A Parliament of Owls

  It didn't hang together. There were too many pieces missing. But all the same, it felt possible. Ferret frowned, as she recognized her unwillingness to reject her intuitive leap. If Vekh had been meeting an ally, why not choose one of the shippers' taverns? There were a lot of them. Why risk a possibly hostile place? But then, perhaps Vekh had thought the Anchor was neutral; old Rhynne's place was beyond the fish market, near the warehouses—closer to shippers' turf. And Ferret knew she had been careful. Old Rhynne had said, more than once, that she never wanted anyone to suspect she had more wit than hair. Or perhaps he hadn't wanted the shippers to know with whom he was meeting. Maybe Vekh was playing a double game—but she cut that thought off impatiently. Vekh wasn't very clever; he was a tool, not a user. The clever ones didn't end up as bones in rubble.

  Ferret made an imperative gesture; one of her bravos responded instantly. "You know Vekh? One of Khorvan Nakhar's? I want to know where he is. If you canna find him, I want to know when he was last seen."

  She watched him depart, her face impassive. They were the best in the Guild, she thought, her people: efficient, competent and loyal. It wouldn't take them long.

  Chapter Six—A Visit to the Queen

  Queen Celave set aside her embroidery with a sigh. One of her dainty, short-coated dogs laid its long muzzle in her lap and she stroked its silky ears idly. The senior-most of her attendants folded up the work, putting the bright silks and needles in order in the rosewood sewing box.

  "Is the baby kicking?" she asked solicitously, eyeing the Queen's bulging body.

  "No. I'm bored." She smiled wistfully at the woman. "Azhine, do you remember the time we dressed up as boys and stole away to watch the Ythykh-Fair puppets?"

  An answering gleam of mischief lit Lady Azhine Azhere Glakhyre's face for an instant; then she said repressively, "As I recall, the puppets weren't very good and the uproar was so upsetting. We were on bread and water for days, and Aunt Cestelanve lectured incessantly. Why do you bring it up?"

  "Why do you suppose? I'm lamenting the past. Wouldn't it be amusing to be wild and young again?"

  "Your Majesty is pleased to jest," the other woman responded stiffly.

  "Azhine, Azhine!" the Queen said, half laughing, half pleading. "I remember the girl who cut her hair so she could pass for her brother and ride his mare in the races at the Rhakhyffe Festival. That girl swore she would never change, that no punishment could fetter her spirit."

  Azhine glanced about to make sure the other ladies weren't close enough to overhear. "That girl never reckoned with marriage, Celave," she said bitterly. "There are some things even the wildest spirits can't survive." She sighed and eased the acid out of her voice. "I'm sorry you're bored, Your Majesty. Perhaps I could send for one of the Court poets to entertain you?"

  Celave rolled her eyes. "Spare me. Actually," she added, "maybe you could send for the Kalledanni bard, Arre; I hear she sings very nicely."

  The lady in waiting affected puzzlement. "A Kalledanni bard? I hadn't heard one was visiting us. Is Your Majesty certain?"

  Queen Celave's smile was barbed, though her tone was sweet. "She's known, less formally, as 'the Emperor's foreign witch'—or even 'foreign whore' by the crude." At her old friend's stunned expression the Queen snapped, exasperated, "Gods, Azhine. I know I'm only the Royal Broodmare—of value solely for my ability to gestate heirs—but I'm still the Celave who grew up with you, and I am neither naïve, nor stupid."

  "I never said you were stupid; but there are some things, Majesty, it really isn't proper for you to admit to knowing."

  "Don't fling propriety in my face." As she heard her own fury, she visibly reined in her temper. The dog beside her chair whimpered. She scrubbed her face with her hands, and said in a much different voice, "Let's not fight. Distract me."

  "Shall we play khacce?"

  The Queen smiled ruefully. "No. I'd throw the pieces at you. Think of something else."

  "Permit me to ask the others," Azhine said, and as the Queen voiced no objections, she did so. Shortly, she returned to her lady's side. "Owl Ghytteve is back from Kalledann. You could send for him, and he could tell our fortunes. No doubt it is nonsense, but it might be fun."

