Winds of Fury (40 page)

“If I set it now, and lift it when the discussion is ended, it will be limited to that time period,” Darkwind replied. He looked around. “There is this; if any of you feel truly that you cannot bear to have such a spell set upon you, there is always the option to leave and have no part in the decision.”

It was an option no one really wanted to take. In the face of Daren's acceptance, and Talia's, which followed immediately upon his, the other Councillors could do nothing else but accept. No one wanted to be left out of the decision, nor did they care for the idea of giving up any of their responsibilities.

Darkwind was exhausted, but he was also an Adept; he was not dependent on his own personal energies to set this spell. Elspeth sensed him fumbling a little in his attempt to find the nearest node; she solved his problem by linking him to it herself. His brief smile was all the thanks she needed.

It was a sad irony that coercive spells were some of the easiest to set. Darkwind was done before half of the Councillors even realized he had begun.

“There,” he said, letting his link to the node go and slumping back in his chair. “Now, none of you will be able to speak of this outside the Council chamber, nor with anyone who is not of the Council.”

“We won't?” Father Ricard said wonderingly, touching his forehead. “How odd—I don't feel any different—”

“Which is as it should be.” For the first time, Firesong, who was sitting behind Elspeth, spoke up. “A coercive spell is an insidious thing. One set well should not be noticed at all. As none of you ever noticed that you could not speak of magic, nor remember its existence, except as an historical anomaly.” His lips curved in gentle irony as they started. “Yes, indeed, speakers for k'Valdemar—your land has been under a coercive spell for long and long, and you had never noted it. Such is the usage of magic in skilled and powerful hands. You should be grateful that your last Herald-Mage was a man of deep integrity and great resourcefulness.”

:And had a lot of Companions to help him,:
Gwena added smugly, confirming Elspeth's suspicion that the Companions had been involved in keeping true magic a “forgotten” resource.

Kero let out a long, deep sigh. “Well, now that we've some assurance we can keep this out of Ancar's hands, we need to put together our team. Ordinarily—I beg your pardons, but ordinarily this is covert work, and none of you would ever hear about it, much less help me agree whom to send. You
might
have heard about the results, if Selenay, Daren, and I agreed that you needed the information. There have been a number of operations you've heard nothing of, and there will be more.”

The Lord Patriarch smiled, a little grimly. “We had assumed that, my lady.”

Kero coughed. “Well. I had hoped you had. But this time, I
need
that agreement from you, because if we are going to succeed, we must send mages against mages, and we'll be taking those mages away from the direct defense of Valdemar. They're going against Ancar, Hulda, and a mage we
know
is a dangerous Adept, and that means sending in the best we have. So we must accept Elspeth's offer.”

“Must we?” Talia asked, but without much hope.

“Speaking as a strategist,” the Lord Marshal said unhappily, “I must agree. She has volunteered, and she is a Herald—she knows her duty. And again, it is the last move that Ancar would ever expect.”

“The last that Falconsbane would expect, as well,” Darkwind put in. “He will be anticipating that every highborn that can will be fleeing to safety in Rethwellan. He cannot conceive of willing self-sacrifice.
If
he knows that Elspeth is here and not still in k'Sheyna, he will expect her to do the same as he would, to try to escape him and not fly into his reach. After all, she could seek asylum with her kin and be accepted gladly, and she has all the mage-power she needs to escape his minions easily.”

“If you send Elspeth, you must send Skif,” Lady Kester said firmly. “Whether you will admit it or not,
I
am perfectly aware that he has done this sort of thing before. Send an experienced agent with her, one who has been working with her.”

“If I go,” Skif replied, from behind Darkwind, “then Nyara comes as well. Cymry backs her to come along. She is clever and skilled, a trained fighter, she has a score of counts to settle with Falconsbane, and she knows him as no one else does.”

Kero gave him a long look, transferred it to Nyara, then caught Elpeth's gaze, and did something she seldom resorted to with anyone but her lover, Herald Eldan. She used Mindspeech.

