"I don’t want our marriage to be something you endure, Illidian."
"And I will not follow a path that leads me away from you."
Absolute, unwavering. But he was a man who had endless nightmares, and it was becoming harder to believe that they were not about her.
Chapter Twenty
The Sentene mages were upset. Kendall didn’t know why, but she’d noticed it first the previous night, when Lieutenant Meniar had forgotten his smile and spent all his time staring at his feet.
Before, Kendall would just have asked Sukata. There was no reason she couldn’t go do that now: it’s not as if they weren’t speaking to each other. But Sukata would be so careful in replying, walking on eggshells that weren’t there, and Kendall would feel lumpish and full of angles and out of place.
And maybe Sukata wouldn’t even tell Kendall what was going on. It was plain that everybody else knew, except perhaps the Pest and His Smugness. Kellian business, probably linked to why they’d dragged themselves off to this forest instead of chasing down the Black Queen’s monster son. Rennyn no doubt would explain if asked, but she’d eaten in her room and was almost certainly asleep.
Opportunity gloomed past in the form of Lieutenant Meniar, hands in pockets and head down as he wandered into the garden beds east of the hill. Kendall hesitated only a moment before following him along the unlit path. The circle only kept Eferum-Get out, and wasn’t proof against things that had adapted to the flesh-and-blood world, but no doubt the Kellian had cleared out anything resembling a predator for miles around. Lieutenant Meniar certainly wasn’t taking any care, and didn’t seem to notice her following him as he walked all the way up to the inlaid stones that marked the protective circle, and stood staring over the stream that ran just outside.
"What’s going on?"
He straightened with a jerk, and gave her a reproachful glance.
"Spill."
Lieutenant Meniar shook his head, but it wasn’t a refusal. "You know about the Ten, right?"
"That most of the first Kellian are still alive? Yeah. I figured one of the reasons we were coming here was to introduce Herself to them."
He laughed, a sour cough of sound. "Yes. And to ask them their views on life—and other options."
"What do you…" Kendall stopped, remembering talking to Sebastian, just after Rennyn had been made a Duchess. "You mean…what do you mean?"
"They’ve asked Her Duchessness to give the Ten permission to die, should that be what they want."
That made sense: just the sort of thing that the Kellian would do, once they properly understood the spell that had made them. Still…
"That might make the Kellian unhappy—probably back when they decided to do this, before we left Tyrland. Doesn’t explain you."
He tipped his head back, gazing up at stars rather than forest. "The Kellian we work with are an entirely unplanned consequence of Symbolic Magic, side-effects of the creation of the Ten. Duchess Surclere proved the casting was ongoing. We don’t know what will happen to its side-effects if the Ten are removed from the picture."
Kendall felt as sick as Lieutenant Meniar looked. "Die?"
"Even that is possible. Or Queen Solace’s casting will unravel, and only their human heritage will remain. Or perhaps nothing at all will happen. That’s Symbolic Magic for you—it is as imprecise as it is powerful."
He glanced at her, then dredged up an attempt at a smile.
"It’s not a complete throw of the dice. We know what happened to the descendants of the one of the Ten who was killed about fifty years ago: absolutely nothing. But it’s hard to set aside the less probable consequences."
For Lieutenant Meniar—and half the other Sentene mages—in love with their Kellian partners. For Rennyn, married to Captain Faille. For…
Muttering something that might pass as thanks, Kendall turned on her heel and headed to the bedroom she had been assigned to share. Sukata had gone there after the dinner clean-up, so Kendall had figured she’d kill an hour or two until the need for awkward silences had passed. She barely caught Sukata, freshly dressed, on her way out.
"Are you going to tell them?"
Sukata’s fingers closed on the hem of her coat—a tiny giveaway to make up for not being able to look nervous.
"We are to spend the night in vigil in the resting place of the Ten," she said, her thin voice even more muted than usual.
"Are you going to tell the Ten that letting them die could make you stop being Kellian—maybe even kill you?"
"To do so would be to influence their answer."
"You think they wouldn’t want to know?"
"To protect ourselves by prolonging their cruel state is not possible, Kendall. Who we are…we cannot buy our existence at the expense of the Ten."
"And what’s it going to do to Herself? Even if absolutely nothing happens to you, you’re asking her to kill your…your grandmothers! And if—!"
Kendall made herself stop, an immense consciousness that she was hurting Sukata washing over her. Now wasn’t the time to pick an argument. All it did was make it harder to find a way back to the time when there was nothing more natural than ranging herself at Sukata’s side, because the pair of them were allies in dealing with a full-of-herself mage too powerful for her own good.
"Sorry," she said. "You go do your…whatever."
She was saved from the temptation to add a barbed "Since it’s nothing to do with me," by Captain Faille, coming out of the room he shared with Rennyn. He gave Kendall one of his Looks, easily translated as "You’re on duty," before going off up the hill. Sukata, after a moment’s hesitation, followed without another word.
"Bugs and rot," Kendall muttered, but so low even a Kellian probably wouldn’t have heard, then went and scratched on Rennyn’s door, and opened it.
Kellian mightn’t hold much with ranks, but Duchesses—or Captain Faille—still warranted what was probably one of the prime rooms, with windows looking out over the fields and gardens. Pointless, since they’d straight away been firmly shuttered and barred, and a heavy curtain pulled over them against any hint of autumn chill, with a brazier added to make sure the room kept toasty. Herself was still up, dressed for bed, but sitting cross-legged on it, not doing anything noticeable with the hairbrush she held.
Kendall had only once seen Rennyn Claire cry: right after she’d told the Kellian that she technically-not-really owned them, and they’d all gone from sort of liking her to flinching. In the months since then her slow recovery from the broken ribs and the hole in her side had led to plenty of fits of black sullens, and some days of sheer had-it-up-to-hereness, but even at her worst she’d mainly responded with gritted teeth and thinning patience. The Kellian asking her to kill their grandmothers, back around when she’d been made Duchess, must have been the cause of those days when she’d been all withdrawn and distracted.
Head tangled in her own concerns, it took Kendall an entire handful of moments to study the still profile of the most powerful mage in the world and read devastation.
What? Why? Rennyn had to have known about the Kellian plans for the Ten before they’d even started the trip. But this almost waxen stillness, the grey pallor, the exhausted set of her shoulders…