Roberson, Jennifer - Cheysuli 05 (40 page)

           
Corin swore, pushing himself from
the chair. The silver was heavy on his wrist, heavy and cold, unneeded ballast
for his spirit. "So help me, Ihlini, I will have you sent from Atvia
now—"

           
Lillith also rose. They faced each
other across a space no wider than five paces, knowing centuries of contention.

           
Corin frowned as he stared at her.
He badly wanted to ask Kiri's advice, but their link was blocked by Lillith's
nearness. "What do you want?" he asked. "What is it you want,
Ihlini? My cooperation?—you know I will never give it. My departure?—on
Alaric's death the realm is mine, regardless of where I am. But you stand here
and tell me to reach out my hand and take the throne; you hint you will put
Alaric out of my way. Collusion? No. I will never condone his death. And yet I
wonder ... I wonder if I refuse it, if I go, does it serve some unknown Ihlini
purpose? Do you tell me to stay, to take the throne, only because you know the
asking will make me go?"

           
Lillith laughed. "Have I
confused you, Corin? Do I show you the two-sided mirror?"

           
"You show me the perversity of
your race," he retorted. "Do you think I will listen to you?"

           
"If I choose to speak, you
will." Lillith gestured and the door flew open to slam against the wall.
"Simple tricks," she told him derisively. "The old gods saw to
it the Ihlini could not level most sorceries against their brother race, but
some small powers remain."

           
"And Asar-Suti?" he asked.
"Does he promise godhood in exchange for servitude?"

           
For a moment, a moment only,
Lillith's color changed.

           
And then she smiled, smoothing her
skirts, and gestured for him to go. "A servant will show you to your
chambers."

           
There was little for the servant to
do with Corin's shoulderpacks other than remove the contents and put them away
in trunks and casks. Corin, watching in silence, realized there was little
about him that denoted his rank. He had come away from Mujhara with few belongings;
under the circumstances, he had not wanted to ride with a baggage train. Now he
was dependent upon Alaric for such things as extra clothing, and he did not
like it.

           
Had I thought about it, I might have
planned more carefully, he told Kiri, and then flinched away from the
interference in the link. Lillith's presence was everywhere in the castle,
imbuing even the walls with the stink of sorcery. Outside, at greater distance,
he had no doubt the link would be re-established, but within the walls of the
castle he was cut off from his lir in everything save physical contact.

           
The servant bowed himself out.
Corin, hardly noticing, went instantly to Kiri. He sat down on the bear pelt by
the bed and gathered the vixen into his arms. She was warm, alive,
affectionate, but he badly missed their interior dialogue, the link that gave
him the ability to change his shape. He felt stripped of half his identity.
"Gods, Kiri ... I am so alone."

           
As be bent down, she pressed her
muzzle against his neck. He felt cold nose, warm breath; smelled her familiar
musky scent. Bright amber eyes seemed to tell him all was well, but it served
only to make him even more restless and ill at ease. Suddenly Kiri seemed no
more than a tame fox, little more than a pet. It made him angry, resentful,
uneasy; it robbed him of his sense of self, so important to the Cheysuli.

           
Is this what it was like for my
jehan? Lirless all those years, despairing of ever knowing the magic of our
race . . . Corin shivered once. Gods, I could not bear it. . . this is bad enough,
and I know it is temporary.

           
Against her fur the silver wristlet
gleamed. He felt his fingers curl, tighten, fist, until he wanted to smash it
into the nearest wall. It did not matter that he would shatter delicate bones;
he wanted only to rid himself of the shackle Lillith had put on him.

           
"No chain," he said aloud.
"No chain, but this is more than enough."

           
He turned his hand over, baring the
underside of his arm. The silver was seamless, displaying no joints; a solid
ring of metal. Corin pulled his knife, slid the tip of the blade beneath the
cuff and tentatively pried. The shackle was very snug, leaving no room for the
blade. Steel scraped on silver; a subtle stinging told him he sliced hair
instead of metal.

           
The door swung open.

           
Corin, seated on the floor with Kiri
in his lap and the knife in his hand, prepared to send the servant away. But
when he looked up, scowling, he saw plainly the woman was not a servant at all.

           
Cheysuli was the first word that
came to his mind. And then another: jehana.

           
Corin said it aloud. And then,
awkwardly, he sheathed the knife and rose, turning Kiri out of his lap.

           
He had, he thought, prepared himself
for the meeting.

           
On the voyage from Hondarth he had,
every night in his bunk, carefully considered what he would say and do when he
saw Gisella. But now, seeing her, he could do nothing at all.

           
"Which one are you?" she
asked. "Which son does he send?"

           
For a moment his tongue was locked
in silence. Having heard of Gisella's madness from his father, his uncle and
others, he had reconciled himself to incoherence, wandering wits, perhaps even
tantrums. But not such clarity. Never such conciseness.

           
"Corin," he said hoarsely.
"Third-born of his children."

           
"Mine, too," Gisella said.
"Mine, too, Corin."

           
He drew in an unsteady breath. He
was accustomed to his father's disfigured face, even beneath the patch; to the
wear derived from worry and the experiences of his past. And somehow Corin had
unknowingly transferred much of it to Gisella, expecting to see identical signs
in her flesh. But there were none.