:Family resemblance, kitten?:
she asked.

Elspeth nodded, very slightly. There was no point in going into excruciating detail at this point. Let Kero simply assume that Nyara was trying to make up for the perfidy of a relative, and perhaps, to extract revenge for something Falconsbane had done to her. That was something Kero could understand.

:Ah,
: came the reply.
:I'd wondered.:
And she left it at that. Kero was nothing if not expedient. And she trusted Skif's judgment as she trusted her own.

“By the same token, I must go with Elspeth,” Darkwind put in. “We have worked together successfully, I am the more experienced mage of the two of us, and as Nyara knows Falconsbane, so she knows Hulda. That will give us four agents to target them, two of them mages and Adepts.”

“But you and Elspeth would strike first at Hulda and Ancar,” Firesong pointed out. “There is some urgency for
our
people in ridding the world of the Beast, and only an Adept is likely to be able to counter his protective magics. That being the case, I should go with you as well. If you divide, two to target the Hardornens, and two to target the Beast, Skif and Nyara should have an Adept with them. There is no point in dividing those who have worked together.”

Kero nodded. “I have to admit that Falconsbane is not a priority for us—”

Firesong shrugged. “He should be—believe me, even more so than the Hardornens. So, let us plan a two-bladed attack upon
him.
That gives you an Adept that Falconsbane
does not know
to work upon him, and an Adept each for Hulda and Ancar, Adepts who are also well-trained as fighters. I am by no means certain that an Adept can take the Beast; I suspect I will accomplish more by distracting him, making him think I am his only enemy. This means that the physical attack, which he will not anticipate, can come from Skif and Nyara.”

:And me,:
Need said quietly, for Elspeth's ears alone.
:But the boy will be damned useful
.
I think I'm going to have to be awfully close to Falconsbane to do any good.:

Elspeth tried not to look surprised at the Healing Adept's speech, but she had not expected Firesong to volunteer for this. She glanced back at Darkwind, who shrugged.

:He is unique,:
Darkwind said wryly.
:With his own will. He does have the mind-set of the Healing Adept, and that means he would not care to see Falconsbane working his twisted will on lands that had been Cleansed. And I suspect that your mutual ancestor may have impressed some kind of sense of responsibility for your continued health upon him. I certainly would not turn his aid away! But for predictability—I would look upon Firesong as a benevolent trickster.:

“What are we going to do for mages if you're all leaving?” Lady Kester asked, a little desperately.

“You have the gryphons,” Darkwind pointed out. “They are both Masters. You have Heralds and trainees with Mage-Gift, currently being schooled in combative magics.”

“Ah. . . .” Kero leaned back in her chair, and hooded her eyes with her lids. “We won't be depending entirely on the gryphons. Since this is all under the rose—I have a surprise for you all. There are more mages coming, and I expect them to start arriving any day now.”

As the Councillors turned as one from watching Elspeth and her group to staring at Kero, she revealed to them the news of the three groups of mages currently being brought at top speed toward Haven, riding pillion behind Heralds and trainees released from the Collegium for the duty. She had virtually denuded the Herald's Collegium of all but those Mage-Gifted and first-year students.

“
That's
why you sent all those so-called ‘training groups' off!” exclaimed the Lord Marshal. Kero nodded.

“So, we will have mages. Will they be Adepts?” She shrugged. “I can't tell you. I don't know what they're sending us. What I
can
tell you, since I used mages in my Company, is that a mage is only as good as the tacticians he works with, and his willingness to really use his talents to the fullest. Just because someone is an Adept, that does not mean he is going to be effective.”

“I have, in my time, seen a few completely ineffective Adepts,” Firesong put in. “I have seen a
Journeyman
defeat one of them in a contest. Kerowyn is correct.”

“So there you have it. Are we all agreed on the team?” Kero spread her hands to indicate that she was ready to call a vote on it.

The vote was unanimous, though it was fairly clear that there was some reluctance to place the only Adepts Valdemar had access to, and its former Heir, in such jeopardy.

