Crown of Renewal (Legend of Paksenarrion) (16 page)

Where they had died, most of them, through Luap’s stupidity. She shifted, clenching her teeth at the pain as she thought of it. Only a few scraps gave clues to exactly what Luap had done … and so he offered her nothing to learn from. She would have to figure this out for herself. The only thing she could think of that might work was having everyone—every single yeoman, from birth to old age—cursed or gifted with mage-powers at once. And even that might not work. And even if it did, she had no way to accomplish it.

Down the hall she heard footsteps … boots, not soft indoor shoes as most wore at night. Her breath caught; her pulse quickened. Another assassin? Moving openly because he had already killed the guards—or the guards had proved disloyal? A firm tap on her door and a voice she knew: “Marshal-General? Are you awake?”

“Come in,” she said. Arvid Semminson was an assassin—or had
been—but she hoped he was now Gird’s true yeoman, surprising as the transformation had been. He smelled of the outdoors: horse, leather, sweat, and a breath of night’s coolness clung to him. “What news?”

“How’s that wound?” he asked. He tucked his gloves into his belt, doffed his cloak, and hung it on a peg across the room. “You’re not sleeping, and you look like someone in pain. Should’ve healed by now with all the Marshals around to give it a nudge.”

She shook her head. “Too many others in the city needed them. I’m not that—”

“You are,” he said across her words. “You are that important. Who’s going to take over if you die?”

He had once seemed suave, tactful, but since the troubles started, he had shed his smooth manner for directness.

“The Marshalate would vote,” she said. “It might be Donag.”

“Or it might be some idiot,” Arvid said.

“How’s your boy?” she asked, hoping to divert him.

“He’s fine. Growing, learning … and not, so far, showing a speck of mage talent, Gird be thanked.” He shook his head at her. “It’s you, Marshal-General, we have to worry about. The Fellowship needs you, and you’re not healing as you should. Was the weapon poisoned?”

He’d asked that before. So had others. Her memory of the attack was blurred, more than any other memory in her life, and she did not understand it. Several dark figures—she could not say how many—and though she had fought them off until approaching help sent them fleeing into the night, one had pierced her shoulder, the tip grating on bone.

“Let me see,” he said now. “But I still think—”

“Oh, very well.” She moved, and the pain wrenched her again.

“Soon,” he said. This time she did not hear his boots on the floor, but before she could wonder why not, he was back with one of the yeoman-marshals, Lia. To her he said, “I had a report to give the Marshal-General, but she looks no better than when I left—I believe the weapon must have been poisoned. Has no one seen it?”

Lia frowned. “Marshal-General—who’s been binding it up for you?” She turned to Arvid. “She’s been at her desk half-days; we thought it was fine. But she does look bad tonight.”

“Others needed help more,” Arianya said. “I could do it—” But the pain worsened as if to mock her, and she sagged back against the pillows. “Sorry …”

“Let’s get her shirt off,” Arvid said.

“I can …” she began, but sitting up wrenched a groan from her, and Lia quickly moved to support her back.

“She’s hot,” Lia said.

“Fever, most like,” Arvid said. Arianya wanted to protest, but she could scarcely keep from crying out as they lifted the shirt. She heard Lia’s sharp intake of breath at whatever it looked like. “And that’s more than one wound,” Arvid went on. “I would wager you told no one about the others, did you?” He sounded angry.

Arianya summoned the last of her strength. “They were scarcely more than scratches. I put herbs on them.”

His hand touched her shoulder lightly; she tensed, expecting the pain again, but instead felt the warmth of his breath. “I’m smelling—some poisons have a strong scent …” His voice trailed away.

“What?” Arianya said.

Instead of answering her, he said, “Lia, she needs healing—find any Marshals or paladins; bring them here.”

“Now?”

“Now. We do not have much time.”

The girl’s footsteps clattered away. Arianya opened her eyes; Arvid was beside her, staring down at the wound.

“What is it?” she asked again. This time he met her gaze.

