“Such a wise young man!” said Notole. “Let us seal our alliance, my young Lord. We are old and mistrustful and must be convinced that you take this as seriously as you seem to do. Come to me.”
I climbed up the wide black step to stand in front of her. I was amazed to see that her gold mask was a part of her face, grown right into the pale, dry flesh. Each eye was a single, huge emerald. What could she see through them?
“Everything, my young Lord. Everything.”
I looked away quickly. It was rude to stare, even at something so strange. Notole must be used to it, since she had guessed what I was thinking.
“We’ve found something that belongs to you, young duke, and have been waiting for a proper time to return it.” Her hands were very dry, and the flesh hung on her long bony fingers as if it weren’t connected to the bones at all. She held out a small green silk bag and dropped its contents into her hand. It was the Comigor signet ring, the one Seri had brought to me when she came to tell me lies about Papa’s death. The Lords must have found it in my clothes when I first came to Zhev’Na. I had forgotten all about it.
“Thank you,” I said, and reached for it.
But Notole yanked it back out of reach. “Wait one moment. As I said, we must be convinced that your heart lies here in Zhev’Na, that you will not desert us when times get hard… or when your pillow is wet with a child’s tears.”
My face got hot… and my blood, too. If Sefaro had seen my weakness and told the Lords of it, I would kill him. Then the Lords would know for certain that I was not a child. “I’ve sworn on my family’s honor to avenge my father and my nurse,” I said, trying to stand tall. “I consider my debt to you of equal weight. I do not swear lightly, even though I’m young.” I pulled out my sword and laid it at Notole’s feet. “I will serve you until you consider my life debt satisfied. Your enemies are my enemies, and I will do whatever is in my power to sustain you against them.”
Notole laughed gently, her breath ruffling my hair. “We do not want your sword, young Lord. Not yet… though that may come when you are older. What we want is your loyalty, your allegiance… your soul. We want you to exchange this signet ring, a symbol of a life you have forsworn, for this”-she opened her other hand to reveal a small gold triangle, embedded with an emerald, an amethyst, and a ruby-“the token of our alliance. Else how can we trust that you will consider our common interests in preference to those about which we care nothing? A life debt cannot be half repaid or served only when there is nothing better to do.”
She held out both hands then, the signet ring in one and the Lords’ token in the other. “You must choose.” The palms of her hands were horribly scarred, as if they’d been burned long ago.
Though none of the three moved from their thrones, I felt as if they were all hovering about me-waiting, suspending breath until I would choose. Maybe they thought it would be difficult. But my dreams had already revealed enough of the truth. There was nothing for me at Comigor, and I wanted revenge more than anything in the world. I touched the signet ring for a moment and tried to think what to say about it. I’m sorry, Papa. If I weren’t evil, I could be like you. But I am what I am, and if those who are wicked can have any honor, mine will have to be what I make it. And then I moved my hand to the Lords’ token, picked it up, and felt such a sigh in the room that it made me think of a thunderstorm that breaks a summer’s drought.
“Well chosen…”
“… we are honored…”
“… our young friend and ally. Come let me show you how to wear it.”
Ziddari took the jeweled token, and before I realized what he was doing, a sharp, hot pain stabbed my left ear. “There,” he said, before I could protest. I touched my earlobe, and the jeweled pin was affixed firmly to it like the bolt through a gate.
Now we can teach and guide you…
Help make you more than you are.
My hands flew to my ears. Parven’s and Notole’s voices were not in my ears, but inside my head.
Any question you have, just think it or speak it, and one of us will answer. Ziddari’s lips didn’t move. It was amazing!
They sent me back to my house after that. Sefaro and two other slaves were waiting at the door as always. They bowed as I walked through the gate and across the courtyard. When they straightened up, Sefaro’s eyes fell on the jewels in my ear. He laid his hand on the other slaves’ arms and nodded toward me. Their faces grew pale and their eyes wide when they saw, and all three of them dropped to their knees. I thought that their race must be weak and cowardly to be afraid of me just because I was a friend of their Lords.
Indeed it is a truth, Gerick. Dar’Nethi are soft and corrupt-afraid of their own enchantments, their own power-wanting every sorcerer to be as weak as they. They must be strictly controlled or they are worthless to anyone. We use them as slaves so that we can free our own kind to concentrate on battle. This was Ziddari whispering in my mind. Try them. See how they quake when faced with strength greater than their own.
“So they are sorcerers, too?” I said, just as if I was talking to him in person. That was a new consideration. I couldn’t imagine it. I pushed Sefaro with my foot, and he fell from his kneeling position into a heap on the floor. He didn’t move, just stayed there in the dirt looking up at me until I told him to get up. I would have melted with shame to look like that. “Why don’t they use sorcery to free themselves? Are they too cowardly even for that?”
The collars prevent them. They are Dar’Nethi, subjects of Prince D’Natheil. They and their Prince have forbidden us to grow and use our power efficiently. We use the collars to let them know what it is like to be crippled. It’s the purest torment we can offer them. And very just.
To prevent them using their sorcery did seem just. But I couldn’t help but remember how it was to be afraid all the time, and so later, when Sefaro came to unstrap my weapons and take off the silver chains and the fine suit, I told him that he did me good service. He bowed a bit, but didn’t ask permission to speak. I wondered if somehow he guessed that I’d thought about killing him when I was with the Lords.
When I went to sleep in my huge bed, I didn’t dream at all.
My life changed on that night, more clearly even than it had when I’d first come to Zhev’Na. One of the Lords was always with me, just at the edge of my thoughts-a voice in my head that wasn’t me. It seemed as natural as breathing or using the sorcery that could make toy soldiers march or flowers bloom whenever I wanted.
Sometimes the voice was very clearly one or the other of them. Notole whispered about grand things like how the universe worked and of magical power. Parven lectured me like a military tutor, teaching me attacks and defenses, and tactics and strategies that had been used in their thousand-year war. Ziddari was-well, Darzid-and he would talk about everything else, from how to treat slaves to the names of our enemies and our friends.
Sometimes I didn’t hear any voice, but if I thought of a question about swordplay, Parven spoke up, or if I wondered how to use sorcery to make my bath hotter, Notole answered.
Over the next few days the Lords began to teach me about the origins of the war with Prince D’Natheil, of how everyone in their land could do sorcery, only some were better at it than others. Notole told me how D’Natheil’s ancestors, most particularly the ancient Dar’Nethi king called D’Amath, forbade those who were better at sorcery from trying new things, or from doing any magic that everyone in the land could not do just as well. It seemed like a terrible injustice, like saying that Papa could not fight with a sword, just because he was better than everyone else.