The Demon King (6 page)

Micah seemed uncharacteristically reluctant to talk about his exploits. “Well, good it came out all right in the end. Would anyone else like more wine?”

“Didn’t Mellony say you came late to the hunt?” Missy said, putting her shoulders back to better display her oversized bosom. “How did you get between the queen and the fire?”

Good question, Raisa thought, amazed that Missy had come up with it. Keeping next to the wall, she sidled closer.

Micah seemed to think it was a good question too. He took a long swallow of wine, thinking about it. “Well, ah, we saw the fire from below, so we took a shortcut, hoping to catch them and…” Micah looked up and saw Raisa, taking full advantage of the distraction. “Here is Princess Raisa now,” he said, sweeping down into an elegant bow.

Raisa extended her hand. Micah grasped it and raised it to his lips, then lifted his head and gazed into her eyes, sending a whisper of power through his fingers. She flinched and withdrew her hand. Young wizards sometimes leaked magic, but he smiled in a way that said he was showing off.

Raisa stepped on his foot and smiled at him in a way that said that wasn’t an accident either.

Fiona glared at Raisa, somehow making herself even taller while delivering a chilly curtsy.

Well, all right, Raisa thought, feeling guilty. Perhaps your brother’s had a little too much wine. To be fair, he did save my life, he deserves to celebrate, and he’s probably in some degree of pain.

“Micah is being too modest,” Raisa said, in a kind of backhanded apology. “The fire came on us like a downhill stampede. We were trapped in a narrow canyon with flames on all sides, and I thought for certain we would all burn to death. If not for Micah and his father and the Mander brothers, we would have. They put the fire out completely. It was amazing. They saved our lives.”

“Oh, Micah,” Missy exclaimed. She reached for his hands, recoiled at the sight of the bandages, then wound her arms around his neck and gazed up into his eyes. “You are a hero!”

Micah looked flustered enough to be charming, and untangled himself as soon as he could, shooting glances at Raisa.

Don’t worry, she thought. I’m not jealous. Only annoyed with Missy.

“How do you suppose the fire started?” Missy asked, flicking her elaborate curls back into place. “It’s been raining for weeks.”

“Father thinks the clans might have had something to do with it,” Micah said. “They’re always keen on keeping people out of the mountains.”

“Wizards,” Raisa said. “They’re keen on keeping wizards out of the Spirits. But the clans would never set fire to Hanalea.”

Micah inclined his head. “I stand corrected, Your Highness,” he said. “You are familiar with their ways and I am not.” He forced a smile. “It’s a mystery, then.”

“Well, I don’t trust them,” Missy declared, glancing about to locate the Demonai delegation before she continued. “They slip around like thieves, and they’re always muttering to each other in that foreign language so you never know what they’re saying. And everybody knows they steal babies and replace them with demons.”

“Don’t repeat nonsense, Melissa,” Raisa snapped. “Children are fostered with the clans for their own good, to teach them the old ways. Besides, the clans were here first. If there’s a foreign language spoken in the Fells, it’s Vale-speech.”

“Of course, Your Highness,” Missy said hastily. “I meant no offense. But Valespeech is a more civilized tongue. We use it at court,” she added, as if that settled that.

The quartet had completed its warm-up, and now the first strains of real music floated over them.

“Would you care to dance, Your Highness?” Micah asked abruptly. Beyond him, the Klemaths were practically slapping their foreheads that they hadn’t thought of it first.

Wil quickly offered his arm to Fiona. “Lady Bayar, it would be my honor.”

Missy scowled, having been overlooked. She glanced around for other prospects.

Adam Gryphon smiled crookedly. “Would you care to dance, Lady Hakkam?” he said, making as if to swing his canes into position.

“Well—ah—perhaps I’ll go and fetch some punch,” Missy said, fleeing in the direction of the punch bowl.

Too bad Missy’s disablity is between her ears, Raisa thought. She wanted to say something to Adam, but knew he’d come back with a cutting response.

Micah offered his arm, leading her to the small dance floor. She put one hand at his waist and cradled the bandaged hand carefully with the other.

They circled the floor, floating on the music. Raised at court, Micah was an excellent dancer, despite his several glasses of wine and stomped-on foot. But then, he did everything relentlessly well.

“How are your hands?” Raisa asked. “Do they hurt very much?”

