Fortress of Ice

“Brother, if we begin it, if we only begin it—”

“ Where? Every morsel of ground atop the hill is built on. There’s not room for a chapel, let alone another Quinaltine! And since when does the Holy Father believe in Bryalt Lines?”

“They’re not Bryalt.”

“Does he see them?”

“He can’t.”

“Nor believes in them, I’ll warrant. It’s a Bryalt belief. And you propose to explain to him how this exists in his Quinaltine, while explaining to him you want to tear down his sanctuary.”

“And build one that’s clean, and whole. I can lay it out. I know where, on the hill, there is a place.”

“Where? Just suppose for a moment that I even entertain this notion. Where would you put it?”

“Midsquare. The square itself is clean.”

The public square. The meeting place of the populace, the precinct of vendors and artisans, by kingdom-old right.

“Get the Patriarch to deal with the street preachers,” Cefwyn said. “Get them in hand before I ever consider this thing. Do that!”

“It may not be possible,” Efanor said. “It may get worse, as the Lines get worse. They want that place. They intend to have it.”

“Who wants it? The street preachers?”

Efanor shook his head. “No. The things behind the Lines. The ghosts of our own dead, among other things less savory.”

“You’re mad. You’re quite mad, brother.”

“You were on the field. You saw, in Elwynor, when the dragon passed…”

“I saw a shadow! I am not favored, to see dragons.”

“You saw it, I say. You’ve dealt with it. You’ve dealt with Tristen, far more than I. The Quinaltine is failing, and your son has very sensibly gone to him, but I ca

“The people in the streets will be in uproar at the idea, every tavern will have its rumors, and your street preachers, your infernal street preachers, will seize on the matter like a hawk on a sparrow, brother. Give me a better proposal, and a cheaper one!”

“There is nothing cheaper,” Efanor said, “but the Patriarch might foreseeably propose it himself. Or I might do it. It need not come from you.

“Too dangerous for you. And as suspect. I’ll not have you embroiled in the matter. I’ll not have you proposing it.”

“If he proposes it—do I get my shrine?”

Cefwyn drew a long, long breath. Complications, controversies, gods knew—it would divert attention. They could dally for years, ripping up pavements, laying a new foundation, priests debating the design.

Ripping up the city square? Oh, certainly that would be a diversion, at a time when royal power was likely to come under challenge.

Trust that it would come under challenge, when something was loose among the priests in their sanctuary. He hadseen strange things in Tristen’s company. They tended to stay in the back of his mind, shut away from the ordinary tenor of his life. Workaday, he could maintain his balance and swear no such things existed. But he had seen the shadow sweep down the field. He had seen terrible things, and their grandfather—gods, their grandfather Selwyn—had burned candles all night in every hallway: he had had a conflagration of candles, until there was shortage in the city, the week he had died. He had ordered them burned day and night, as the light in his eyes dimmed, and he knew he was dying. He had seen things: the betrayer of Elfwyn Sihhë had seen things at the last and feared the dark above all things.

So where had they buried Grandfather? In the Quinaltine. That thought sent chills down his limbs.

“The people need a parade or two,” he said peevishly. “Damn this snow. Enough ale in the public square, a few more comfortable visions among the priests. It could improve the temper in the city.”

“Hold a feast. That will be a welcome diversion. Call in the lords.”

“The roads are frozen, have you noticed?”

“Call them in for snowmelt. But send now. Let the word go out. That will start the people thinking toward a happy event. And who knows, there may well be a profound vision among the priests… vision of building.”

Cynicism, in his pious brother? “You amaze me.”

Efanor let go his wrist. “I have my uses, brother, dull as I may be.”

“Never dull. Never that.”

“Nor are you as blind as you try to be. Open your eyes. Emuin taught you how. Tristen surely did.”

“Emuin’s left the world. So has Tristen.” The latter was the source of greater pain. Emuin had simply faded from his knowledge, part of the earth, part of the stones. But Tristen—Tristen’s absence was a decade-long grief, half of his heart missing, a part even Ninévrisë failed to mend. “I so miss him, Efanor.”

“So do we all.” Efanor shrugged. “But we, meanwhile, have the world to deal with. He may hear your son. In the meantime, summon the lords. Make a feast. Cheer the people. There’s been too much winter this year.”

“Storm after storm.” Holiday penance brought a

The people might have forgotten that provision of the treaty between Elwynor and Ylesuin, as they had forgotten the king’s bastard living in Amefel, and only now took to brawling, in their unease—so it was a year of forgotten matters coming due, for the populace, first Otter, then Aemaryen.

A new Quinaltine? Construction in the city square? That would be gossip for more than a month, perhaps enough stir, if the Holy Father backed it, to divert the people from the Elwynim question. Perhaps change would catch the popular fancy.

“If the Holy Father asks it,” he said to Efanor. “If hedeems it good: think of the old thief, with all those artisans to cheat. That will occupy him. To the greater glory of the gods. Thatshould please the devout.”

“Brother,” Efanor said with a small, tight smile, and took his presence away

Perhaps, Cefwyn thought, in the closing of that door, the visit of a couple of old southern friends with attendant festivities would soothe the spirits of the people and settle their uneasiness—even the eternal politicking of the dour old northern lords, some of them with sons and daughters to marry off, would be a pleasure this year. The zealots always exhausted themselves in Festival, and slowly settled, once the holidays were past. Religion would give way to the more forgiving, liberal days of spring.

A new Quinaltine? It was an idea to catch the imagination. Glory to the gods. A shining new sanctuary.

And more careful masonwork.

He touched the medallion he wore, remembering that not everything could come down to a building project and a revel. He had a glum and unhappy son on his hands… and now bringing all the lords in, and this crazy business of Efanor’s, this building—

No, best leave that sort of thing to Efanor, who cited holy writ back at the Holy Father with a scholar’s deep understanding, and had a knack for catching hold of the priests’ fervor and turning it to his own purposes. To no other man in Guelessar would he have yielded, but he had utmost hope in Efanor, and hang the expense, so long as expense came slowly, year by year, layer by layer of a new foundation, and became a popular cause and a project to divert the damned priests. If Efanor wanted the square ripped up stone by stone, and gave him that, he should have his way.