Reisil nodded, not trusting her voice. A prickling tingle ran over skin, but it had nothing to do with fear. She swallowed, stepping away.
“Better get some sleep. It’ll be dawn soon, and tomorrow is going to be a long day.”
They confronted Sodur near the Iisand’s quarters.
“Bright morning,” Reisil said as he and Lume rounded the corner where she, Yohuac, Juhrnus and Metyein waited. Sodur stopped, his eyes glittering as if lit from within. Then he visibly collected himself and came forward.
“Bright morning.”
“We want to see the Iisand.”
“Oh, I’m afraid that is impossible,” he said, waving his hand. “You know he refuses all visitors but myself and the Lord Marshal.”
“Don’t pretend,” Reisil said. “I know better, and so do they. I’m leaving Koduteel. I want to see him before I go. I want us all to see him.”
“I wish you hadn’t done that.” His gaze lingered on Metyein.
“I wish a lot of things,” Reisil retorted. “But it’s about to get a lot harder in Koduteel. And we’ve a right to see what we are facing. Your sorcerers aren’t going to help. We’re on our own.”
Sodur frowned and stared off at a wall. He had a befuddled look, like a harmless, mind-broken grandfather. Suddenly his head whipped around. He cocked it to the side, giving Reisil a slanting glance, sharp as a blade, like he knew what she was thinking and it amused him. His lips parted in a cunning smile. Reisil drew back, unnerved at his abrupt alteration. Masks again.
“Let’s not keep him waiting, then.”
They entered the Iisand’s apartments with no argument from those guarding the door. Inside, the apartments were empty and chilled. Sodur set his basket on a table and set about making the place look lived in. He stirred up the remains of the previous day’s fire, scooping coals into an iron lantern before adding a pile of coal. Then he set out the food from the basket, nibbling on it and crumbling pastry across the tablecloth. Most of it he fed to Lume after offering it to his silent spectators.
“Doesn’t he eat at all?” Juhrnus asked.
“Nothing. Not for close to eight months now,” Sodur responded airily.
“How does he survive?” Yohuac murmured.
Sodur turned around to face him. “You’re the new
ahalad-kaaslane
, aren’t you?” He scanned Yohuac from head to toe. “Who knows?” Sodur lifted a book from a shelf, opening it and laying it facedown on a table beside the fire. “I admit, it saves cleaning. Quite a benefit, you’ll agree, when you see him.” He cast another of those sly looks over his shoulder at Reisil and proceeded into the Iisand’s bedchambers.
He climbed under the bedclothes, rolling back and forth, thrashing his legs and giving the impression of a restless night. Then he pulled a wadded-up set of clothes from a drawer and dropped them on the floor beside the wardrobe, choosing another set to stuff inside for the next day. The nightshirt he balled in his hands. Then he sprinkled some of the Iisand’s perfume on it before dropping it in a heap on the floor of the bathing chambers. Afterwards, he splashed water on the floor around the copper tub.
“Geran was never strict in his housekeeping. Liked to make his staff feel useful. The servants may suspect something’s not quite right, but they don’t know anything. Good about not gossiping. Handpicked.”
On a sideboard, he poured a healthy glass of brandy and swallowed most of it, wiping his lips with the back of his hand and setting the half-empty glass next to the book.
“Geran likes a glass before bed,” he said, turning to examine his handiwork. He muttered and went to the chaise, where he stretched out, flattening the plumped pillows, and tossed several on the floor.
“That ought to do it for now. Follow me.”
He picked up the iron lantern of coals and went to the bookshelves opposite the mantelpiece. With his foot he pressed something on the floor and stretching high, he pulled a lever hidden in the molding midway down the top shelf. Reisil gasped when the center portion of the bookcase swung open. Sodur gestured for everyone to precede him. There were two guards inside the tunnel, and like the two guarding the Iisand’s door, they neither spoke nor looked at the visitors. Sodur led them away into the darkness, stooping as the way grew shorter and narrower. With her wizard-sight, Reisil was undeterred by the thick gloom, Sodur’s lantern casting little light. Behind her she heard a thump and then muttered cursing as Metyein stumbled into Yohuac.
“I had no idea. Do these go everywhere in the palace?” Juhrnus wondered aloud.