“It’s definitely poisoned,” he said. “And by something we in the Guild believed was an elven poison. Could your attackers have been elves?”

She tried to force her memories to clarity, but the attackers remained shadows. “They were tall,” she said. “They wore dark clothes, like … thieves—”

“The Guild never contemplated killing a Marshal-General,” Arvid said. “It would cause too much trouble. If elves attacked you, though—you had that visit from elves—”

“The kuaknomi,” Arianya said. “Those elves were worried about the kuaknomi in the western stronghold, where Luap was. Said he’s let them out—”

“They’re just elves, aren’t they? Another tribe?”

“More than that,” she said. All at once she felt strength flowing out of her, as if even mentioning kuaknomi harmed her. She could scarcely keep her eyes open.

“No!” Arvid’s voice was loud, painfully loud. “Open your eyes—look at this!”

She struggled and managed to open her eyes enough to see what he held. Her Girdish medallion, with a candle held close so it glittered in that light.

“Gird does not want you to die now,” Arvid said in a quieter voice.

She wanted to laugh but lacked the strength. “You’re sure of that?”

“Yes. You know Gird … speaks to me.”

“And he spoke to you about me?” She could not really believe that. Everyone knew the gods and heroes of old spoke to some but not to most.

“Sometimes people don’t listen,” Arvid said. “Sometimes they’re doing well enough and nothing needs to be said.” A pause, then he added, as if prompted, “He doesn’t want you to die now. I’m sure.”

She heard voices outside her rooms, echoing in the stairwell. Too many voices—Lia must have roused more than a couple of Marshals. First in the room was High Marshal Donag.

“You!” he said to Arvid. “What are you doing here?”

“I came to report to the Marshal-General and found her wounds had not been properly treated,” Arvid said.

“You accuse us—!”

“Of nothing,” Arvid said. “But it is a fact. There’s poison—possibly even a remnant of the blade that made the wound.”

“She didn’t say—”

“Marshal-General—” Camwynya, one of the paladins now resident in Fin Panir, ignored the High Marshal and threaded her way through the others to the bed. “May I see?”

Arianya nodded. Several were talking now, some arguing with the High Marshal and some agreeing with him. She wished they would all be quiet and go away, but she could not summon the energy to tell them so.

Camwynya’s face showed her shock when she uncovered the wound. “It’s not healed at all—who looked at it first?”

Arianya could not remember. Someone, she thought, had helped her stanch the bleeding, laid folded cloth on it, wrapped the bandages around, but all she clearly remembered was struggling to replace them … when? The next morning, surely, but she could not remember that, either. She murmured that. Camwynya’s eyes narrowed.

“It’s definitely poison, and one I don’t know. Arvid, do you?”

Arvid moved closer to the bed. “We thought it was elven in the Guild. Marshal-General mentioned kuaknomi.”

Arianya looked up—the other faces seemed strange—still talking, some looking at her, some at one another, all shadowed, this cheekbone and that brow picked out in yellow candlelight.

“Kuaknomi.” Camwynya leaned over her. “Marshal-General, we must probe the wound, see if anything’s left inside. You know how often their weapons are designed to leave a fragment in the wound. I fear the effect of numbwine, as weak as you are.”

“Light,” Arianya said. “Need light.”

Light blazed in the room—Camwynya’s light, Gird’s light. She blinked against it. She felt the bed move as several dragged it out into the room and then hands on her shoulders. Camwynya laid one hand over Arianya’s heart and the other on the wound itself. Pain stabbed deep—deeper than the wound itself, it felt like. Arianya closed her eyes, trying not to struggle against it … and still there was light, shadowless, pure, unending.

And another face, the one she had imagined so often but never seen, emerged from the light, looking at her … steady gray eyes, endurance and compassion in the lines of his face.

In the haze of light and pain, Arianya murmured, “I’m sorry.”

The brows went up, and the mouth quirked. “For others’ misdeeds?”

“For my mistakes.” She was aware that she was not speaking aloud, that somewhere else others were working on her body, but the pain had eased … had vanished … leaving her here in the light with the old, stoop-shouldered balding man in his faded blue shirt.

