The Soul Weaver (7 page)

He cocked his head, looking at me quite seriously. “Do you truly think you'll come to Avonar to live?”

“Gondai is my husband's home, Radele. He sits the throne of Avonar, and my son is his successor. Of course I'll come.”

He did not comment, just bowed and walked away. What did Karon mean when he said he needed someone whose heart was not engaged with our family? I slammed the wicket gate so hard it bounced back open again.

After a second week of this peevishness, a tentative tap on the study door brought Teriza with news. “A man's come to see you, my lady. He's waiting in the small sitting room.”

Visitors at Verdillon were a rarity. Pausing only long enough to wipe my pen and close the inkwell, I followed Teriza down the wide staircase and into the sitting room. Awaiting me was a sturdy man wearing a thin-at-the-elbows coat of dark blue and holding a soft, wide-brimmed hat in his hand. The flame-colored patch on his coat proclaimed him a sheriff, a local magistrate whose first responsibility was the extermination of sorcerers. Fortunately his weathered face proclaimed him a friend—Graeme Rowan, the sheriff of Dunfarrie.

“How wonderful to see you, Sheriff. And Paulo will be delighted.”

“It's fine to see you, too, my lady,” he said, taking my hand and offering a polite bow.

I didn't lie when I said I was happy to see Rowan. Though I had once despised him for his office, he had shown himself to be a faithful ally and a man of honor and integrity. Yet one close glance at the sandy-haired sheriff made it clear that he was not to be the instrument to relieve the tensions of the household. Deep creases lined his ruddy brow. When I sat on a couch that faced the windows overlooking the overgrown lawn and cherry orchard and motioned him to join me, he perched on the edge of the cushions.

“What brings you so far, Sheriff? Just a visit, I hope.” One says the words.

“Free to speak plainly, ma'am?” His soft-spoken manner and country accent did not accurately reflect the capabilities of a man responsible for maintaining the king's law in a sizable district of Leire. Graeme Rowan was easily underestimated.

“I've never known you to do otherwise,” I said.

The lines in his brow failed to soften at my meager humor.

“There's no one but me in the house.” I said. “Tennice is gone to Yurevan for the day. Teriza and Kat are heading off to market. Gerick is most likely in the stables with Paulo, and Radele, our new Dar'Nethi bodyguard, is never far from him.”

“King Evard wants to see you.” He held out a small folded paper.

“Evard!” The paper was heavy and stiff, of good quality. Nothing was written on the outside, and the red wax seal bore no device. I turned it over in my hand. “How is that possible?” Almost six years had passed since the day Gerick had been abducted by the Lords, and I had followed him to Gondai and Zhev'Na. I thought I was well buried.

Rowan's voice was tight and low. “All I know is that ten days ago, two gentlemen of the Royal Household come to Dunfarrie. Their only interest was your whereabouts. I told them the story we agreed on, that I'd heard naught of you since your nephew's abduction. I said how I had it straight from the bailiff at Comigor and the sheriff of the district that no trace of you or the boy had ever been found. But these two men said the king believed you alive and that he ‘very much wished to speak with you.' ”

Very much wished . . .
That didn't sound like Evard at all. “How could he know I was alive? And what could he want?”

“I asked them that. They said only that if I was to ‘happen to run across you,' then I was to say that your pardon stands and that this matter is with regard to the last conversation you had with His Majesty.”

“That's when I told him about the other world and the threat to this world posed by the Lords. I wasn't even sure he believed me.” Once caught up in rescuing Gerick from Zhev'Na, I had never looked back at my old nemesis, the King of Leire. Our enmity was too deep. His boyhood friendship with my brother had prompted him to issue a pardon for my “crimes” of consorting with sorcerers, but I expected no further favors from him. “So what did you tell them?”

“That anyone who thought you were alive was an optimist, and anyone who thought you'd be living in Dunfarrie again was a fool.” Rowan fidgeted with his hat, his face knotted into a frown. “For certain they didn't believe me. The whole business smells bad. That's why I thought I should bring this myself.”

I broke the seal. The message was brief and to the point.

“Windham . . . he wants to meet in Martin's gardens at Windham.” I wadded the notepaper and threw it to the floor. “Cheeky bastard! How dare he set foot there!”

Martin, Earl of Gault, had been my mother's distant cousin and my dearest friend and mentor when I was a girl. On the same day the king and the Council of Lords had condemned Karon to burn, Evard had executed Martin, his beloved mistress, and Tennice's brother Tanager, accusing them of plotting with sorcerers to topple his throne. Only chance had allowed Tennice to escape death. No matter who claimed Martin's land and titles now, the thought of Evard walking in Martin's gardens was vile. Vile.

“One more thing,” said Rowan. “The messenger said, ‘Tell her that a search for one missing person may turn up others who should never be found.' ”

Cold fear quickly doused my indignation. “Stars of night! Could Evard know about Gerick?”

“They said no more than I've told you. I thought maybe they knew of the three sorcerers living at your place. At least
they're
well away.”

On his first venture to save D'Arnath's Bridge, Karon had healed three Zhid, restoring the souls that had been stolen from them centuries before. The three had stayed at my old cottage for a while, but were now back in Gondai on a mission for Karon. Out of Evard's reach, at least. But if the king had any idea about Gerick . . . that he was Karon's son . . . a sorcerer, too . . .

I snatched up the letter from the floor and stared at it again. And then there was the matter of Tennice. . . . Rowan watched me, his thumb rubbing the brim of his hat.

