The Element of Fire (46 page)

Kade stood and stepped out of the ring so she could think without it singing in her ears. "Yes, but I made a mistake. I shouldn't have gone." She sat beside him and put her head in her hands. "Grandier was waiting for me. He knows that I-- He told me Thomas is alive, and that I am to stay out of the way." She felt her mouth twist into a sneer. "He knows it will be difficult for me."

"Yes, you made a grand cock-up," Boliver agreed.

She rubber her eyes and said sourly, "Your confidence in me is overwhelming."

Boliver sighed. "Is your Thomas that important to you, then? Has he said anything of the kind to you?"

She looked up and saw he was watching her gravely. She stilled the quick flare of anger. "Yes, he is important to me. And if he's dead I'll never know what he thinks about me."
And I wouldn't care if he hated me as long as I knew he was alive somewhere...

"Then stop rushing about like a daft-headed chicken and do something," Boliver said suddenly, scattering her thoughts.

"I am not rushing about like a daft-headed anything," she said through gritted teeth.

He pointed the pipe at her. "Oh, you're not weeping or fainting, but you're running about in circles, letting this damned human wizard point you any way he wants you."

"I am not--"

"By Puck's pointed ears, woman, you're the Queen of Air and Darkness. Act like it!"

Kade was on her feet and Boliver was scrambling for cover when it occurred to her that Thomas had said much the same thing to her. He had said it on that cool rainy night on the loggia, when they had listened to Denzil twist Roland's friendship into slavery.

She supposed she should feel like dying. What she felt was a cold numbness centering around her heart, as if she were already dead. Kade turned away and started to cross the field toward the castle. Reaching the edge of the garden, she climbed the steps and entered her turret workroom. She stood for a moment in the quiet with the sweet smell of herbs and flowers. Then she saw that the bowl on the table was glowing softly. It was the spell she had tried to make to reveal the location of the keystone. She had forgotten it.

Holding her breath, Kade went to the table. The water at the bottom of the bowl had formed an image: a hazy translucent image of a room. And she recognized the room.

"Gods above and below take that canny old bastard," she whispered, almost reverently. "It was there all the time."

Then she had an idea.

THE SUN WAS shining here, too.

Kade and Boliver stood in an open court, bordered on all sides by a low wall and a sheer drop to the sea. The wide blue vault of the sky stretched over them, and the stiff breeze had the tang of salt and dead fish. Kade went to the edge of the ring, which resisted her for a moment before she stepped free of it. The power swelling it had almost the same force as the Knockma Ring, but it was far more turbulent. But then, this ring saw a great deal more use.

She went to the wall and looked down. They were atop a pillar of rock that stood a hundred yards or so above the sea that tore at its base. Leaning out, she could see the stairs that climbed it, leading up from a bare stone dock, and the stern of the fantastically painted ship that was moored there.

On the opposite side of the court, two identical fay with golden skin, red-pupiled eyes, and long amber hair guarded an archway twined with carved oak leaves leading to a narrow delicate bridge. It led from their pillar over the channel of gray-green churning water to the cliff tops of a rocky section of coast. A massive structure grew out of the end of the bridge, with heavy octagonal towers the warm brown of sandstone from the faraway deserts of Parscia. Squinting at it in the afternoon sunlight, Kade saw that light glittered off it at regular points, as if it were adorned with a pattern of jewels, or small round windows. She looked back at Boliver, who was watching the bridge guards warily and cleaning out his pipe onto the immaculate flagstones. "This is the place."

She went up to the guards, who were dressed in cloth of gold and glittering gems and armed with slender swords of silver. They were both watching Kade and Boliver with disinterested amusement, and one said, "Your name and your errand, fair lady, before you pass."

The words "fair lady" had no doubt been applied facetiously. She answered, "I'm Kade Carrion, the Queen of Air and Darkness, and I'm here to see Oberon."

The two exchanged an opaque glance that might have concealed more amusement, or surprise, and the other said, "Then pass gladly, lady."

She walked down the bridge, Boliver padding behind her. Ahead they could see two large wooden doors surrounded by stonework carved into waves and bubbling seafoam. Closer, and the sun brought out the faint tint of rose in the brown stone; closer still, and she saw that the small round windows that studded the tower were not windows but eyes, with dark iris and blue pupil, and that some were watching them, others staring off to sea.

Boliver stage-whispered, "We're being watched!"

Kade ignored him.

Another fay guard, identical to the two at the bridge except for the graceful amber-glazed wings on his back, pulled open one of the heavy doors for them.

Inside was a high stone gallery, floored with white tile, airy and cool. They went down it and into the perfect silence of the place. Corridors branched off at intervals, but they might have been the only living creatures inside.

Thinking over what she had to do--what she was forced to do--Kade was conscious of a curious numbness that might be shock. She was beginning to recognize it as the feeling of anger taken to such a level it was no longer possible to separate it from any other emotion or thought. In a way, it was a liberating sensation. The attitude of the fay guards, or what she suspected was their attitude, would have bothered her very much under any other circumstances; now it seemed the most minor of considerations. Anger this intense defined everything into the goal, and the obstacles that must be overcome to reach the goal, and it would make it very easy to make the decisions to dispose of those obstacles.

It was probably quite close to how Urbain Grandier felt when the Bisran Inquisition had finished with him.

As they neared the end of the hall, they could hear a thread of harp music, and voices and laughter.

"We're going to be roasted," Boliver said, with gloomy relish. "And eaten."

"Stop sniveling," Kade muttered. Boliver had driven her out of her despair with arguments that she should do something constructive; now that she had embarked on a plan, he was arguing against it. Typical fay perversity.

