The Oracle's Queen

  “I know this place! I came close by it when I was looking for Caliel and his friends,” he explained in his own language, leaving Arkoniel to translate for Tamír. “But I saw the great house in a vision, too. Caliel and the others came from there. There’s evil living in that house, and great sadness, too.”

  “How far is Remoni from there?”

  “Three, maybe four days’ long walk? You southlanders don’t go there, to Remoni. We still have sacred places by this sea. Boats come into the protected water behind the islands sometimes, when people come to fish, but no one lives there. Why does she want to go there?”

  “What’s he saying?” Tamír asked.

  Arkoniel explained.

  “It might be only two days, riding hard,” she mused. “Tell him I’m going to build a new city there. Will he guide me?”

  Arkoniel translated, but Mahti was rubbing his eyes now, as if they hurt him. “Need sleep. I go there.” He pointed out the window at the garden. “Too many time in this house. Need sky, and the ground.”

  “But there’s so much I want to know!”

  “Let him rest a while,” Arkoniel said, sensing that Mahti had some reason for not answering her. “You should rest, too, and be ready to speak with your generals.”

  As she turned to go, Mahti looked up and tapped himself on the chest. “You have pain. Here.”

  “Pain? No.”

  “Where Lhel make magic bind to you, there is pain,” he insisted, looking at her very intently as his hand stole to his long horn again. “I make dream song for you. Take away some pain.”

  Tamír hastily shook her head. “No! It’s healed. There’s no pain.”

  Mahti frowned and went back to his language. “Oreskiri, tell her Lhel’s magic is not broken yet. She had no witch to help her cut the spell. There are still threads that bind them. That is why her brother demon still comes to her.”

  “I’ll try to explain to her,” Arkoniel replied. “She doesn’t trust magic very much, though. The only magic she knew as a child was hurtful or frightening. That fear still haunts her, even with everything else she’s seen. She doesn’t like it practiced on her, even for her benefit.”

  Mahti looked thoughtfully at Tamír, who was regarding him more warily. “She cannot be completely herself until she is freed of these last threads, but I will not without her consent.”

  “Give her time.”

  “What’s he saying?” Tamír asked, looking from one to the other.

  Arkoniel walked her out to the corridor. “You’re still bound to Brother somehow.”

  “I figured that much out for myself.”

  “Mahti is quite concerned about it.”

  She stopped and folded her arms. “You trust him already?”

  “I think so, yes.”

  For just an instant she looked unsure, as if there was something she wanted to say, but instead, she just shook her head. “I’ve had enough of that magic. I’m a girl now. That’s enough. I can deal with Brother.”

  Arkoniel sighed inwardly. Even if he could have forced her, he would not.

  Returning to his room, he found Wythnir and Mahti sitting on the floor together. Wythnir had one hand extended, a silvery orb hovering over his open palm.

  “Look what Master Mahti showed me how to do,” the boy said, eyes fixed on the orb.

  Arkoniel knelt beside them, caught between curiosity and protectiveness. “What is this?”

  “Only water,” Mahti assured him. “It’s one of the first spells witch children learn, for fun.”

  Wythnir lost his grip on the spell and the orb of water fell, splattering his hand and knees.

  Mahti ruffled his hair. “Good magic, little keesa. Something to teach your friends.”

  “May I, Master?”

  “Tomorrow. It’s time for you to go say good night to them. I must make our guest comfortable.”

  The moon was almost full. Mahti sat down on the damp grass near a rosebush, savoring its sweetness and the good smells of earth and air. Arkoniel had sent all the southlanders from the garden so he could be alone here under the sky. He was grateful for the solitude. Being confined in a room so far above the ground for so many days had been difficult. The unhappiness and fear of the three southlanders he’d cared for had filled the room like a fog.

  Lutha and Barieus were happy now that they’d spoken to Tamír. He was glad for them; they’d treated him well from the first. The older one, Caliel, was darker in his mind, and not only because of his fear of Mahti. He carried a deep hurt in his soul. The betrayal of a friend was a bad wound to carry, and very hard to heal. Mahti had mended Caliel’s bones and played the poisons away as they tried to gather, but his heart stayed dark. It was the same with the one named Tanil. Mahti saw at a glance what had been done to him. He wasn’t sure even he could help that one.