“Fine.” Kero nodded. “Then as far as I am concerned, this meeting can close. We all have things we need to do. I have to find a way to insert these folk into Hardorn. You have things you need to tell your people. Ladies and lords, you will be in charge of the physical defenses and the evacuations. You should consult with the Lord Marshal about that, and how to organize them to coordinate with his strike-and-run raids. I'll join you as soon as we come up with an insertion plan.” She raised an eyebrow at Talia, Elspeth, and Prince Daren. “You three have a task I really don't envy. The Queen is not going to like this.”

Talia and Elspeth exchanged a knowing glance and a sigh. Daren shook his head.

“Perhaps,” he suggested gently, “I should be the one to break the word first to Selenay. I shall remind her of how sad the little ones would be to become half-orphaned; I hope then she will not slay the father of her children out of sheer pique.”

 

Elspeth and Talia waited nervously in the rather austere antechamber to Selenay and Daren's private suite, but it seemed almost no time at all before Daren was back, beckoning to both of them to come with him. They followed him into Selenay's private office, and Elspeth's heart ached to see how drawn and worn her mother's face was. And to add to that burden of grief and worry—

But Selenay only came straight to her, held out her arms, and embraced her tightly but not possessively. Her body shook with tension but not with the tears that Elspeth had feared.

Finally she released her daughter, and held her away at arm's length, searching her face for something although Elspeth could not tell what it was. Her eyes were narrowed with concentration, and Elspeth saw many fine worry lines around her eyes and creasing her forehead that had not been there when she left.

“Good,” she said finally. “This isn't something someone talked you into. You know exactly what you're doing. You thought of this yourself?”

Elspeth nodded. Her mother had pulled her hair back into a no-nonsense braid like Kero's, and like Talia, she was wearing breeches and tunic, her only concession to rank being a bit of gold trim on the tunic hem and her coronet about her brow. Her sword and sword-belt were hanging from the chair beside her desk, and knives lay on top of a pile of papers. Although she had seen her mother in armor and on a battlefield, this was not a Selenay that Elspeth had ever seen before, but she rather expected that anyone who had fought with her mother and grandfather in the Tedrel Wars would find this Queen very familiar. Selenay had pared
everything
from her life that was not relevant to the defense of her land. Valdemar was in peril, and the Queen was ready for personal action.

“I thought about trying to be a commander, but I'm not a tactician, and not even a particularly good fighter. No one knows me to follow me as a charismatic leader,” Elspeth said slowly. “In the lines, I would be just one more warrior. Yes, I
could
help with magic defenses—I could even coordinate the mages—but I would be
your
daughter, and the ones from outKingdom would always expect me to favor Herald-Mages and their safety over those from outside. Such suspicion could be fatal. Kero always taught us that you don't stand off and fling sand at a fire from a safe distance; you go in and cut a firebreak right in its path.”

“Kero taught you well.” Selenay rubbed her eyes with her index finger, and blinked hard against tears. “The Queen agrees with you; the mother—what can I tell you? I hate the idea of sending my child off into this kind of danger, my heart wants to hold you back and keep you safe. But you are a woman grown, Elspeth. You are responsible for your own safety and I can't protect you anymore. Besides, there is no safety anywhere in Valdemar, not now. Elspeth, I am so
proud
of you!”

Elspeth had never expected to hear that last; it caught her by surprise, and her heart swelled and overflowed. She flung herself into her mother's arms again, and this time they both gave way to weeping. Talia, and then Daren, joined them in a fourfold embrace, offering comfort and support. This was sorrow both bitter and sweet, sweet for the accomplishment—bitter for all that accomplishment meant to all of them. Nothing would ever be the same again, even if they all survived this.

When both of them got control over themselves again, they separated, slowly and reluctantly, with tremulous smiles.

“Thank you, Mama,” Elspeth managed. “That is the most wonderful thing you have ever said to me. I've always been proud of you, too, but never more than today. . . .”