“They’re all right.” He seemed tense and unusually inarticulate.

“What happened this morning?” Raisa persisted. “Why were you so late?”

“Raider came up lame. We had to pull a shoe, and it took longer than expected.”

“You must keep a dozen horses at court. You couldn’t ride another?”

“Raider’s my best hunter. Besides, like I said, it took longer than expected,” he said.

“Your father was really hard on you today,” Raisa said.

Micah grimaced. “My father is hard on me every day.” And then, in the manner of someone who’s intentionally changing the subject, he said, “That’s a new dress, isn’t it?” When she nodded, he added, “I like it. It’s different from your other dresses.”

Raisa glanced down at herself. Part of Micah’s appeal was that he missed nothing. “Because it’s not all layered with ruffles?”

“Hmmm.” Micah pretended to think for a moment. “Perhaps that’s it. Plus the color sets off your eyes. Tonight they’re like pools in a forest glade, reflecting the leafy canopy overhead.”

“Black sets off your eyes, Bayar,” Raisa said sweetly. “They glitter like dying stars cast from the heavens, or twin coals from the bowels of the earth.”

Micah stared at her a moment, then threw back his head and laughed. “You are impossible to flatter, Your Highness,” he said. “I am helpless here.”

“Just leave off. I was raised at court too, you know.” She rested her head on his chest, feeling the heat of him through the wool, hearing the thud of his heart. They circled silently for a moment. “So you’ll be going to Oden’s Ford in the fall?”

Micah nodded, his smile fading. “I wish I could go now. They ought to send wizards at thirteen, like soldier pledges.”

Micah would be attending Mystwerk House, the school for wizards at Oden’s Ford. There were a half-dozen academies there, clustered on the banks of the Tamron River, on the border between Tamron and Arden.

There should be a school for queens in training, Raisa thought, where she could learn something more useful than table manners and pretty speech.

“The clans believe it’s dangerous to put magic into the hands of young wizards,” Raisa said.

Micah grimaced. “The clans should learn to relax a little. I know your father is clan, but I don’t understand why they insist that everything remain the same. It’s like we’re all frozen in time, paying for an ancient crime that nobody else remembers.”

Raisa tilted her head. “You know why. The clans healed the Breaking. The rules of the Naéming are intended to prevent it from ever happening again.” She paused, then couldn’t resist adding, “Didn’t you learn that in school?”

Micah dismissed school with a wave of his hand. “There’s too much to learn in a lifetime. Which is why they should give us our amulets at birth, so we can begin our training as soon as possible.”

“They’ll never do that because of the Demon King.”

The song came to an end, and they drifted to a stop on the dance floor. Gripping her elbows, Micah looked down into her face. “What about the Demon King?” he said.

“Well. They say the Demon King was something of a prodigy,” she said. “He took up wizardry—and dark magic—at a very young age. It destroyed his mind.”

“Mmmm. That’s what the clans say.”

It was the argument they’d had a hundred times, packaged in different ways. “They tell those stories because it’s the truth, Micah. Alger Waterlow was a madman. Anyone who could do what he did…”

Micah shook his head, a slight movement, his eyes fixed on hers. “What if it’s made up?”

“Made up?” Now Raisa’s voice rose and she had to make a conscious effort to lower it. “Don’t tell me you’ve joined the Revisionists.”

“Think what this story gets the clans, Raisa,” Micah said, his voice low and urgent. “Wizards carrying around all this guilt, afraid to assert their inborn gifts. The clans controlling the objects that allow them to use their magical powers. The royal family, forced to dance to whatever tune they play.”

“Of course the clans control amulets and talismans,” Raisa said. “They’re the ones who make them. It’s the division of power between green magic and high magic that has kept us safe all these years.”

Micah lowered his voice further. “Please, Raisa. Just listen a minute. Who knows if the Breaking ever actually happened? Or if wizards were the cause.”

She glowered at him, and Micah rolled his eyes. “Never mind. Come on.” Taking her elbow, he drew her into a windowed alcove overlooking the illuminated city.

Cradling her face in his bandaged hands, Micah kissed her, first lightly, and then with more intensity. Like usual, Micah was changing topics to something they could agree on. Most of their arguments ended this way.

Raisa’s pulse accelerated, and her breath came quicker. It would be so easy to fall under his spell, and yet, she wasn’t quite finished with the conversation.

