It was as well I chose to fight, for just as I finished my own story we heard shouts from the street and a hammering on the door. Aimee hurried out to investigate and returned moments later with the news that war had returned to Gondai.
Chapter 21
"They say the flames can be seen for thirty leagues," said Mistress Aimee, whom I'd learned was the owner of this house. She whisked the breakfast things from the table as she delivered the newest details of the night's dreadful events. Without warning, a massive force of Zhid warriors had fallen on Lyrrathe Vale, slaughtered or captured every inhabitant, and left .the fertile wheat fields of the easternmost Vale of Eidolon an inferno. The imagining left my flesh cold. I knew all about Zhid raiders.
"Prince Ven'Dar has commanded every seasoned warrior to take up a weapon and find an untrained youth or maiden to stand beside him. He is riding out himself with Preceptor W'Tassa and six hundred guards to take their stand at Lyrrathe Vale, and he dispatched another five hundred fighters—all that he could summon in the middle of the night—to the northern borders. Je'Reint has been charged to defend the city and to muster more troops to send to Lyrrathe as soon as possible."
"Ven'Dar must be told she's taken Gerick," said the Lady Seriana—Seri she said to call her, but I wasn't ready for that kind of intimacy with the family of a man I'd once sworn to kill. "He must hear what I suspect about D'Sanya, as well."
"I'll see the message sent," said Aimee, handing a stack of plates and bowls to a wide-eyed girl who was evidently the only servant left in the house. Everyone with talent had been summoned to the aid of Avonar.
"Je'Reint has summoned me to the palace. I go to him within the hour."
Paulo perked his ears up at that. "He wouldn't send you out with the fighters? Not a lady like you." His face took fire as it did every time he addressed Aimee. Not difficult to see how the wind blew in that quarter.
For her part, Aimee gave him a smile that could have melted a boulder. "Certainly not, sir. Master Je'Reint is very wise. He knows that my skills are of far more use in planning strategies than in executing them." She then proceeded to demonstrate that very fact by tipping a tray of cups just far enough that three of them fell off, splattering her white gown with tea. Paulo jumped to her rescue, snatching up the cups and gently removing the tray, while Aimee threw up her hands in good humor. "I can help them lay out an image of the terrain or the placement of troops without being on the battlefield. I'll be quite safe and out of the way, so I don't risk upsetting anything more important than teacups!"
It had taken me more than an hour to realize that Aimee was blind. I had just thought her clumsy. It didn't seem to bother her all that much, even her awkwardness. Indeed she was fortunate—intelligent, talented, well provided for, and with a naturally gracious disposition and the kind of face and figure that made men forget their own names. She even spoke of her family with love. I decided that it would be very easy to dislike Aimee.
But then again . . . she couldn't see the way Paulo wrapped his eyes around her. And she was the daughter of a Dar'Nethi Preceptor, while Paulo was . . . well, I still wasn't quite sure what he was, other than a friend such as anyone might wait a lifetime to have. But I would guess that he could never aspire to a woman of prominent family in his own world. And the secret reading lessons hinted that he had never told Aimee of other yearnings she could not see. Perhaps he never would, and she'd never know. I'd always thought there was a goodly bit of perversity in the turnings of the Way.
"Clearly we'll have to find Gerick on our own." Lady Seriana's mind was fixed neither on war nor romantic attachments. "Could she have taken him back to Maroth?"
While Aimee busied about her household, preparing to answer her summons to the palace, Lady Seriana and Paulo worked on strategies for tracing Lady D'Sanya's movements, and for searching the hospice—just in case I might be lying about him being gone—and the second hospice in Maroth. They even discussed hiring a Finder to help them discover him. They seemed to have forgotten about me.
I sat on the little footstool with my chin on my hand, my ugly, serviceable clothes stiff with dried mud because I had been too stubborn to yield to Aimee's offer to have them cleaned for me. What in the name of sense was I was doing with these people? Their concerns were corrupted souls and wars for control of the universe; their acquaintances were Princes, Preceptors, and Lords, and men who visited the land of the dead and came back again. Vasrin had shaped no such path for me. I needed to be on my way back to Gaelic Papa would be wondering where I was. As soon as they stopped talking long enough, I would take my leave.
I stopped listening, wandered over to a tall window, and stared out at the deceptively peaceful sunlight bouncing off the garden walls and the city towers beyond them. The air wasn't peaceful . . . not by a long way. War. The Zhid. Avonar's fear was thicker than the daylight. I could feel it in the way you feel the coming of the first storm of winter.
"You've never told us your name."
I almost jumped out of my skin. Aimee had come up just beside me. Her eyes were closed as the sunbeams bathed her smooth skin. "I'd be pleased to know you better before you leave us. And Lady Seriana will wish to tell Master Karon of you. It will give him heart to hear that Gerick was able to help you . . . that he retained some power the Lady could not control."
"Is it truly Prince D'Natheil who lies at the hospice? The very same?"
"It is, though he goes only by his other name now. I served him with my Imaging in the years he reigned in Avonar, and once I have imprinted the image of a person on my mind, I cannot mistake him. He is the noblest gentleman I've ever known save my own dear father who has passed on to L'Tiere."
"It hardly seems possible."
"Their story is astonishing, is it not? I'd never heard it told all at once until now. Had I not been privileged to witness a small part of it, I'd never believe it."
"I need to get back to my father."
She nodded, understanding. "And then to answer the summons of your own talent in this coming war?"
"No summons comes for such as me. Oh, I've useful skills, but no true talent. It seems to have been lost along my Way."
I waited for the effusive sympathy and subtle aversion that was the usual when a kind person finally made the connection. It probably just took Aimee longer because she couldn't see the ugly telltale about my neck.
Though her voice could not have been heard across the room, she bent closer to my ear. "Someday you and I will have to decide which is easier on those around us: your skills with no true talent, or my true talent with so little skill at anything truly useful."
I had to laugh. She spoke with such sincere good humor as to make me forget my usual bristling at discussions of true talent.
"My name is Jen'Larie," I said. "But I've always been called Jen."
"Jen'Larie—what a beautiful name! I've never heard it." She extended her hand. "May I?"
I wasn't exactly sure what she wanted, but I wasn't afraid of her. I took her hand and felt the warm flow of sensation up hand and arm that accompanied a touch of sorcery. She squeezed my hand as she released it a moment later.
"Now I shall be able to recognize you should we meet again. You are so strong and lovely and delicate all at once, just like your name!"
Now I believed Aimee was blind. No one in all the world had ever called me lovely. "It was my mother's name, too," I said. "Everyone shortened mine to tell us apart."
"My mother shared my name, as well, but we didn't have much confusion," she said. "She did not survive my birth. It came too early and was very difficult. Many weeks passed before the Healers were sure I would live, with or without sight."