“What would a palace be without secret passages?”
Reisil stopped. “Then they go to Kebonsat’s quarters also?”
“In a roundabout fashion.”
“Then let’s go get him.”
“Whatever for?”
“Because he should see this as well.”
“He’s Patversemese.”
“I want him to see,” Reisil declared flatly.
“It’s too dangerous.”
“It’s necessary.”
“Reisil, I know you think you know what you’re doing. But you must see that he cannot know about the
nokulas
. He cannot know about the Iisand.”
“What makes you think I haven’t told him already? Besides, what I see is that your sorcerers are doing nothing, the Verit will be declared regent, and the
ahalad-kaaslane
will lose what little influence they have left. It’s time to ask for help from those who will give it. Kebonsat will give it.”
“And what can he offer? He is a prisoner in the palace. His country has abandoned him. He’s useless.”
“Maybe not.”
Sodur’s brows slanted up. “Do tell.”
Reisil gave a slight shake of her head. “I don’t think so.”
“You’ll have to give me more than that if I am to believe you.”
Reisil stepped closer so that her right shoulder brushed his left. She bent forward to speak softly near his ear. “Your scheme has failed. I don’t trust your choices. You can help me or not, but now that I know how to get to Kebonsat, you can bet I’ll not let a wall or two stop me. I need him. Kodu Riik needs him. And I’m not going to give away any chances to save this land, not now that the sorcerers sit inside our gates slavering after us, while the rest of the world waits for us to wither on the vine. Now make up your mind.”
Reisil straightened, shocked at herself. For the first time in a long time, she saw in Sodur the mentor and friend he had been. Everything he’d done was for Kodu Riik. It felt like betrayal, but was it? Was it any more so than telling everyone that Yohuac and Baku were
ahalad-kaaslane
? Or hiding the fact that Baku could pick their thoughts from their minds?
She flicked a glance at Juhrnus, Metyein and Yohuac. They trusted her. They’d chosen to follow her, to be led by her. She did not want that responsibility. What if she made mistakes? What if she chose wrong? How many would die because she didn’t know enough, because she didn’t see clearly enough?
~Is it any different than being a tark, than holding another’s life in your hands?
Saljane’s red eye gleamed like an ember.
~I know what I’m doing as a tark. I’ve trained. I’ve practiced. But what do I know about any of this? Sodur knows far more than I.
~But you no longer trust his choices.
~Who am I to say if he’s right or wrong?
~You are
ahalad-kaaslane.
~So is he.
~The Lady chooses many to serve. There are none who are not flawed, who do not misjudge, even though they mean well.
~How can I be sure I’m right?
~You must trust your heart
. They
trust you.
And looking at her three companions, Reisil knew they did. And until they decided she was making the wrong choices, they would follow her. She took a breath. She could trust them to tell her she was wrong, to walk away from her. She could trust them to choose a new path without her. Just as she had with Sodur. They believed in her, but they were not stupid, nor did they follow blindly.
“Wait here. I’ll go get him. Keep your voices down.” Sodur turned and disappeared, the sounds of his feet fading quickly.
“Maybe you shouldn’t have let him go without getting him to tell us what he knows about the wizards,” Juhrnus said. “He’s being unusually cooperative.”
“He’ll tell us,” Reisil said, sure now that he would. “What are you two cooking up? You’ve had your heads together all morning.”
Juhrnus winked. “A chance to keep people eating while you’re gone.”
“How?”
“Nothing sure yet. I’ll be glad to see Kebonsat. There might be something he can do.” He wasn’t going to say any more.
“Be careful. The Verit’s going to be watching,” was all Reisil said.
Reisil had no sense of how long Sodur was gone, but she was thirsty, and the chill of the stone tunnel had begun to leach through her clothes.
“Ho, Kebonsat. It’s about time. Getting soft sitting about doing nothing, have you?” Juhrnus called in a low voice when he appeared, following Sodur.
“And you, crawling in the walls like a rat. Or just peeking in at the women?”
“The women. Always the women,” Juhrnus said, slapping Kebonsat on the shoulder.
Kebonsat grasped Reisil’s arm in a warm grip. “It is good to see you,” he said. “But what’s this about?”
“You’ll see,” she said as Sodur called everyone to silence.