  And then there was Tamír. She was hurt very deeply, but she did not feel the wounds. When he’d looked at her from the corner of his eye, he could see the black tendrils still issuing from the place where Lhel had made her binding. Tamír’s spirit was still bound to the noro’shesh, and that tie kept her from healing completely into her new form. She was a young woman, certainly, but some vestige of her old self held on. He could see it in the hollowness of her cheeks and the angular lines of her body.

  He tilted his head back and filled his eyes with the white moon. “I have seen her now, Mother Shek’met. Did I come all this way just to finish the magic of Lhel and heal her? She does not want that. What must I do, so that I can go home again?”

  Holding these questions in his mind, he raised the oo’lu to his lips and began the prayer song. The pregnant moon filled him and lent him her power.

  Pictures began to form behind his eyelids and after a time his brows drew down in surprise. He played the song to its end, and when he was finished he looked up at the moon’s pale face again and shook his head. “Your will is strange, Mother, but I will do my best.”

  What do you think of them, my girl and my oreskiri? Lhel whispered to him from the shadows.

  “They miss you,” he whispered back, and felt her sadness. “Do they hold you here?”

  I stay for them. When all is finished, I will rest. You will do as the Mother has shown you?

  “If I can, but our people will not welcome her.”

  “You must make them see her as I do.”

  “Will I see you anymore, now that I’ve found her?”

  He felt an invisible caress, then she was gone.

  A man stirred in the shadows by the courtyard door. Arkoniel had come into the garden while he was dreaming. Without a word, the oreskiri disappeared back inside.

  There was great pain there, too.

  Mahti laid his horn aside and stretched out on the grass to sleep. He would do as the Mother required, then he would go home. It was tiring, being with these stubborn southlanders who would not ask for help when they needed it.

  Arkoniel sat by his window, watching Mahti sleep. He looked very peaceful there on the bare ground, head pillowed on his arm.

  Arkoniel’s heart was in turmoil. He’d heard Lhel’s voice, smelled her scent on the air. He understood why she had gone to Mahti, but why had she never come to him?

  “Master?” Wythnir asked sleepily from his bed.

  “It’s all right, child. Go back to sleep.”

  Instead, he came to Arkoniel and climbed into his lap. Curling up there, he tucked his head under Arkoniel’s chin.

  “Don’t be sad, Master,” he murmured, already half-asleep. By the time Arkoniel recovered from his amazement the boy was fast asleep.

  Touched by this innocent affection, Arkoniel sat there for some time, just holding him, the sleeping child’s trust a reminder of the work that lay ahead.

  Tamír found the reunited Companions in Nikides’ chamber. Lutha and Barieus were stretched out on their bellies across the wide bed. Ki and Tharin sat on the edge beside them, and made room for Tamír between them. The rest were sprawled in chairs
or on the floor. Ki was telling Lutha and Barieus about the dragon they’d seen in Afra. “Show them your mark,” he said as Tamír came in.

  She held out her finger.

  “I wish we’d been with you,” Barieus exclaimed enviously.

  “Next time you will be,” she promised. “Tell me more about Korin. Is there any chance he can be reasoned with?”

  Lutha shook his head. “I don’t think he can ever forgive you, Tamír.”

  “And now he’ll have an heir,” said Ki. “All the more reason for him to fight.”

  “Lady Nalia’s with child? Well, I don’t wonder,” Lutha muttered, coloring a little. “Korin was trying hard enough. I guess it finally took.”

  “What do you know of her?” asked Tamír.

  “Almost nothing, beyond what Korin said. He keeps her shut up in the tower most of the time. She was always pleasant to us when we did see her, though.”

  “Is it true she’s ugly?” asked Ki.

  “More like plain, with a big pink birthmark on her face and neck.” Barieus traced a pattern on his own cheek. “Sort of like that one on your arm, Tamír.”