           
At thirty-nine she did not share the
same uncanny youthfulness as Lillith, but she was not what Corin expected. She
was, plainly, Cheysuli; the Atvian was unseen. Black hair was pulled back from
her face, displaying the widow's peak that lent her features an odd elegance.

           
There was no hint of silver, no
trace of age in her coiled braids. Her flesh was taut and dark, untined except
for a delicate tracery at the edges of yellow eyes. Most striking of all, having
borne two sets of twins, she retained the slendemess inherent in Cheysuli
women. And she certainly claimed the posture.

           
Corin and Keely were Niall; now he
saw Brennan and Hart.

           
"Jehana," he said again,
and wished that he had not.

           
"Jehana," she mimicked,
shutting the door behind her."Aye, I am your jehana. Gisella of Atvia;
Gisella, Queen of Homana."

           
"Aye," he said carefully,
wary of her mood.

           
"I have ordered the packing
begun."

           
He blinked. "Packing?" He
felt a fool, cursing himself for his inability to say more than a single word.

           
Gisella smiled. "It is time I
was a wife to my husband again."

           
"Wife—" He stopped
himself, drew in a deep breath, tried to keep his tone uninflected. "There
is no place for you in Homana."

           
"Then I will make one."
Yellow eyes glittered a moment; he was reminded of Brennan and Ian. Of a
predator stalking its prey. Gisella, watching him, laughed.

           
"They told you I was mad."

           
Corin was foundering quickly.
"Aye," he said plainly at last, giving up on diplomacy.

           
"Do you think I am mad?"

           
She waited expectantly, clearly
unoffended by the possibility he might say he believed she was. He wondered
what he would say if it were given out that he was mad.

           
"All I know." he said
slowly, "is that you tried to give all of us to Strahan."

           
"Is that proof of
madness?" Gisella asked. "It was not what Niall wanted, nor any of
the Cheysuli, but it hardly makes me mad. It makes me an enemy."

           
"Are you?" He stared at
her. "Are you an enemy?"

           
"Would I give you to Strahan
now?" She laughed. "Oh, no, no. That time is passed. I would rather
keep you."

           
That pleased Corin no better; he
pictured himself a lapdog on her leash. Or a dogfox in a cage. He looked at
Kiri uneasily, wishing they could converse.

           
Gisella moved into the room almost
idly, playing with the girdle that clasped slender hips and spilled down the
front of her skirts. She wore red, deep, rich red, and rubies set in silver. “That
time is passed," she repeated. "The time now is for me to stand at
Niall's side ... to share my husband's bed." She turned abruptly, catching
him off-guard. "To send that whore from my place."

           
Anger rose instantly. "Deirdre
is my jehana. You will not call her a whore."

           
He had never, to anyone, claimed
Deirdre was his mother. From childhood it had been made plain that Deirdre was
mother in blood only to Maeve; that she was not cheysula, but meijha, not
queen, but beloved of the Mujhar. The lines of descent were too important for
dissembling or convenience, even among the Cheysuli; all of Niall’s children
knew Gisella was their mother. But he would not claim her now.

           
"Whore," Gisella said
sweetly. “Meijha, then, if you like. It changes nothing. I am Queen of Homana.
I am Niall’s wife. I am mother to his children, and I intend to assume my
place."

           
"He will never have you."
He was adamant in his certainty.

           
"Homanan law will make
him." Gisella's eyes were on Kiri, "I will go before the Homanan
Council and I will plead my case." Her voice was quiet and even. "I
am the forgotten wife, the forgotten Queen, conveniently pushed aside in the
name of Niall's lust. I bore him four healthy children—three of which are
sons—and I have borne exile meekly, with no thought to disagree." Her eyes
were eerily feral. "But now I weary of such treatment. I desire better. I
desire the place to which I am entitled, the privileges of my rank, the respect
and honor of my husband." Her lids half-shuttered her eyes, but he saw the
yellow glint. "I desire to know the love of all my children."

           
"Get out." He was shaking.
"Get out of my room. Go. I want nothing to do with you—"

           
"But you do." Gisella
stood before him. "You do, Corin. You want to love me. You want to have me
love you in return. You want a mother, a jehana. You want a cheysula for your
jehan. You want things to be right in your world, so you can feel good again.
You want to know that all those years were not wasted; that indeed, your mother
loves you. And would have loved you better, had your father allowed it. Had he
not sent me away for the sake of an Erinnish princess."

           
"You would have given me to
Strahan—"

           
"What other choice did I
have?" Her shout stopped him cold. "What choice, Corin? Lillith
raised me. Lillith shaped me. Lillith told me to."

           
"Lillith is Ihlini," he
said tightly. "What did you expect?"

           
"I expected—and
received—love," Gisella told him. "It was what she gave me. It was
what my father gave me. In the name of that love, I did what I was told."

           
"To Strahan—"

           
Gisella looked away. "I was
confused," she said softly. "Confused, afraid—so afraid." She
crumpled the silver girdle so that the links bit into her flesh. "I did
what I was told."

           
Corin stared at her for a long,
stricken moment. And then he backed away. Hugging himself, he backed away,
Knowing himself as confused.

           
And perhaps equally afraid.

           
"Go." He stared at the
floor. "Just—go."

           
She went. He heard the chime of
silver links, the rattle of clashing rubies, the swish of heavy skirts. He
heard the door thud closed. And then he was alone.