“We’ve a long walk. Let’s not waste any more time.”
There was no chance to talk as they walked, the passage narrowing so that they had to walk single file, sometimes bent almost double. They went down and down, deep into the roots of the castle. Reisil began to hear the pulse of the harbor cavern.
They burrowed down into the cliffs beneath the palace, the passage eventually growing wider and more damp, even as it grew steeper, zigzagging back and forth down steps and switchbacks. Now the thunder of the harbor cavern drowned out every other sound, and it was impossible to ask Kebonsat about the Verit or Vertina or anything else.
They came to an open space where the smell of brine and damp was overpowering. Reisil wrinkled her nose and then gently pushed the others after Sodur, who stood inside the left-hand passage, gesturing impatiently. They pressed closely against a wall, the moss-slickened floor slipping sharply away. Carefully they edged along until they came to an opening. It proved to be a serpentine doorway leading to a flight of steep steps that dropped away abruptly from the landing. There was a sudden quiet as the pounding of the harbor cavern was suddenly muted. Light flickered below as Sodur lit a torch.
“What is this place?” Reisil asked, staring up at the arched ceilings and dangling lucernes.
“Palace was built on the ruins of another, perhaps many others. This was a dungeon for those who came before us. Come on. Geran waits.”
Gargoyle heads snarled down from fluted pilasters on either side of the entryway, their expressions pitiless and harsh. The room beyond had once been a torture chamber, and Reisil could almost hear the screams of the men and women who’d suffered here. Sodur seemed oblivious and circled quickly around to the other side. There he lit two more torches, stopping at the entrance of a narrow passage.
“It’s too small to fit everyone. Two, maybe three at most.” He held out a torch.
“We’ll wait. You go,” Juhrnus said, indicating Reisil, Yohuac and Kebonsat. Reisil hesitated and then slid into the narrow corridor, turning sideways to ease through. Kebonsat followed next with Yohuac bringing up the rear. On Reisil’s shoulder, Saljane mantled and clenched her talons tighter.
~What is it?
Distress. Uncertainty. Unease.
~I know, me too. I feel . . . flat . . . somehow.
She emerged into a small open space shaped like a teardrop. Kebonsat and Yohuac crowded in behind. The gargoyles’ bulbous eyes glowed red, their stone tongues fleshy and malevolent. Yohuac took the torch from her and lit those in the wall sconces. Reisil examined the door. It was a solid slab of oak bound in iron. Three bars secured it closed, each etched in scrolling patterns. A grille-covered window allowed a view inside.
Reisil peered through the grille and realized there was an interior cell door. Was he so dangerous? She thought about the
nokulas
who’d attacked her and Sodur and shivered. She took a breath, fear making her hands tremble. The walls of the cell were covered in the same scrolling patterns as those on the crossbars. The space was perhaps twelve paces deep and twelve wide. There was no furniture, only bits of wood and cloth strewn across the floor. Against the far wall was a dented chamber pot turned on its side. Otherwise, the cell appeared empty.
Then she heard a noise, a scraping, a tapping. There was a swish and the debris on the floor scattered as if blown by a stiff wind. Reisil tensed, remembering the paths in the grass made by nearly invisible bodies, the translucent
nokulas
flashing silver like moonlit water.
“What do you see?” Yohuac asked.
Reisil did not answer. Suddenly she felt a tickle across her forehead and jerked back, rubbing her skin. A painful, rough line rose beneath her fingertips.
“Reisil?”
She shook her head, holding up her shaking hand. A sound rippled over her skin, almost too high to hear. It was akin to a laugh, but high-pitched and eerie. Inhuman. Out of nowhere a form began to resolve itself, like moonflies gathering into a shapely swarm. The result froze Reisil, her mouth open in a silent
O
. She could hardly fathom that this
thing
could ever have been human.
Like the
nokulas
from Veneston, it was powerful and looming, its movements graceful and quick. It stared at her with slanted silver eyes, curved like spoons, pupilless and fathomless. Thick, transclucent hairs sprang up over its head and ran down its spine and arms. They waved and undulated in deliberate motion, as if tasting the air. Its arms ended in six-jointed fingers tipped with hooking talons. As she watched, Reisil saw the beast scrape furrows in the stone floor.