Three Coins for Confession (47 page)

Kathlan. He felt her in his mind now. Felt her touch, tasted her
scent as if she might be standing behind him.

Lauresa was a past that had been taken from him. A thing that
might have been but wasn’t. Chriani had waited for that fate to find him, had
chosen to close his eyes rather than watch it pass him by. On the winter road
from Rheran, he had reached back for that lost thread, tried to touch it one
last time, because it had been the easiest thing in the world. But in his
heart, he had always known he was looking backward. Had always known he’d need
to look forward, to turn for home before that journey was done, because Lauresa
was a past already lost.

Kathlan was a future he had never expected to see. That was
something else.

He looked down to see movement below and around them, sentries
passing each other along what appeared to be one of the lower platform tiers.
The black tree was somewhere behind them. There was no sound except Tician’s
breathing, close to his ear.

She couldn’t see the movement below them. Just shadow to her
Ilmari eyes.

As fast as Chriani moved, she almost stopped him. Would have
stopped him if she hadn’t had her hands locked together, but he understood how
that gave him the advantage he needed.

She had forced her hands together when she sealed the silver
sphere against the space outside. She had kept them together all the time since,
as she controlled the sphere’s movement. Chriani brought his arms up between
her arms now, driving them hard to the side to knock her hands apart and free.

He felt the lurch as the sphere tumbled. Silver light rippled
before him as the portal cracked open. Then he pitched himself forward to fall
through it and into open air beyond.

CHRIANI HALF-EXPECTED the assassin to follow him. He
expected to feel a knife in his back or hear her scream some oath of vengeance,
but there was only silence in his wake as he fell. He hit the platform hard,
rolled with it as best he could. He felt the air knocked from his lungs
regardless, felt a sharp point of pain at his ankle as it twisted beneath him.

He slid to a stop along wet wood, the scent of mold sharp in his
senses. He slipped the black ring off his finger, fumbled within his belt and
hid it there beside the plain steel band. At the same time, he pulled the
hunter’s heart from its pocket and plucked the golden badge from its space. He
felt the warmth of the disk as he threw it off the platform, watched it
disappear into shadow below. The talisman flared bright for a moment in his
hand before he hurled it away. The hiss of alarm sounded out around him as he
rose to his knees.

“Let me confess!”

Footsteps pressed in, six Ilvani there. He heard more moving
behind them, heard the creak of the adjacent bridges as they closed. A blaze of
gold filled the shadows around him, the lóechari’s eyes flashing bright.

“I was a soldier for the Ilmari!” Chriani shouted it in
Ilvalantar, kept his empty hands out to his side. “I rode with the
Crithnalerean and the Laneldenari.” The closest cultist lashed out at him,
forcing him to roll back to evade his knife. “I came to the temple to join you.
I know intelligence of Brandishear and Aerach, of the Laneldenari and the Order
of Uissa. I’ll tell you everything.”

“Hold!”

A voice from the edge of the platform rang out with a tone of
absolute authority. A tall Ilvani warrior stepped forward, his appearance and
armor uniformly pale, the color of spoiled milk. All but the golden eyes,
blazing unnaturally bright.

He stepped in close, set the backsword in his hand to Chriani’s
throat. Chriani met his gaze, wouldn’t look away.

“I’ll tell you everything,” he said again. “Let me confess.”

The warrior stepped back to lash out with his foot, catching
Chriani in the stomach. He took the full force of the blow, felt ribs crack as
it laid him out. Then hands were on him, lifting him roughly to his feet.

He looked up but saw no sign of the silver sphere, as he knew he
wouldn’t. He thought he could feel Tician’s presence, though. Could feel her
cold gaze on him as the lóechari dragged him off into the darkness.

He was beaten as they half-pulled, half-carried him down through
a labyrinth of terraces and bridges. Chriani fought to stay on his feet as he
ran. They had lashed his wrists tightly together with silk ropes, one of the
Ilvani pulling on the trailing lead as if it was a leash. Someone had seized
Dargana’s bloodblade from his belt, the pale Ilvani holding it now where he
sprinted at the head of the company.

Through the haze of pain that filled his head, flaring each time
he felt a fist across his shoulders, the flat of a blade against the back of
his legs, Chriani saw the pale Ilvani studying the bloodblade. Reading the
marks that etched its steel. More than once, he turned back to Chriani to
assess the war-mark at his shoulder, a dark look in his golden eyes.