  The Queen gave a decisive nod. "Yes; have him brought. Did you know? He told the Emperor the child I bear will be a son. It will be interesting to draw other rash pronouncements from him."

  ***

  The Queen's command arrived in the Ghytteve apartments, phrased as an invitation, on a heavy piece of scented paper. Effryn read it to Owl.

  "'It is to be hoped that the young lord Owl Ghytteve will be honored to present himself to Her Royal Majesty Celave Azhere Anzhibhar and the ladies of her train, in Her Royal Majesty's Rose Garden at an hour past noon.' It's signed by Lady Azhine Azhere Glakhyre, for the Queen."

  "'Young lord Owl Ghytteve,'" the Seer scoffed. "Either this Lady Azhine's memory for scandal is remarkably short, or the irony doesn't come through in the ink." He sighed. "Just what I always longed to do: dance attendance on a gaggle of Court ladies. I suppose I can't get away with claiming a headache?"

  "Owl, it's an honor," Effryn chided.

  "Squirrel, it's a nuisance. She probably wants me to play fortune-teller to amuse her ladies," he added sourly.

  "Maybe she wants to inspect Councilor Cithanekh Ghytteve's dashing friend," Effryn suggested mildly. "Will you take Cezhar with you?"

  "Is Cezhar on the invitation? I didn't hear his name." Effryn knew Owl well enough to hear the acid beneath the surface.

  "Owl—"

  "I'll take Lynx," he offered, "if you really feel I must have a chaperon."

  Effryn sighed. "I want you to have a bodyguard; I'm not sure your Lynx isn't more of a danger than a protection, frankly."

  "I know," Owl said sweetly. "That's part of her appeal."

  Effryn sighed again but made no further protest.

  The steward checked them over before they left. The severe cut and muted blue color of Owl's tunic owed something to the fashions of Kalledann; it made a striking contrast with the extravagant jewelry he wore: a single dangling earring of pearl and sapphire; an ivory bracelet carved with owls and hawks; and the two, heavy rings, loose on his thin hands. Beside him, Lynx was frankly exotic. Even the green and silver Ghytteve livery only made her look like some eldritch woodland creature, the tooled leather harp case riding at her side as if it were a part of her.

  "No weapons," he reminded them. "The Queen's Guard may search you."

  Lynx nodded.

  "Will we do, then?" Owl asked. "We won't disgrace you?"

  "You look fine. Whether or not you disgrace me," he added, the echo of banter in his tone, "will depend upon how you behave."

  Owl put his hand on Lynx's guiding arm and smiled in the steward's direction. "I'll try to be good," he promised. "Let's go, Lynx."

  The Queen's Guard didn't search them, but ushered Owl and his guide into the Rose Garden with efficient courtesy. An hour after noon, the garden was hot, the air heavy with scents; the ladies were clustered in the shade beside a pattering fountain. Their low conversation and laughter stilled as the guests approached. When Lynx paused, Owl bowed politely, then waited for the Queen to address him. There was the faint scrabble of claws on gravel before a cold nose was thrust into his hand. Owl stroked the dog's silky head while the silence stretched.

  The silence was long enough for a very thorough scrutiny; then a voice, cool and even a little disdainful, said, "So: you are Owl Ghytteve."

  "I am."

  There was another long silence before the Queen said, "I have heard such a great deal about you; it made me expect someone more flamboyant, more self-assured. How old are you?"

  "Eighteen, Your Majesty."

  She gave a little, deprecatory laugh. "So young to set the Court buzzing. Everyone has some delectable morsel of speculation about you. According to rumor, you are everything from an unacknowledged Anzhibhar bastard to a former slave; one story has it that the Duke of Ghyt
teve adopted you because he was so grateful to you for ridding him of his poisonous mother; gossips fill you with mystical powers and wisdom, or declare you the veriest charlatan; scandalmongers have you sleeping with everyone from Councilor Cithanekh Anzhibhar-Ghytteve to the Kalledanni bard, Arre; I have even heard it said that you promised my husband that the child I bear is the long awaited Royal son. Cloaked as you are in mystery, can you blame me for wanting to meet you for myself?"