“I can't let Evard start looking for me,” I said. “Any questioning of my old associations would lead him to Tennice's father, which could easily point them here. Not only would that endanger Gerick, but Tennice is still condemned.” That my old friend had escaped execution sixteen years ago was only a matter of luck.

“Perhaps it's time for you to move on. Away from here.”

“Where could we go? We can't hide forever.”
Very much wished . . . Your counsel is needed . . .
“Besides, I'm curious. . . .”

Perhaps it was the week's tension that made me so certain I had to answer Evard's summons, anything to get away from Verdillon and the teeth-on-edge days. For myself, I wasn't afraid of the king. Even his not-so-veiled threat could not shake my confidence; I believed it nothing but an indication of urgency, a clumsy effort at persuasion. Evard had always been a bully. But his friendship for my brother, proven over and over again, had prevented him from physically harming me. And somehow, on the day I had told him of Tomas's death and the strange circumstances surrounding it, I had felt that youthful loyalty transferred to me, a gift of grief in a heart that knew little softness.

No, my only concern in such a meeting would be Gerick's safety. I didn't want Evard getting curious about him, yet I couldn't leave him behind, either; the echoes of my son's night terrors still rang in my ears.

“I think I'd best find out what he wants. Gerick will have to come with me. And Radele, too. We'll travel in disguise, so if Evard is planning a trap, it won't work, because we won't arrive in the way he expects. The change will do us good.”

 

I mustered my arguments carefully before approaching the others with my idea. But to my astonishment, Gerick threw himself into planning it right away. “Paulo will have to come, too, don't you think? He's the best of all of us at slipping in and out of places and getting people to say things they never meant to say. We'll want to scout out the situation before you meet King Evard.”

The trees were noisy with chattering blackbirds as Gerick and Tennice and I sat on the lawn that evening, discussing the journey to Montevial. Graeme Rowan had already ridden out for Dunfarrie, convinced I should be shut up in a lunatic asylum.

“Don't even think I'll allow you near this meeting, dear boy!” I said. “You and Radele—and Paulo, too, if he has to come—will stay well out of the way.”

Though dismayed at the consideration, Tennice agreed that we needed to find out what Evard wanted. “. . . but if you're going to do this, discretion and speed must be of first importance,” he said. “Too many together are noticeable. I still say,
both
young men should remain here.”

“Gerick and I stay together,” I said.

“And I won't go without Paulo.” Gerick's lean face was animated and determined. “He can travel separately. As a horse trader perhaps. All the better to watch out and not be one of us. And my mother and I—and I suppose the Dar'Nethi shadow
must
come—we could be . . .”

“. . . a family looking for a squire's billet for a son,” I said, caught up in Gerick's enthusiasm. “It's the most common reason for a mother and son to be traveling to Montevial. A father dead in the war. The family seeking someone to take the boy under his wing.”

“Just what Philomena was trying to do for me after Tomas died, before I went to Zhev'Na,” said Gerick.

He said it so casually.
Zhev'Na
. The syllables pricked my heart, evoking horror and hope in a confusing muddle. The name recalled so much of grief and despair, yet for Gerick to speak of the Lords' fortress with equanimity was surely a sign of his healing. He guarded his thoughts so fiercely, I grasped at any sign of progress.

“Exactly,” I said. “Radele would be the fencing master who's taught the boy until now. Can we pull it off?”

“Of course we can,” said Gerick. “I'll be interested to see Montevial again. My last time there I was eight or nine, when Papa—Tomas—took me to see the ruins at Vaggiere. Actually, I think he wanted to show me his new chambers in the palace more than he wanted to show me the ruins.”

“I would imagine he did. Tomas was an inveterate show-off.” I smiled at Gerick, and he returned it, a brief, glorious reflection of my brother and Karon all in one. He didn't smile enough.

Tennice, as always, was skeptical, but Gerick's cheerful mood won him over. My old friend unfolded his long legs and got up from the grass, grimacing and stretching his ever-aching back. “I'll speak to Teriza, get her started on your provisioning.”

Gerick sprang to his feet. “I'll tell Paulo. He'll think it a lark—riding horses all day for weeks.”

During the discussion Radele had remained unobtrusively in the shade of a myrtle hedge, a vantage from which he could see both the lane from the main road and the service road that led from the stableyard deeper into the parkland. The moment Tennice and Gerick were out of earshot, the young Dar'Nethi confronted me, his face quite solemn. “Madam, you cannot be serious about this fey masquerade, traipsing about the countryside . . .”

I stood and brushed the grass from my skirt. “I'm quite serious. And if you've heard so much, then you know you're to accompany us.”

“We must wait here for the Prince's return.”

“That could be months. King Evard likes getting his way, and if he starts hunting, he could discover this place long before that. I'll not have Gerick's or Tennice's safety compromised. It's too dangerous to wait.”

“I don't think it will be months. Probably only a few days. And in any case, my lord's commands to me . . .”

“. . . said nothing about preventing a journey to Montevial, I'm sure. He would never set me any such restriction.”

“You? Of course not. But he would not have the young Lord . . . put in such a risky position. The boy must not leave here until the Prince returns.”

A chill prickled my skin.
The young Lord.
That's what they had called Gerick in Zhev'Na.

“I would never put my son at undue risk, Radele. Our position at Verdillon may not be secure, even now, so Gerick cannot remain here. He needs to be with me. Besides, he needs to get out in the world. He's not a prisoner.”

“But the Prince said—” He stopped abruptly.