Chriani remembered how Dargana had reacted when she first saw a
narneth móir in his hands.
Tell me where and how you obtained it that I
might slay every laóith and half-blood hand to have touched it since, and I may
let you die quickly.
He tried to meet the Ilvani’s gaze, defiant. Conscious
of wanting to push the anger as much as he could. Conscious of the fact that
pushing it too far might get him killed.

They hadn’t found the rings in their hidden pockets within his
belt. They had searched him too quickly, had used spellcraft to seek for magic
on him, but they had missed the gold foil and what was hidden within it. It was
the first of the many turns of fortune Chriani would need if he was to survive
long enough to do what he needed to do.

He felt the black well before he saw it. The same stomach-turning
sensation he’d felt when they watched the rite. It was the premonition of
decay, like the instant of knowing that wine had soured even before its taste
had settled on the tongue. Except it wasn’t an instant, but an ongoing churning
revulsion that rooted in his stomach and spread through every limb.

He nearly retched as the Ilvani dragged him over the white stair
to the black terraces beyond. The storm of shadow could be felt here as well as
seen, pouring across him like a scalding rain. It was in his eyes, in his lungs
as he fought to breathe. He had to focus to see through it, catching sight of
Ilvani standing in short rows between the floating globes of mage-light. More
lóechari were shifting in from behind them. Sentries called in from across
Markura, seemingly. Coming to witness Chriani’s capture and whatever would
follow it.

He was dragged to a halt, the pale Ilvani turning back to stop
beside him. A kick to the back of Chriani’s leg sent him to his knees. He took
it in silence, looked up to the Ilvani’s molten gaze.

“Let me…”

A steel-hard blow took him across the back of the head. Chriani
felt himself slip down into shadow, felt the warmth of the platform beneath
him. He thought he remembered trying to call out again, and another storm of
pain descending.

No words, half-blood. Words only get in the way.

The voice in his mind spoke one of the old Ilvani tongues. But as
with Veassen, the words were clear to him, their understanding defined by the
mental link across which they moved. Chriani blinked his eyes open but still
saw only shadow. He had to force himself upright for the haze to lift.

The sorcerer in black was pacing around him, all the Ilvani
sentries except the pale captain having shifted back. They all stared in
silence, Chriani feeling the weight of their gaze like an itch that rose even
above the pain of the blows he had endured.

He tasted blood at his lips, did his best to not make any sign
that he was trying to speak again. He focused.

Let me confess…

The sorcerer’s thoughts cut through his, punching into his mind
like an attack.
I already know your plea, half-blood. I heard it on the
terrace above, as I saw you struck down when you spoke it. I am master of this
place, and keeper of the coins of the confessor.

Viranar,
he thought. Focusing on the name Tician had given
him while he pushed all thought of the assassin from his mind. He could only
hope she hadn’t been lying.

The dark sorcerer nodded.
You know far too many things that an
Ilmari should not. Are you a mystery meant to be solved? A puzzle to be broken
apart in the hope of understanding how it fits together?

I’m an heir of the Valnirata from my father, and wanted for
treason in Aerach and Brandishear alike.
Chriani let the truth of his words
resonate in his mind, drawing on all the power and pain of what had happened.
He let the memory of Kathlan push through him, let the sorrow of her in his
heart frame each word.
I lost everything once dear to me. I joined the
Laneldenari, but they’re dead. But through them, I know what this place is, and
now I’ve seen its power. I want to be one of you. Please.

Chriani felt a ripple of reaction shift through the sentries
around him. He understood that whatever link of memory the lóechari shared
through their rites, his thoughts in the mind of the sorcerer Viranar were
filtering through to everyone. He fought to feed them his anger, had to dig
deep beneath the fear to find it.

Viranar whispered an incantation, her voice at Chriani’s ear
strangely hollow compared to her thoughts in his mind. A tingling rose at the
back of his neck, the pulse of dweomer twisting through him. Truth magic, he
guessed.

The sorcerer’s thoughts shifted at a level below words. Waiting
for him. Curious.

I know things,
Chriani said.
I was a ranger of
Brandishear. I had contact with guards under the duke in Teillai, and I know
the useless games that the princes play for power, Chanist and Vishod. I was in
a war-council in Sylonna. I know Laedda and Contáedar, and what they know of
the lóechari, and what they don’t yet know. I’ll tell it all to you.

