers of magic in the household. But because of this I did not really know how such things were ordered in the great houses. I had not thought that trying to protect those women might in fact lead to them being cast out.

“Perhaps if I speak to Althan instead?” I suggested. “Not anything too direct, but only a suggestion that the plainer girls wait on Maldis. They have had no problems, have they?”

Beranne shook her head. “Not that I have heard, my lady. Fancies himself an authority on ‘the female form,’ or so Narenna told me when she came to me about her problems with Maldis. Ill-favored sort that he is, I’m sure he’s trying to take advantage of his position here, for surely no woman would go to him purely for his looks.”

Her vehemence surprised me, for although I certainly had the lowest opinion possible of Maldis, I thought there were many men who, feature for feature, were far uglier than the dark mage. My first impression of him was that he was merely ordinary in appearance, although now of course I found it hard to be objective.

“I think you are right,” I said. “All the more reason for me to speak to Althan as soon as possible. Could you let him know that I wish to talk to him, and have him come here at his earliest convenience?”

“Of course, my lady.” Beranne did not try to hide the relief that swept over her face as she bobbed a curtsey and went out, moving in greater haste than was usual for her.

I wouldn’t say I was exactly relieved myself, although in an odd way it felt good for me to focus on something else besides what Kadar and Maldis might or might not have planned for either of the parties involved in that upcoming state wedding. My feelings told me that it was most likely the princess who would be their target, and not Emperor Torric. Not that I doubted Maldis’ — or Kadar’s — ambitions, no, far from it. However, my father had informed me once that the Imperial palace in Iselfex still bore powerful wards and sigils left over from the days of magic, spells buried in the very stones themselves to provide protection for the Emperor and indeed all who dwelt within those walls. It would have to be a very powerful sorcerer indeed who could pierce those defenses.

As I waited for Althan, I thought on what Beranne had just told me. I did not know exactly why I should be surprised that Maldis would have a venial side such as this. After all, users of magic were not like the monks of far-off Damarkeen, who swore an oath at the age of ten to have no dealings with women ever after. My father had a family, of course. Even Ulias had loved once, and fathered a child…a child whose blood had come down to me all these hundreds of years later. No, Maldis had sworn no oath of celibacy in order to practice his powers, and I supposed it should be no great surprise that he would be as lacking in scruples in his dealings with women as he was in all other things.

I realized then that my hasty search for Kadar earlier had made me quite thirsty, so I crossed the room to the table where Beranne made sure a pitcher of well water always sat. No sooner had I poured a measure into an earthenware goblet, however, than a knock sounded at the door, followed by Althan’s voice.

“My lady?”

“Do come in, Althan,” I called out, and he entered, expression polite as always, but with a certain lift to the brows that seemed to indicate his puzzlement at being summoned in such a way.

It was true that I tried not to call on the steward any more than I absolutely had to, as I knew his day was full enough without me making further demands on his time. He had had the management of the household for many years. I was new to all of this, and so would not presume to tell him how he should run things.

He bowed slightly. “Beranne said you wished to speak with me.”

“Yes, I did.” I hesitated then, not knowing the best way to phrase my request. But Althan, being who he was, would know what I meant as soon as I said the words, even if I tried to couch them in innocuous terms. “Unfortunately, it has come to my attention that certain of the maids are being…approached…by Maldis of Purth in ways that make them uncomfortable. While it is true that the Mark has made Maldis a member of his staff, and therefore a part of this household as well, I do not think that gives the councilor the right to make our maids’ jobs more difficult for them. It appears it is the pretty girls who are most at risk, so I believe if you set the plainer and older maids to these duties — ”

“ — Then they should not be molested,” Althan finished for me.

In truth, I had not expected him to speak so frankly, but I was glad to hear him do so. He, too, appeared to have taken Maldis’ measure, and found it wanting. So why, then, was it so difficult for Kadar to do the same?

Because Maldis is promising Kadar something he wants. We are often blind when we desire something so very badly.

Sometimes I wished that inner voice would not be so bald in its assertions, even when I knew it was right.

Clearing my throat, I told Althan, “Yes, that is my hope. Thank you for understanding.”

He bowed again. “Thank
you
, my lady.”

“‘Thank you’?” I repeated. “For what?”

“For taking an interest in the household, for being concerned enough that you would wish to protect even a maid.”

“They are all members of this household, and so they should feel safe as they go about their duties, should they not?”

“Yes, my lady, but…”

“But?”

For a second or two the mask of politeness slipped a little, and I saw something of the proud man beneath. “It is not my experience that those with a rank such as yourself would concern themselves with such things.”

I couldn’t help letting out a weary laugh. “Well, Althan, perhaps you are right about that, since you probably have far more knowledge of such things than I. However, since I was not raised to be a great lady, no one ever told me it was not my place to worry about matters such as this.”

“But that is where you are wrong, my lady.”

I lifted an eyebrow.

“All I mean to say is that you may not have been instructed in such things, but you are a great lady. I will see to this immediately.”

He gave a final bow, then turned and left while I looked after him, dumbfounded. I had been called a number of things in my life, but certainly “great lady” was not one of them.

Despite everything, I couldn’t help smiling a little as I turned to my neglected goblet of water and lifted it to my lips. Although of course they could do little to help me prevail against Maldis, it still cheered me to think I had allies in the household, that they counted me as one of them, and not some foreign interloper.

Out of nowhere, a wave of black power washed over me. The water I had just swallowed seemed to lodge in my throat, and I fell to my knees, choking and coughing. At once Tresi came running over to me, whining, even as she nudged me with her nose.

“I’m…all…right,” I gasped, trying to pull some air into my brutally constricted throat. All around me the atmosphere felt noisome and dank, heavy as if I crouched in some fetid swamp, and not in the comfortable chambers Kadar and I shared. Wheezing, I could only remain hunched over, palms flat on the floor, as I forced myself to breathe, to recall the exercises Ulias had taught me.

For I knew this was no spell of his. The times I had felt his magic, even when it frightened me with its immense power, I had not experienced this sensation of evil, this cloying, heavy darkness that seemed to cling to me like the fumes from one of the factories in Iselfex, where I had heard the very air was poisoned by the smoke that belched from their chimneys. No, this could have only come from one person.

Maldis.

Somehow I managed to drag myself to my feet, poor Tresi still hunched in a little grey ball on the rug, her ears flat and her breathing coming shallow and fast. How she felt it, I did not know, but I supposed that animals had their own special senses when it came to danger.

Clutching the edge of the table for support, I closed my eyes and forced myself past the black cloud that surrounded me, made myself recall the exercises Ulias had taught me. I would be a poor Protector indeed if I could only manage these spells when I was calm and unmolested, and not under duress.