Fortress of Eagles

CHAPTER 9

Where wereyou?” he asked Idrys in displeasure as they walked in the shadows of the passage, His Holiness, with Efanor, being obliged to a more circuitous route to the privy chamber. “More to the point, whereis Tristen? Gods give us witnesses. Tell me he is with witnesses the last hour.”

“Tristen is closeted with Emuin,” Idrys hissed back. “Lusin and Syllan are with him. And Uwen.”

Cefwyn stopped so quickly that the guards behind them brought up desperately short. Idrys was a shadow against the few candles in the privy chamber beyond the tapestried passage, a dark and ominous shadow. It had always been Idrys’ business to know all that went on. And Idrys knew, within the Guelesfort, where Tristen was, and what was happening. But the Quinaltine and its doings were all but impenetrable territory to Idrys’ men.

“Tristen left his apartment,” Cefwyn reiterated.

“With a train of Your Majesty’s guards and his own man all the while. The guards are sitting outside Emuin’s door in his tower. Tristen is inside.”

“Emuin himself is not pure in their eyes. We dare not have this break out. Damn! Where were you? Why did you permit this?”

“I heard the commotion with the Quinalt. The damage to the place is extensive. And I regret the Lord Warden went to the tower this evening. But that is not the worst. We have a courier from the river. Tasmôrden has moved his army south at dawn today.”

Devastating news. He caught a deliberate, a difficult breath.

“Is thatwhat you were about?”

“I was down in the guardroom, I beg Your Majesty’s pardon.” Idrys rarely had to. “The shore-fire was lit, one fire, after dawn this morning, and since that hour, a courier has come from the shore to us. We assume the direction of movement is toward Ilefínian, if the observers saw it clearly, if he was not hindered in lighting a second beacon.”

A partisan of Her Grace of Elwynor, on the far shore of the Lenúalim, had risked his life to bring them that much, lighting one of a combination of fires that their posts on this side could see. One fire, southerly, meant alarm and movement toward the south. Gods send mud, was his thought, thick mud with this downpour, on the roads between Tasmôrden and the capital of Elwynor. Gods send sleet and snow and ice to shield Her Grace’s capital. Her partisans would be slaughtered to a man once Tasmôrden breached the gates and got into the town: few of her supporters could maintain their secrecy, though the wiser ones would hie them out the gates and southward as fast as they could. And if the Elwynim rebels hadmoved and (considering Efanor’s damned levin bolt) if sorceryhad risen in very fact, and ridden this storm—then gods save them.

Gods, couldit bewizardry? If some wizard joined Tasmôrden, there would be the devil of a war.

The candleflames in the sconces swayed: a door closed in the privy chamber. His Holiness had come in.

Damn, again. The Quinalt roof was far from his concern, balanced against this news; and yet it was the point of attack—and correctly so. Everything depended on a few scorched roof slates. Tristen’s safety was at issue because of it. Ninévrisë’ssafety was. A charge of sorcery attached to his dearest, his most loyal, his most intimate friends… might be sorcery indeed. But notTristen’s. And it was at least possible it was no more than ill-timed chance.

“Set a watch on Tristen,” he said, very quietly, and walked from behind the sheltering tapestry into the dim chamber. He settled himself on the cushionless, cold chair, and the guard brought in two candles, in a room tapestried in the deeds of the Marhanen, the murder of the Sihhë, the raising of the Quinalt shrine, the battle against the Elwynim. The predominant color was red, Marhanen red, the red of blood, red of fire, red of royal power.

For two pe

Perhaps he should besuch a king as his grandfather had been. A judicious murder or two, friends protected, and his enemies, even clergy, not allowed to leave this room alive—no tales whispered by servants either. He looked sullenly at the Patriarch’s pale presence in the dim light, with Efanor, like him, in Marhanen red, just behind, and wondered how the Patriarch had dealt with his grandfather and survived… for this had been his grandfather’s priest, raised, with his entire sect, to primacy in his father’s reign.

“This fatal pe

“Your late father, gods give him rest, upheld the Quinalt, and did not accept a breath of witchery in his court.”

“Nor I! Dare you say so?”

The Patriarch, being a ca

“It was lately potent beyondAmefel.”

“In Elwynor!”

“By news just now arrived, we may spend a winter knowing Tasmôrdensits in Ilefínian killing every man who favors Her Grace’s cause, and if you would surmise where we might look for sorcery, let me remind Your Holiness sorcery killed my lady’s father, killed her loyal men, and made her an exile in this court. If I had had a little less discourse on the height of my seat and the colors of the hangings for harvest-tide, if I had had my reliable reckonings out of the villages faster, and not bungled beyond all redemption, if we had had the enthusiasm of the Quinalt behind this war, we might have done something to prevent this disaster that now confronts us. Sorcery, aye, sorcery—”

“The coin—”

“Did we search every purse? I think not, Holy Father. But I know that Lord Tristen’s gift was pure! I gave him the coin myself, since he had none, Holy Father. I gave him a purse of good Guelen pe

He ran out of wind and words alike and lost the thread of his thought altogether. He had heard his father’s rages at his advisers and as those went, this one had its effect; but temper passed beyond policy and overwhelmed his reason. There was utter silence, as his brother and the Patriarch alike sifted through that spate for pebbles safe to pick up. A candle spat. It was that deep a hush.

Two deep breaths forewarned the Patriarch’s intent to speak. “I assure Your Majesty, we are fully in agreement on sorcery, but the Lord of Ynefel isnot willingly Quinalt, however noble Your Highness’s effort.” This last with a nod to Efanor.

“He is no further from us than Bryaltine,” Cefwyn said, straining at the truth, which was that Tristen knew less of any of the three faiths than he did of pig-keeping.

“But a Sihhë soul,” the Patriarch said, “if he has a soul. Which is to debate…”

“If he had not a soul, how could a wizard have gotten him out of death? What did Mauryl bring back to this world, if not a soul?”