"You're right, you don't," he agreed evenly.
"Don't you dare leave without saying goodbye to your mother," Elke Kael flared, standing up.
Tarrin attended to that, hugging his mother and father, then scruffing Jenna's hair affectionately, and then he left them all before it turned into a protracted series of farewells. He was sure that that was going to rub on a few people, but he didn't want to get hung up with them right now. He started down the hallway, knowing that those who were going to help him would excuse themselves and join him in the courtyard.
Despite it had been so long, he found it to be almost automatic when he entered the hedge maze. Just like when he brought Jenna there the day before, the way seemed to open itself to him. He walked through those plant-bound passages resolutely, knowing that what was facing him was going to be long and not entirely pleasant. Reading books and doing scholar things didn't suit him. He was intelligent and quick, but he knew that he simply didn't have the patience to sit in a chair and read book after book after book. It would irritate him, and that would make him even more impatient, and that would create an endless cycle that would probably drive him away from the books in a bad temper. But what they were doing was important, so he had to endure the discomfort.
Slipping through the choked entrance, he found himself standing in the courtyard, and despite only having been there last night, he took a moment to marvel in this magical place, and the sense of peace that it never failed to incite within him. With its perfectly grown grass-never long, though never cut-and the elegant rose bushes that grew at either side of the single bench that rested before the fountain. It held at its pinnacle the statue of the nude woman that was so marvelously detailed that it looked alive. It was alive, of course, though very few people knew that. It was the center of the area of peace, the heart of the courtyard, the point to which all attention was drawn whenever anyone entered the place. He remembered the very first time he had come there, when he and Dar had been out exploring the gardens, at how mystified he'd been by this place. He even remembered his and Dar's argument over the statue. Dar, who was raised in a place where men and women bathed together, had been embarassed by the statue's incredibly detailed appearance. Tarrin remembered, with a bit of a guilty blush, that he had fondled the statue in the most intimate manner to assuade Dar's discomfort. But at that time he didn't understand, and he was sure that the Goddess wasn't too offended. At least he hoped not.
The statue was in a different pose now. For the longest time, it had been in a feminine stance, one leg bent before the other atop a small elevation in the base upon which it stood and one hip high, arms outstretched as if to welcome those who found the secret place into the courtyard. The set and pose of the statue hadn't changed, but now the arms were held out wide, as if to demonstrate something to those who gazed upon it, and the gentle expression that had been there before was replaced by a slightly sober look that belonged on the face of a schoolteacher, though it did not in any way detract from the beauty of that face. The hair had moved as well, he noticed.
Tarrin stepped closer, looking at the statue. "Mother," he nodded. "I didn't know you could move."
"Of course I can move, my kitten," the statue replied in a very audible voice, literally coming to life before him. The stone hair moved just like normal hair as she moved from that pose, elegantly sliding down to seat herself upon her base, feet dangling into the water. Her movements were fluid, like any living thing, and the stone that made up her being behaved like flesh or hair. He realized fleetingly that it was the first time he had ever heard that voice outside of himself, or outside of the Heart. "Icons aren't just pieces of stone. I could have my icon walk around the Tower, if I really wanted it."
"Does the Keeper know about you?"
"Yes and no. They know my icon is within the grounds of one of the Towers, but they don't know which one. Keritanima told them that they're here to destroy my icon, but the Keeper secretly doesn't believe that I'm here. She thinks that the tower in Sharadar is where my icon is, and even if my icon were here, she believes that I'd simply remove my icon to the tower in Sharadar if it were truly being threatened. But she doesn't understand that because of the forces at work you can't see or comprehend, I can't do that. Not right now. My restricting myself to this Tower is part of the agreement I had to make to be able to grant you the aid that I've granted you. To restrict myself in all ways as Val is restricted, so that I can grant you the same aid he grants his own children." She held out a hand to him, and he wasted no time stepping up onto the lip and wading across the fountain. He reached her and took her hands in his paws, feeling the stone, but sensing the incredible magical power that rested just beneath that mortal shell. He looked down into stone eyes, but he could see those same eyes that looked upon him when he was within the Heart, could feel that same sense of her presence that never failed to evoke powerful feelings of love and security in him, love and devotion to this ethereal being who so totally owned him. "I feel your love, my sweet one," she smiled up at him; despite being on the raised base, he was so tall that even that wasn't enough to put her eyes above his. "It has become so strong now, almost like a bonfire."
He couldn't really say anything to that, just looking into her eyes. "I hope I've done what you wanted me to do, Mother," he said with uncertainty. "I've tried."
"Oh, Tarrin!" she laughed. "You have no idea how proud I am of you."
That made him absolutely explode with relief and pride, knowing that one such as her was proud of him. He felt blessed, truly blessed. "Well, I know I can be a pain," he said self-effacingly.
"It's part of what makes you strong, my child," she said gently.
"What's going to happen after we find out where the Firestaff is, Mother?" he asked.
"You'll find out when you get there, kitten," she replied with a gentle smile. "For now, know that you're on the right track."
He nodded, then blew out his breath. "I'm not looking forward to this. Spending days learning Sha'Kar and then poring over endless books doesn't sit well with me."
"Well, I have a secret for you," she said with a little smile. "You're not doing it."
"Why not? Isn't that what I was supposed to do?"
"No, kitten. You had to recover the book. The task of unlocking its secrets belongs to someone else. You'll be here, and you'll help, but the main burden of that responsibility isn't yours."
"Kerri."
"It's not much of a stretch, is it?" the statue smiled. "This is just the kind of thing Keritanima is suited to do."
"I know. We make a good team."
"She'll have plenty of help, of course," the statue smiled. "But one of Keritanima's strengths is her ability to organize many and set them onto a single goal."
"She is a Queen."
"Yes, she is."
Tarrin remembered something. "You did that to her, didn't you?" he asked insightfully. "I once scoffed that she wouldn't be queen, but you told me to wait and see. You had a hand in that, didn't you?"
"I told you after that that her being queen was more important than her being with you, remember, kitten?" she told him. "Of course I did that to her. It pained me, because I don't like seeing my children suffer, but sometimes the suffering makes you stronger. Just as it pained me when I told the Keeper to send Jesmind after you. I knew what was coming, and I hated it. But sometimes we don't have choices. Not even the gods." He bowed his head, and she reached up and put a stone hand under his chin, lifting it so he would look into her eyes. "But you forgive me, don't you, my kitten?"
"I understand why you did it, Mother," he sighed. "I understand it now. I didn't at first, but I do now."