Viranar didn’t move, but Chriani felt a command slip out from her
to the pale Ilvani at his side. A name hung unspoken there.
Raecla.
He
felt a nod from the captain to two sentries on either side of him.

Chriani was pulled to his feet, a wave of nausea flowing through
him to follow the pain at his neck and back. His hands were still tied, aching
where the circulation had been cut off. He fought to move his stiff fingers as
the dark sorcerer paced away, feeling himself pushed roughly forward to follow
her.

Her destination was the pillar of grey stone. She stepped onto
the dais where the eight Ilvani had taken the rite, Chriani three steps behind
her. He heard footsteps following that he was sure marked the pale captain,
Raecla. He didn’t turn back to confirm it. He stumbled as he reached the
pillar, saw its fractured lines gleaming with an oily light. He saw the movement
shifting within it. Realized up close that it wasn’t a reflection as he’d first
thought.

Looking beyond the platform’s edge, it was as though he could see
down beneath the surface of the world itself. The well of shadow was a surging
whirlpool of dark magic, crusted to solid form like the skim of ice that would
form over even fast-flowing water if the cold was sharp enough. As from the
platform above, he saw the great roots of the black tree twist and plunge
downward into darkness. But seen up close, he could make out the white rot that
shot through those roots, and which sent pale veins coursing up the tree’s
black bark and twisted branches.

So tell me.
Viranar’s voice shivered with a seductive
quality that made Chriani tremble. Not with any desire of the body, but of the
mind. He felt her pressing against his thoughts to dull their frantic
thrashing, like another’s hand soothing the sting of a burn with a cool salve.

Promise me first. Let me take the confession. Let me forget.

He let the pain of his mind take him again. He remembered
Kathlan’s face in the tent when he’d told her the truth, remembered the pain of
her voice driving into him like a dull blade. The memory of her face as she’d
turned away from him, the ache at his chest as he’d ridden away into the
Greatwood. Away from everything his life had been.

No Ilmari has ever taken the rites of confession.

I’m Halobrelia.
In his mind, Chriani was defiant.
I
belong here. I’m meant to be here.

The dark touch of the well’s magic flared as if in response to
Chriani’s thoughts, almost overwhelming him as Viranar paced before the pillar.
In the new wave of nausea that coursed through him, he could feel all the
Ilvani draw strength from the magic as it flared. The power coursed through
Viranar even more strongly, Chriani seeing the fire at her hands, the light of
her golden eyes pulsing beneath her skin now. At her neck, the three coins were
blazing bright.

With his hands bound, Chriani couldn’t raise them to make the
moonsign, but his frantic fingers clawed the crescent shape across his stomach
as he fought to stay standing. He let the fear flow through him, not caring
that Viranar would feel it. His mind was memories of Barien suddenly, and how
the warrior had always been dismissive of the Ilmari suspicion of spellcraft.
He let himself remember learning with shock that Barien had channeled magic
himself as Irdaign did, as one of the spell-singers of the Leisanmira.

He told himself that if it had been Barien standing here instead
of him, he would have been doing the same thing Chriani was doing. Making the
same choice. The pain that came with those thoughts was raw still, the loss of
the warrior’s presence like a butcher’s blade had cut part of Chriani’s life
away. A wound that wouldn’t heal, wouldn’t ever close.

“My name is Chriani. I’m the heir of the exile’s blade.”

He needed to say it out loud to focus the words. He expected to
be struck down, but there was only silence in response. The touch of Viranar’s
mind to his quickened somehow. An intensity to her thought. A sudden storm of
fear and hope, but wary.

A command slipped out to Raecla behind him. As the pale captain
stepped forward, his golden gaze burned into Chriani, malice and bloodlust
shining even brighter in his eyes. But from his belt, the Ilvani pulled a
familiar talisman. Chriani saw the furious surprise in the pale face as the
talisman’s bloodstone chip flared to a blood-red glow like the Darkmoon in a
clear winter sky.

Chriani noted the frantic pulse of that glow. Felt it echoed in
the hammering of his heart.

The shadow that wrapped the platform shifted. A shudder passed
through the storm of darkness that swirled and rose around them, like the web
of thought and mind that connected him to the lóechari was connected in turn to
the shadow well itself. That shadow’s breath of decay wrapped tighter around
him, the mage-light of the platform shimmering, but Chriani kept his gaze fixed
tight to Viranar.