  "Who could live up to such notoriety?" Owl asked. "I am destined, it would seem, to disappoint."

  "What? Aren't you even going to confess to a charming eccentricity? Some tidbit I can toss back into the pool of gossip to see what rises to the bait?"

  Owl smiled wryly. "I suspect invention could provide a more compelling lure than the unadorned truth, Your Majesty."

  An appreciative murmur from the ladies answered him; but a steely note crept into the Queen's voice. "I would like to know," she commented, "whether you actually told the Emperor to expect a son."

  "I did—or in point of fact, I told Cithanekh and he told the Emperor."

  A dark overtone Owl couldn't identify—threat, or fear, or rage—rang like a false note in the Queen's next words. "And what if I bear another daughter, or the child dies, or any one of the myriad disasters which stalk a woman in childbed occurs? Whose fault is it, then? Yours, for the misprediction—or mine, for the failure?"

  An image, marked by the silvery veil which differentiated his visions of the possible future, drifted furtively across his inner sight: the Queen in childbed, too still, and the midwife holding the squalling newborn to out to Khethyran, whose face was streaked with tears. "Your Majesty," he said softly, "I have told the Emperor—and anyone else who will listen—that my visions are not pronouncements of what must be; they are hints, fragments, subject to interpretation. And the future—even a future I have foreseen—may be changed by actions in the present. I believe that the child you bear is a son; so I told Cithanekh, and asked him to warn the Emperor, because—if my vision proves to be true—it will alter the temper of the Court."

  The silence was tense, and when she spoke, the Queen's voice was edged with bitterness. "So: in your twisted augury, a Royal son becomes a pitfall; and though I may produce that which the Emperor married me to gain, you, like some antic oracle, warn that it will not bring us joy."

  "Did I say that?" Owl protested.

  "I am not a fool, Owl Ghytteve. No one wants anything of me but that I bear Khethyran's children, but I have a mind—and eyes." The barbs melted out of her tone, then, as she went on, "Can you look into the future and tell me this: will he ever love me the way he loves his foreign witch?"

  Expression abandoned Owl's face, leaving it opaque as the stamped emblem on a coin. The visions that swept over him were scattered, tatterdemalion, inscrutable as a foreign alphabet: the Queen, Arre, Khethyran, the Royal children, all moving together and apart in some arcane dance which defied interpretation. He surfaced from the bewildering tide to an ache in his own heart which rendered him nearly voiceless. "Your Majesty, I do not know," he whispered. "There are so many kinds of love, so many variations on need and obligation."

  "You saw something: it shows on your face; but you won't tell me."

  "I do not know," Owl repeated. "My gift never gives me answers: only scraps to piece together; and sometimes I lack the skill to make a pattern."

  In the silence, feelings too large for words pushed and shouldered each other. Finally, with studied brightness, the Queen said, "When I asked you here, I thought perhaps that you would tell our fortunes to amuse us."

  Owl felt Lynx stiffen beside him, but he kept his own reply neutral. "I am no fortune teller, Your Majesty; but if it will amuse you, I will do my poor best."

  There was rustling and tittering among the ladies, before one came forward to say, "Tell my fortune, Lord Owl."

  He smiled, a sudden, easy expression that brightened his face like the sun emerging from the clouds. "Lysse! You have to make it harder than that." He took her hands, and said more formally, "Lyssemarhe Ghytteve. I didn't know you were here among Her Majesty's ladies."

  The girl—for she was the youngest of the ladies, perhaps fourteen or fifteen—squeezed Owl's hands. "Papa thought it would be good for me serve Her Majesty; I get to see the Court, and Yrkhaffe."

  "The next time you come to visit Marhysse, we'll talk. But now, was there someone who wanted her fortune told?"

  After more rustling and giggling, another of the ladies took Owl's hands. "Tell my fortune, Lord Owl."

  At her touch, an image answered him: a somber-eyed young woman standing in front of a banner bearing the rose of House Ykhave. "Ykhave," he murmured; then, he realized the banner was elegant beaded embroidery, and that the woman held a needle and a small wooden box. "You do the beaded embroidery that I hear about, don't you?" he asked her.