  “What else can you tell me, now that we’re away from Cal?” she asked.

  Lutha sighed. “Now I do feel like a spy. Korin’s gathered a sizable force—riders, men-at-arms, some ships, mostly from the northern holdings and the mainland territories. He’s sent out some raids against those loyal to you.”

  “I’ve been doing the same.”

  “I know,” Lutha replied. “It galled him no end, along with the reports of your second victory against the Plenimarans. I don’t know if it’s Niryn’s influence, or just Korin’s own jealousy, but now that he is ready to move, I don’t think he’ll settle for anything less than an all-out fight.”

  “Then that’s what he’s going to get. We’ve only got a few good months left before winter closes in. Tharin, ask Lytia to have a complete inventory of supplies ready for my audience tomorrow morning. I need to know how long a siege we could withstand here, if it comes to that. Send out runners to all the camps and heralds to all the lords who’ve gone back to their holdings north of here. I mean to march as soon as possible.”

  “With your own Companions at your side,” Ki said. “At least those of us who are fit,” he added with an apologetic look at Lutha.

  “We’re fit enough!” Lutha assured him.

  Looking around at the fierce smiling faces of her friends, Tamír wondered how many more would be lost before this was over?

  Thoughts of war fled for a moment, however, as she and Ki walked back to their rooms. Reaching his own door, Ki paused, looking uncertain. Tamír realized he was waiting for her to say where he would sleep.

  She hesitated, too, all too aware of the guards posted nearby.

  Ki glanced their way and sighed. “Well, good night.”

  Later, as Tamír lay alone in her great bed with Ringtail curled up and purring under her chin, she traced her lips with a finger, remembering their kisses only a few nights ago.

  I’m queen. If I want to sleep with him, I can! she told herself, but blushed at the thought. It had been easy when they were both so scared, so far from court. Maybe Ki even regretted it?

  She shook off the thought, but a hint of doubt remained. Now that they were back among the others, he was acting as he always had.

  And so am I. And this is no time to be thinking of love! Nari’s stern talk had given her other things to consider, too. That sort of love led to babies if you weren’t careful. Nari had given her a jar of pessaries, just in case.

  In case—

  As much as she longed for Ki, the thought of actually coupling scared her more than she liked to admit. If she used this body like that, it was the final admission that she was a girl—no, a woman—in every sense.

  All the same, the bed felt too big and lonely, especially knowing that Ki was so close by. She fingered the healing cut on her chin. She didn’t mind if it left a scar. Every time she saw it in the mirror, it would remind her of him, and what it had felt like, lying beside him in their old bed at the keep. She traced slowly down her throat to her chest, thinking of his fingers taking the same path.

  As her fingers brushed the scar, however, it brought back what the witch had said. What had he meant? The wound was healed. It didn’t hurt at all.

  She hugged the cat closer, wishing his soft fur was Ki’s hair or skin. For the first time in her life, she wondered what it would be like between the two of them if she was an ordinary girl, with no dark secrets or great fate, and neither of them had ever seen Ero at all.

  “If wishes were meat, then beggars would eat,” she whispered into the darkness. She was what she was, and there was no changing that.

  When she slept at last, however, it was not Ki she dreamed of, but battle. She saw that rocky place again, and Korin’s red banner coming ever closer.

  Chapter 42

  Tamír rose early the next morning, better rested than she’d expected. Having finally accepted the path she must take, she was eager to move. If this was the only way she could meet with Korin, then so be it.

  With Una still gone, she had the luxury of dressing herself, with only a little help from Baldus. She put on the necklace and bracelet the Aurënfaie had given her, and was combing her hair when Ki knocked. Baldus let him in. She turned with the comb in her hand to find him staring at her. “What’s wrong?”

  “Umm—nothing,” he replied, going to the armor rack. “Do you want your cuirass?”

  “Yes,” she replied, puzzled at his odd demeanor.

  He helped her into the burnished breastplate and fastened the buckles on the side.

  “There. Do I look like a warrior queen?” Tamír asked them, wrapping her sword belt around her hips.

  “You do.”