Raisa gently pulled away from him, turned and stared out over the city. It sparkled below, perfect from a distance.

“Did you hear this theory about the Breaking from your father? Is that what the High Wizard thinks?”

“My father has nothing to do with this,” Micah said. “I have ideas of my own, you know. He just…” He rested his hands on her shoulders and power sizzled through his fingers. “Raisa, I wish we could…”

He was interrupted by a rising clamor in the dining room. The band shifted smoothly into “The Way of the Queens.” Raisa and Micah stepped to the doorway of the alcove in time to see Queen Marianna sweep the length of the room on Gavan Bayar’s arm, dancers parting before them, sinking into curtsies and bows. Behind them came the Queen’s Guard, resplendent in their Gray Wolf livery and led by Edon Byrne.

Raisa scowled at the sight of her mother processing arm in arm with the handsome master of the Wizard Council. She looked over and saw Elena Demonai watching, face stony with disapproval, and sighed. Lord Bayar might be a hero, but still. Tongues wagged well enough at court without encouragement.

The queen turned in a swirl of skirts and faced the room. She was dressed in champagne-colored silk that added high-lights to her blond curls. Topazes glittered in her hair and on her neck, and honey-colored diamonds adorned her slender hands. She wore a lightweight diadem set with more topazes, pearls, and diamonds.

Queen Marianna smiled out at the assembly. “In a moment we’ll go in to dinner. But first we shall recognize the heroes in the hall tonight. This day by their valor they saved the lineage of Fellsian queens.” She extended her hand without looking, and someone placed a goblet into it. “Would Micah Bayar, Gavan Bayar, Miphis Mander, and Arkeda Mander come forward?”

Gavan Bayar turned gracefully and knelt in front of the queen. Micah hesitated a moment, hidden in the alcove, looking to either side as if he wished he could escape. Then he sighed and left Raisa to join his father. Arkeda and Miphis came and knelt as well.

Servers circulated through the crowd, distributing glasses to those who were without. Raisa accepted one and stood waiting.

“Today these wizards saved me, the princess heir, and the Princess Mellony from a disastrous wildfire through the use of extraordinary and accomplished magic. I therefore toast the unique and historic bond between the line of Fellsian queens and high wizardry that has long protected and sustained our realm in this time of war.” The queen raised her glass, as did everyone else in the hall, and drank.

Mention Captain Byrne, Raisa mouthed to her mother, but Marianna did not.

“I would also like to welcome back to court a young man who has been like a son to us. After three years away, he has returned for the summer and will serve us on temporary assignment to the Queen’s Guard.” Queen Marianna smiled at the assembled soldiers, singling out one in particular. “Amon Byrne, come forward.”

Raisa stared, amazed, as one of the tall soldiers stepped forward and knelt before the queen. Edon Byrne drew his sword and passed it to Marianna.

“Do you, Amon Byrne, swear to protect and defend the queen, princess heir, and all of Hanalea’s descendants from our enemies, even to the loss of your life?”

“My blood is yours, Your Majesty,” this strange, tall Amon said in an unfamiliar deep voice. “It would be my honor to spill it in defense of the royal line.”

The queen tapped Amon on each broad shoulder with the flat of the blade. “Rise, Corporal Byrne, and join your captain.”

The new corporal rose, bowed again, and backed away from the queen until he stood side by side with his father, who did not loose a smile.

Raisa stood transfixed, her hand at her throat. Amon’s gray eyes were the same as she remembered, as was the straight black hair that flopped over his forehead. Much of the rest of him had been remade.

“Now,” the queen said, “let’s in to dinner.”

Raisa had no chance to speak to Amon during dinner. She was seated at the head of the table, between Micah and his father. Arkeda and Miphis sat in positions of honor on either side of the queen, with Mellony on the far side, Fiona next to her. Also within speaking distance were the Demonais, and Harriman Vega, a wizard and court physician.

As captain of the Queen’s Guard, Edon Byrne had a place near the foot of the table, but the Guard itself was stationed at the far end of the room, near the entrance to the ballroom. Raisa’s eyes kept straying to Amon.

His face was thinner, the bone structure more prominent, any trace of baby fat worn away by his time at Oden’s Ford. He had his father’s intensity packaged in a rangier body, but he’d added a new layer of muscle in his chest and arms.