  "Yes," she admitted. "I'm Pakhrielle Ykhave."

  Before he could release her, his Gift showed him another glimpse of her—and he realized there was another of the Queen's ladies holding on to Pakhrielle's elbow. She was a laughing young woman, barely out of girlhood, who wore the chisel and hammer emblem of House Ambhere. "And with you? A lady of House Ambhere?"

  There were delighted exclamations. "Yverri Ambhere," the other lady acknowledged.

  At the sound of her voice, Owl saw another image: she was casting a jeweled lure for a hawk, spinning it enticingly; but the bird hung aloof against a steely sky. "Your family—" Owl went on. "No: you; you, personally are hoping to form an alliance with Ghytteve." The hawk in his mind's eye spun in the air, a glint of green light caught in its talons. "With Cithanekh Ghytteve, but he appears indifferent to you."

  The other ladies laughed. "That's enough," Yverri Ambhere said cheerfully. "Unless you want to explain why Councilor Cithanekh is unmoved by my charms. Who's next?"

  She and Pakhrielle Ykhave moved away as another of the Queen's ladies put her hands in Owl's. He smiled suddenly. "You're the one who wrote the letter: Lady Azhine Azhere Glakhyre; Duke Ymlakh Glakhyre's lady." Heavy chains and a barred window filled his inner sight. "You would like to be free of Court, free of..." He stopped himself from saying: of Ymlakh; the shadow of a horse flew past the barred window. "Free to gallop horses across the upland downs and race the wind to the sea."

  Without a word, she drew her hands out of his grasp and moved away. Another lady took her place.

  "And what can you say about me?" the lady asked as she put her small, jeweled hands in Owl's.

  The emblem of House Azhere, a moth within a six pointed star, filled his inner sight. "House Azhere," he said.

  "Yes," she agreed. "I'm Centyffe Azhere."

  He saw an image of a young woman with the Prime Minister Zherekhaf. "Are you Zherekhaf's granddaughter?"

  "That's right," she said, while the others murmured.

  The same woman, listening and then whispering behind her hand to another lady; he saw her writing; and he saw a boy with a sheaf of handbills in the marketplace. "You like to gossip," Owl guessed, and the others laughed.

  She removed her hands. "That could be said of most of us," she pointed out as she moved away and another of the ladies took her place and gave Owl her hands.

  The ship: the Admiral's ship filled his inner vision; but now, it was listing badly, the sails flapping like broken wings. Sweat sprang on Owl's brow. "No," he breathed. Like a new constellation, the star and anchor of House Dhenykhare glowed above the ship. Perspective changed dizzyingly. A huge hand, girt with a silver and onyx signet, appeared as though from the sky; the hand cradled the ship, frail as a model, for an instant. Then the fingers clenched, and the delicate frigate splintered into flotsam.

  Owl's hands tightened suddenly on the woman's as his face lost color. "Lord Owl?" she prompted. "What do you see?"

  Owl forced his wits to work. "Are you...Dhenykhare? The Admiral's wife?"

  She laughed. "Dhenykhare, yes; not the Admiral."

  But Owl wasn
't listening. A millrace of new images swept thought away: an old woman in a filthy tavern; a burning building on the waterfront; sailors unconscious, while the sea heaved and the sails lashed themselves to tatters; a ring of weeping people in Dhenykhare colors; Rhydev and his lover again; a chain of office, and the hand with the black signet stroking it possessively.

  Lynx pinched Owl's elbow, wresting him from the undertow of images. Steady, Owl, she thought, her mind a bright cable, pulling him free of the swirling flood. Gently, he disentangled himself from the lady.

  "I'm afraid that's all," he apologized. "It tires me—more than I thought."

  The ladies were gracious. Someone brought little glasses of chilled juice and passed them around. The conversation turned light and undemanding; and as soon as it was decent, Owl made his excuses.

  ***

  Lynx took him back to the library in the Ghytteve apartments. She pushed him into a chair and stood looking down at him; he was gray and sweating, his lips bitten together like someone stifling pain. "Stay here," she said. "I'll bring you coffee."