"The one who condemned his son to death saying he was too evil, too corrupt to live?"
"The same."
"It's impossible, Papa. Prince D'Natheil is buried in the Tomb of the Heirs. And clearly he did not do everything we thought. One of the Lords still lives."
But I was very confused.
Chapter 12
"A fortnight more or less, then I'll be back," I told my father. Outside, the dawn gleamed through a watery mist, the lingering remnants of a rainy night. "Are you sure you'll be all right? Perhaps I shouldn't have—"
"If we're ever to be done with this business, you must be satisfied that the Lady serves no purpose of the Lords. Can you say so yet?" My father sat listless and unshaven in his chair by the open doors. Unable to lie abed on the morning of my departure for Maroth Vale, I'd rousted him too early.
"She loathes the Lords. The least mention of Zhev'Na sets her talking of some new scheme to erase all memory of them. She is . . . exceptional … in so many ways, and I can find no fault in how she uses her talents."
On our last visit to Tymnath, D'Sanya had healed, embraced, and listened to people's troubles until well past midnight. Every day she spent at least an hour writing letters to those who worked to restore and rebuild Gondai, encouraging them to persevere. She sent them gifts of tools and materials, even hiring craftsmen to aid those in remote villages.
"But you're not ready to tell Ven'Dar to yield his throne and sleep soundly after." He tried to smile. An effort . . . but a poor one.
"She's still said very little of what they made her do in Zhev'Na. It pains her to speak of it. But most of my doubts center on her power. I've not yet come to understand it."
I didn't want to tell him that my greatest concern was his own erratic behavior; he needed nothing more to weigh on his spirit. On some days he could converse with the same insight and intelligence as always. But on some days, he could not utter three syllables that made sense together. Why did this hospice enchantment, woven with such care and generosity, leave its subjects so empty and joyless?
"She changes the subject whenever I ask her about power or talent, as if by talking about it, she's somehow boasting or pointing out my lacks. But she's admitted that she has little need to gather power the way most Dar'Nethi do. She says that she and her brothers inherited their father's power directly. Does that make sense? I'll confess, when I try to analyze her enchantments, I feel as if I'm being battered by a tidal wave, and the best I can do is survive the onslaught."
Having so little experience of sorcery and enchantments outside Zhev'Na, I had no feel for the magic D'Sanya worked. It was incredibly complex, dense, obscure, slightly different in composition every time she used it. Of course all Dar'Nethi magic seemed somewhat obscure to me, out of tune somehow, more so than I remembered from my limited experience of it. Perhaps I'd been in the Bounded too long, living without sorcery in a primitive land. But as long as I could not testify to the components of D'Sanya's magic, I could not declare our work done.
My father hunched in his dressing gown. No matter how cool or wet the weather nowadays, he insisted on keeping the garden doors open, saying he felt suffocated otherwise. "Inherit power, rather than talent? I don't know. D'Arnath's power was legendary … as was that of all those of his blood. The histories claim that many other Dar'Nethi wielded power on an incredible scale before the Catastrophe. When I first ruled in Avonar, the Preceptors told me that my workings felt that way to them. Ah, Gerick, I do miss it."
I squatted beside his chair and laid my hand on his knee. "I know, Father. A fortnight with her will surely satisfy our last doubts. You'll take care of yourself while I'm away? Paulo said he would ask if T'Laven might come visit you."
He picked at a frayed corner of his pocket and stared vacantly into the light.
"Father?" I twisted my neck, making sure my face was in his line of vision. "You'll be all right while I'm in Maroth?"
"Yes, yes. I'll be fine." A spark of good humor brightened his face for a moment. "Now, go. A fortnight with a beautiful lady who adores you . . . Who would have thought our stay here would lead to that? Don't waste one moment of it. Not one."
Adding this one more guilt to my oversupply of them, I hurried through the public gardens and took a shortcut to the stable, arriving at least a half-hour early for our departure. F'Syl, the head groom, was still yawning over a mug of saffria.
"Have you seen Cedor this morning?" I asked. Perhaps I could arrange an early breakfast for my father as an apology for waking him.
The balding groom, two purple scars making his round face look inexpertly put together, pointed toward the orchard with a four-fingered hand. "He brought me my cup. Then took off that way as if he'd a bee on his backside."
Thanking F'Syl, I stowed my pack inside the door and hurried down the orchard path. The sweetish odor of rotting fruit—plums and cherries that had been crushed underfoot during the harvest—hung in the damp air along with the scent of ripening apples . . . early, it seemed from what I knew of apples. But then one could say that everything in the orchard was "early." A year ago the orderly ranks of trees had not existed. So many marvels D'Sanya had wrought. Growth and healing. Verdant life. The Gardeners at the Gaelie guesthouse had said the reclamation of the Wastes had almost come to a standstill before last month, when the Lady spent a day on the western fringes. The Lords had never valued growth or healing or verdant life. D'Sanya did not serve their purposes.
I walked all the way to the end of the orchard path before locating Cedor. On the far side of the grassy strip that bounded the orchard, just beside the hospice wall, my father's fair-haired attendant was deep in conversation with a taller man in a green cloak—the consiliar Na'Cyd. I couldn't hear what the two were saying, but their rigid posture and the occasional crescendo of sound indicated it was no morning pleasantry. Rancor and bitterness flowed out from them like fish rings in a pond, making the very air about me venomous. Though discord among the Dar'Nethi was always a matter of concern— Zhid fed on discord—I turned my back and retraced my steps. D'Sanya would be waiting.
Three horses, one of them mine, stood saddled and ready in front of the stable. Wrapped in a light traveling cloak of scarlet, the Lady was supervising F'Syl as he snugged a small bag on her saddle. The bulk of her baggage had already been sent on to Maroth through a portal, but we had chosen to ride on this journey, as we took such pleasure in it.
I stood for a moment at the edge of the orchard, pleased to watch her when she was not aware of me. She was teasing F'Syl about his propensity to oversleep, but when she thanked him for loading her pack, her slim fingers, adorned with two gold rings, touched his maimed hand. Even twenty paces away, I felt the tidal wash of her magic. F'Syl's bones ached terribly in the damp, but he refused to take up one of the precious places in the hospice to ease his hurts. He, too, had once been Zhid and proudly wore D'Sanya's lion pendant around his neck.
When D'Sanya turned to watch the groom hobble away, she caught sight of me. The happiness that blossomed on her face warmed the morning far more than my brisk walk had done.
"When I didn't see Nacre here this morning, I worried that you had changed your mind about the journey," she said when I joined her at the stable.