  There it was again, that strange look of uncertainty on Ki’s face.

  “Baldus, go and fetch the rest of the Companions and Lord Tharin. Tell them I’m ready for the audience.”

  The page ran off to carry out her order.

  “Did Lutha and the others sleep well?” she asked.

  “Yes.”

  “I don’t suppose Caliel has changed his mind?”

  “No. But Tanil is better than he has been. He slept with Cal last night and won’t be parted from him. Caliel seems a little better, too.”

  “Perhaps there’s hope for them both.”

  “I’m taking Lutha and Barieus to look for a swordsmith later. They’re absolutely determined to ride with you.” Ki reached behind her to free a lock of hair trapped under the cuirass, then ran a thumb lightly across the cut on her chin. “You’re a sight, but it’s healing.”

  They were standing very close, almost touching. On impulse, she touched the dragon bite on his cheek. “You, too.”

  “It doesn’t hurt anymore.” He kept his gaze on her chin, fingers just brushing her cheek. It sent a little shiver down her arms and Tamír caught her breath as the feelings that had awakened that night at the keep came flooding back—pleasure, and with it the confused sensation of having two bodies at once.

  That didn’t stop her from leaning closer and kissing Ki lightly on the mouth. He kissed her back very gently, cupping her cheek. Tamír slid her fingers into the warm, soft hair at the nape of his neck and her body went hot and cold at once. Emboldened, she put her arms around him but her cuirass knocked the wind out of him and made him laugh.

  “Gently, Majesty! Your humble squire needs those ribs.”

  “My liegeman, Lord Kirothieus,” she corrected with a chuckle, embracing him more gently, seeing her own wonder mirrored in the depths of his dark brown eyes. The ache between her legs grew stronger, and confusion began to give way to something else.

  She was about to kiss him again but the sound of the door opening made them jump apart, blushing guiltily.

  Nikides stood in the doorway, looking amused. “Tharin, Master Arkoniel, and the witch are here. Shall I send them in?”

  “Of cou
rse.” Tamír brushed her hair back, feeling to see if her cheeks were hot.

  Ki retreated to the armor rack, trying to hide his own embarrassment as he pretended to check her mail.

  Nikides’ grin widened as he took his leave. Arkoniel took no notice of their state as he hurried in with a large scroll tucked under his arm, with the others close behind.

  Mahti was dressed like a minor noble. His hair was combed and pulled back in a bushy queue and the barbaric jewelry was gone. He’d left his horn behind, as well, Tamír noted, guessing this was Arkoniel’s doing. Mahti did not seem to be very pleased about it. He was not smiling.

  “Mahti has something to tell you,” said Arkoniel, looking rather excited.

  “I have vision for you,” the witch told her. “I show you a way to west.”

  “To that harbor, you mean? Remoni?” Tamír asked.

  “You will be go west. My goddess says so.”

  “And you saw this road in a vision?”

  He shook his head. “I know road. But the Mother say I bring you there.” He looked even less happy now. “Is hidden way, forbid to those outside the people. This my help for you.”

  Baffled, Tamír gave Arkoniel and Tharin a questioning look. “That’s all very interesting, but right now I’m more concerned with—”

  “Ah, but I think this may be of use.” Tharin took the scroll from Arkoniel and unrolled it on the bed. It was a map of northern Skala and the isthmus. “Korin will most likely come straight at you here by the coastal route. From what Lutha has said, he doesn’t have enough ships to bring his whole army by sea. The route Mahti is talking about seems to go here, through the mountains.” He traced a finger just south and west of Colath. “That would bring you out here, near your harbor. From there you’re within easy striking distance to either cut Korin off on the isthmus, or come at him from behind as he heads east.”

  “It’s a trail that the Retha’noi keep hidden with the same magic Lhel used to hide her camp,” Arkoniel explained. “They have many villages along it, and won’t welcome outsiders, but Mahti claims he can take you that way without harm.”

  Tamír stared down at the map, heart beating a little faster. Was this what the Oracle had tried to show her? Is this what all her dreams of the place had been leading to?