The hall made an abrupt turn, and stairs spilled down into a large roofless court that must be at or near the center of the fortress. More of the amber-skinned guards lined the porticoes, lazy but watchful, armed with gold-bladed pikes.

Most of the Seelie Court was gathered here.

Lake maidens dripped water and glamour from their gowns like pearls. Beautiful ladies wore clothes of flowers, gossamer spangled with dew, silvery gauze, or were covered only by their long hair. There were men of the same ethereal beauty as the guards, in velvets, fine lace, and gold-shot brocade. Here and there a wing as delicate as a butterfly's and more beautifully hued rose above the crowd. The bright sunlight in the open court made so much glamour the air glowed, and a troupe of gaily dressed fay tumblers performed feats impossible for humans. Most of those here were shape-changers.

Kade went down the steps and through the crowd.

They parted for her. There was no stink of unwashed flesh under the perfumes, as there would be in any human gathering. Her faded and dirty smock, her dragging petticoat lace, her page boy's boots, were violently out of place here, and she caught many sidelong glances. She could have used glamour to make herself more pleasing to the eye; several here had done so. But she didn't need to be told that that would have been a mistake.

Titania lay on a leopard-skin couch under a canopy of ostrich feathers, cool shade under the bright light. A small woman, smaller than Kade, the fayre queen wore a mantua heavily laden with pearls and silver embroidery, and her hair was the color of gold, true gold, and her features were much more beautiful than even Queen Falaise's. But Falaise's face had been touched by fear, worry, and care, and Titania's was as perfect as a carved goddess's; Kade suddenly preferred Falaise, for all that lady's wavering will.

Two fay pages with the appearance of fair young boys waited on the fayre queen, one holding a wine carafe, the other her fan. They watched Kade with matched expressions of sly mockery. But seated at her feet was a human boy with skin the color of chocolate and dark curly hair, whose gaze remained locked on the tumblers.

Kade did not curtsey to Titania. She was a queen here in her own right.

Titania's shrewd sapphire eyes considered her. She held a silver wine goblet beaded with moisture, and ran a thoughtful finger over the rim. "Oberon is not here, my sister." Her voice was like harp strings stirred by the wind.

"But you are." A few days ago Kade would have replied
I am not your sister, but she couldn't afford to be driven now.

Titania laughed. "And what have you come for?"

"A favor." Kade looked down at the human boy, and when his brown eyes met hers curiously, she asked him, "Do you want to go home?"

There was an almost soundless gasp from the assembled fay, the music ceasing and the tumblers staggering to a halt.

The boy smiled and shook his head. "No, lady," he said into the silence. His voice was a little husky, but still a child's.

Kade looked back at Titania, who smiled. "I love him," the queen of fayre said.

"The sad thing is," Kade found herself replying, "you probably do."

Titania shook her golden head in irritation and set the goblet down on a low jade table. "You always ruin our pastimes, Kade."

"Good." Kade paced a few idle steps away from the bower, to avoid showing her rabid impatience, to keep Titania from knowing how every passing moment grated. She saw the smaller sprites at the edge of the crowd back hastily away. She was hardly surprised; she probably looked like she should be standing over a battlefield piled with corpses with a raven on one shoulder. She had been right not to try to put on a pleasing appearance with glamour; that would have been catering to their whims. She looked like herself, fey and eldritch even in this company.

Watching her with perfect brows lifted archly, Titania said, "I only tolerate your interference because of my affection for your mother."

Words, no sentiment. Copied from some human. Kade smiled at her feet. She couldn't think why she had ever feared Moire, or Titania, when she had spent much of her early life sparring with Ravenna, who could have effortlessly handled both fay queens were she blind, deaf, and lame. Kade said, "I am the Queen of Air and Darkness."

Titania accepted a fan from her page and drew the delicate ivory construction through her fingers. "You do not know what that means."

"Someday I'll find out." Kade looked up and smiled. "And here you will be."

"And what must I do about that?"

"Make me happy."

Titania laughed again, this time in genuine amusement. Or at least genuine for her. She waved the two fay pages away, but let the human boy remain. "What do you want?"

Kade sensed the crowd behind her begin to relax. The clear note of a harp sounded, and the jugglers began to perform again. The boy's eyes strayed in their direction. Boliver was around somewhere; she could smell his pipe. "The first, the power to shape-change."

"Ah." Titania must know every movement of the Unseelie Court, and she did not ask why. "Best tell me what else you want, for I cannot give you that."

"You mean, you won't give me that."

Titania's perfect brow creased in annoyance. "Words. I am not a fool; I can't hand you that much power."

Kade knew it would come to this. "What if I were to offer you a power in return?"

Titania shook her head, consideringly. "You are very desperate."

"Yes. And I am very dangerous, when I am very desperate." That was as close to a threat as she wanted to come. Threats she did not have time to make good on. Kade was at a severe disadvantage and knew it. All she had was bluff and Titania's greed.

"What would you offer?"

Kade felt as if she were about to step off a precipice. After this, there was no going back. She took a deep breath, and jumped. "Knockma." Somewhere in the crowd, she heard a thump: Boliver hitting the floor. He had known what she meant to do, but his sense of the dramatic had gotten the better of him.

Titania stared, honestly shocked. Kade waited, forcing herself to smile lightly. Then Titania shook her head, her expression of honest consternation making her look more human, and, Kade thought, more beautiful. "I cannot do it, not even for so great a prize. I cannot give you that much power."

Kade sighed.
I know. If I were you I wouldn't do it either. But I was hoping you'd be too blinded by greed to care. So forget the first plan and try the second.
With Knockma dangling before her like a diamond in the sun, Titania would break down eventually. "We can bargain."