He shrugged. “Everyone makes mistakes. I made mistakes. Are you leaving my service?”

“Leaving …”

“You allowed none to care for you. Why?”

“I did not deserve—”

He grunted. “What you deserve is not at issue. Others deserve a good Marshal-General.”

“A good Marshal-General would have found more paladin candidates … would have foreseen this trouble … would have …”

“Been a god?” A bite of sarcasm in that. “Neither of us, Arianya Girdsdotter, is a god. I was a good-enough leader when I lived in that room; I am a good-enough messenger now. Make up your mind: Will you leave my service, or will you stay?”

Faced with that face, she had only one answer. “I will stay.”

“Good. We must talk again another time. You do not always listen well, Arianya. Be well.” She felt the touch of a hand on her forehead—his?—and the brilliant light slowly dimmed. She felt pain again and heard other voices.

“It’s stuck in the bone—I can’t get a grip.”

“Try this.”

“It’s so small—”

She heard the gritty sound of something being pulled from bone and a gasp from someone nearby.

“What is that? Black—”

A door banged, and other footsteps came closer, running. Through her closed eyelids light glowed red. “Who is it—ahhh.”

“Paks.” That was Camwynya … and Paks was here? Here? She had been gone … a long time, Arianya thought. “We think it was an iynisin attack. I just pulled this from the bone—and look.”

“I see. If they used what they did on me, then the only healing I know is Kuakkgani … and there’s no Kuakgan nearer than the southern mountains … perhaps in western Tsaia.”

“Surely we can do something.”

“We will do our best.”

Paks leaned closer; Arianya could smell horse, leather, dust, and then as suddenly as before she slid into another place … this time not white light but green.

A green glade, spattered with sunlight piercing the tree canopy overhead. Purple flowers gave off a fragrance spicier than violets; a
bright-colored bird flew past, a winged jewel when the sunlight touched it: glittering green, red, blue, purple. Out from the forest shade came a strange cat—gray spots on a snow-white coat, eyes of palest blue. It paced up to her, rose on its hind legs and set its fore-paws gently on her shoulders, extended a pink tongue and licked her across the face.

Across the glade, a pile of pillows and coverlets appeared, inviting her to lie down. The cat returned to four feet and butted her gently toward the pillows. She took a step, then another; the cat walked beside her, and when she faltered, she found its back under her hand, warm beneath the soft fur, a firm support.

She sank onto the pillows; the cat lifted one paw and gently pushed her down, then drew the coverlets up. With her last sight, she saw the impossible … the purple petals of the flowers rose up and flew to her, covering her with purple. When two petals touched her eyelids, she fell asleep in that instant.

Waking again was strange. For an instant, the forest glade overlaid the familiar room, as if the walls were draped in embroidered veils. Then the veils faded away, and she saw whitewashed walls and heard someone snoring across the room. The light coming in the window was dim, blue-gray … predawn? Near nightfall? She lay still, not wanting to wake the pain, listening to the snores. The wall seemed more distinct moment by moment; the air moving into the window carried a tinge of woodsmoke. A rooster crowed; a mule brayed. Morning, then. She moved one leg, then the other, then turned her head to see who was in the room with her. Slumped in a chair, feet up on a stool, Paks slept with one arm dangling, the other hand on her Girdish medallion.

In the passage outside, the
slap-slap
of light shoes came nearer. Then a knock on the door. Paks woke at once, the way a cat wakes, and turned to the door.

“Sib, lady. Cook says bread’ll be out in a half-glass, and porridge in less.”

“Thank you,” Paks said. She came back into the room with a tray and met Arianya’s gaze. “You’re awake—how do you feel?”

“What happened?” Arianya asked.

“That’s a story with two sides,” Paks said. “I know what we tried to do; you alone know what it was like for you.”

Arianya moved her left arm a little. Her shoulder was stiff but not painful. “It doesn’t hurt. And I—it’s clearer.”