She turned away from Fthoom, from the bearer, from everyone, glad of the excuse not only not to face any magicians for a moment, but to remind herself she could and, at this moment, as she entered the Little Hall and settled herself in her place, should. In formal Court, as this was, you did not turn your back on your betters. She was reminding herself and all the Court that she was a princess, and Fthoom was only a magician. With the roc of her vision still tugging at her attention she thought suddenly of the rocs and taralians and norindours, the ladons and the wyverns of Garren’s report, and their leagues of dark tunnels and unknown exits—and hoped that Danny and Garren and Farley always had good eyes and good swords at their backs. For a moment her own eyes were dazzled blue, not the midnight blue of the bearer’s robe, but as if Danacor stood in front of her, and unsheathed the Sword: but at least the blue flare banished the tawny roc.
She climbed the three steps to her chair, and then she had to turn round again and sit down, and face Fthoom. She was still taller than he, even sitting, on the king’s dais, and her head was level with Ebon’s, who was standing at her side. Ebon looked at her once—an unreadable, unfathomable, silent look—and then faced out, inscrutable as a black statue of a pegasus. She hoped her own face was as expressionless. Ahathin, with the faintest tock of Speaker sticks, took his place beside Ebon.
A herald announced that the Court was present on this day of six sixes after the vertex of spring at the request of the magician Fthoom and the sanction of the king; and herewith it begins.
Fthoom stepped forward, his cloak rustling. “My kings,” he said, and knelt, in precisely his old unmindful gesture. Rising to his feet again he plunged into speech, eager as a child at a party. His eyes glittered—like jewels in sunlight, not like human eyes at all. “My kings,” he said again.“I have done as my king bade me, and studied the records in the royal libraries for all mention of friendship between pegasus and human beyond the binding defined in the Treaty of Alliance. Years this work has taken me, as you know, for there have been many records to study and many reports to consider and weigh; and my work was the harder in that most of those chronicles which dealt specifically with such relationships did not tell plainly of their outcome. I had to use all my skill—all my skill and all my helpers’ skill—to extrapolate what lay hidden: and still no clear picture emerged.”
Which is to say that you found no support at all for your hateful theory and you were working away like anything to think of ways to discredit what you did find, thought Sylvi—and she thought this louder than she realised, for there was a silent hum of agreement from Ebon. But this gave her no comfort; Fthoom had not demanded an audience to declare defeat.
She felt a sense of dread as strong as if Fthoom were to announce a tawny roc waiting for them, now, this minute, in the Great Court.
“Until, but a few months ago, I had a dream. While I have also been suspended from my position in the Guild of Magicians, I have not lost my expertise.”
Sylvi, listening hard, thought that for the first time his voice sounded a little too emphatic, and thought, something good may yet come of this, if his power in that guild has been shaken. She wanted to look at her father, but she didn’t dare; and she also knew that he, of everyone in the Court that day, would never allow anything to be read on his face.
“I had a dream, and I knew at once that it was an important dream. In this dream I saw myself in a far corner of one of the libraries—the farthest oldest corner of our king’s great library—a corner where such fragments of text as have little worth are stored. And in a corner of this corner I laid my hand upon a stone, and found that it was loose in the wall, and drew it out, and found a parchment roll in the dark hollow behind it, old and brown and fragile.”
Sylvi wanted to shout, I don’t believe you! I don’t believe you! It’s a trick! What you say you found—if you found anything—you put there for yourself to find!
The young bearer shifted his position and a breath of alien air fanned across Sylvi’s face with a smell of hot metal and blood.
“My dream, as you will have guessed, spoke truly. I went to the corner of the library, and I found that stone—but it was not loose in the wall, and had I not spells to loosen it, it would remain there still, and its secret dark behind it; and had I not had the dream I would not have recognised the stone that I needed to loosen. This stone has the ancient symbol for lightning etched upon it, as guard and ward; but it itself had been warded, that no one might see there was something there defended, for whoever hid this thing badly wanted none to find it. And had I—I—not been so absorbed—consumed—by my desire to fulfil my obligation to my king that even my dreaming self did continue the search on planes of being and perception I cannot reach awake, I too might have passed it by. As it was I spoke certain subtle words of power, and I drew the lightning-blazed stone out, and there I found the parchment roll.”
Fthoom paused, sure of his audience. “That parchment roll,” he said, his voice now low, and slippery as oil on a plate, “tells a story of the reign of King Ascur II, who was also twelfth of his line.”
Ascur II, thought Sylvi frantically. Ascur II—she could remember a little about him because he did not have a placid reign like Egelair III, and he made more interesting reading—what—there was a war, and the crown went to a cousin—it was a long time ago, long before the Great Hunt—some of the palace got knocked down—the war had rocs in it—
“In the days of Ascur II, there was a deadly invasion of taralians, norindours, ladons and wyverns, and led by rocs. The kingdom was hard-pressed by these creatures, and whether Ascur’s forces or the opposing army would win at last was often in doubt. The war stretched on for years, with neither side able to claim a decisive victory.
“Ascur had three sons; the youngest was named Tilbad. He was bound, at the age of twelve, to the pegasi king’s third child, a daughter, Erex.”
Three children? But the crown went to a cousin. The Sword chose—I can’t remember anything—
She heard the echo of a great—a vast—hoarse shriek, perhaps like the sound that a roc might make—she shook her head to clear it. No, she was imagining this, as she was imagining the tawny roc of her vision in the Great Court.
“The war broke out several years after this binding: four years, in fact, although the two events appeared to have nothing in common. When Tilbad reached the age of seventeen, he and Erex joined the army and they were, the records tell us, very valiant. But the army—including Tilbad and Erex—were now driven back till they were fighting within the palace Wall—the Wall which was still of some defense against taralians, but its magic was failing as the strength of Ascur’s armies failed.
“The battle went ill for Ascur’s army; so ill, at last, that the Wall was breached, and the palace fired. So much all our histories tell us. But this is where the lightning-guarded scroll takes up the story:
“The palace was torched and burning, and there were only scattered handfuls of defenders left. Everyone who could be sent away had been sent long ago; Ascur was now trying to gather what remained of his forces for a tactical retreat—even though he knew there was nowhere left to retreat to.
“His messages had gone out, and his soldiers gathered slowly round him. Those who came did not include Tilbad and Erex, although no one could say they had seen them fall; and as the beaten remnants of the army crept through what had once been the parkland surrounding the palace of the king, they saw Tilbad and Erex—fighting a roc. Alone.