Varthlokkur spun. His response so startled the King, he nearly flung himself backward off the wall. Varthlokkur seized one flailing hand. "Don't sneak around like that."
"Like what? Who was sneaking? I walked up and sat down. What the hell is wrong with you?"
The wizard grumbled, "Nothing concrete. Not yet. Something in the east. Without the stink of Shinsan. But I could be wrong."
"Any tie-in with Hsung's change of heart?"
"The world consists of patterns. Mostly, we misread them. In Hsung's case, though, he really wants peace. The question is why."
"You didn't say that before."
"Nepanthe."
"Think I missed something there."
"The years have robbed her of too much. Her brothers. Mocker and Ethrian. Even Elana. I don't want to crucify her on a false hope."
"You're not making a lot of sense."
"It's Ethrian. He might be alive."
"What? Where?" This was staggering news. His godson alive? He owed that boy an incalculable debt.
"Easy," the wizard said. "I don't know anything for sure. It's a touch of a feeling I get lately. Something one hell of a long way off that has his aura. It's like catching one sniff of fresh bread while you're walking down the street, then trying to find the baker. The only resource I haven't tried is the Unborn. I won't unless there's another overpowering excuse to send him that way anyway."
The King sneered his disgust. The thing called the Unborn was a monster which should never have been created. "He's in the east, then."
"If it's him. The far east."
"Prisoner of Shinsan?"
"Lord Chin took him."
"Chin is dead."
"Just thinking out loud. Lord Chin and the Fadema took him. We've assumed they delivered him to the Pracchia, who used him to twist Mocker's arm. But maybe they didn't have him after all."
"They had him. You couldn't bluff Mocker. You ought to know that. They did some fancy convincing to make him attack me."
The wizard peered into the misty east. He did not reply, though he could have admonished the King about romanticizing his one-time friend, or about listening too closely to the guilt he bore.
The King mused, "We never had proof that Ethrian died."
The wizard was proud that he had no scales over his eyes, yet he did have his blind spots. The man Bragi had slain, and whose wife the wizard had later married, had been his son. Sometimes that fact got in the way.
Bragi shifted ground. "Was there anything else?"
"Anything else?"
"Your claim to be preoccupied was unconvincing."
Varthlokkur shifted his attention from the distance to the man. His basilisk eyes crinkled. "You grow bolder with age. I recall a younger Bragi shaking at the mere mention of my name."
"He didn't realize that even the mighty are vulnerable. He hadn't seen the dread ones in their moments of weakness."
Varthlokkur chuckled. "Well said. Don't take the notion too much to heart, though. The Tervola won't give you a decade to find the chinks in their armor."
Bragi stood. "I'll try this conversation when you're feeling more pellucid. Maybe you'll deal some straight answers."
Varthlokkur faced the east. His eyes lost focus. "We will speak later, then," he said.
Bragi frowned, not understanding. The wizard had changed languages. He shrugged, left the man to his mysteries.
The road called Lieneke Lane drew its name from the civil war which brought mercenary captain Bragi Ragnarson into Kavelin. Ragnarson had destroyed then Queen Fiana's enemies. A key victory had occurred near the town of Lieneke.
The road meandered amongst the homes of the wealthy. A lone, rain-soaked rider pursued it westward. A park appeared at his right hand. To his left the homes grew larger and wealthier. He glanced at one. The survivors of the King's family by his first marriage lived there, neither in penury nor in ostentation nor fame. The horseman averted his face. He left the lane just a few houses beyond the King's.
A footman braved the drizzle, took his animal. "The lady just arrived, Mr. Dantice. She said to wait in the library. Bette will be there to serve you."
"Thank you." Aral scampered across the porch. He shed his rain cloak and left it with the doorman. Ambling toward the library, he watched for Mist's children. Usually they were too much in evidence, and too filled with curiosity. He did not see them today, though, and wondered if Mist had moved them elsewhere. Despite the best coaching, little tongues would wag.
"Good morning, sir," the maid said.
"Good morning, Bette. Could you bring me something light? Butter, bread, and preserves, say? I haven't yet eaten."
"The cook has a nice grouse, sir."
"I don't think so. I shouldn't be here long enough."
"Very well, sir. Tea?"
"Anything hot. This rain will give us all the rheumatism."
Dantice prowled nervously after the woman departed. So many books! They represented so much wealth and knowledge they intimidated him. He had no formal education. His limited literacy skills he had garnered from his father, who had troubled to learn only because he was too mean to hire clerks.
Aral was sensitive about his ignorance. His contacts with the court had shown him the value of literacy. His association with Mist had underscored it. She had opened his eyes to uncounted new ideas...
Aral Dantice called himself a realist. He did not believe in the free lunch. His peculiar romanticism lay askew from that of his acquaintances. His relationship with Mist was an alliance of convenience. They were one another's willing tools... so he told himself when he worried.
So why this untamed interest in matters neither commercial nor political? Why did she take time to teach him when the lessons were so elementary they had to be excruciatingly boring? When his long-run value was severely limited and localized? Why did he?... It had come at him from his blind side. It had jumped and mauled him, and had left him with feelings and visions that were new to him. And he was frightened. This was not the right time. And Mist was not the right woman.
She was old. She had been old when his grandfather was a babe. Maybe she had been old when Varthlokkur was a pup, and the wizard had stalked the world for four long centuries. And she was a princess of the Dread Empire. No cosmetic could hide that fact, no term of exile change it. The cruel blood of tyrants coursed her veins. Even now she barkened to its roar.
But she was the most desirable woman alive. When her melting eyes poured fire on a man, he couldn't help but become their slave. Only some gonadless creature out of the same devil's jungle that spawned her could ignore her.
He wondered, perhaps for the hundredth time, just what went on behind her perfect mask of a face. The male thaumaturges of the Dread Empire concealed themselves behind hideous beast dominoes. She hid behind beauty.
He scanned all the titles and finally selected the book he chose each time he came here. Bette brought bread and butter and tea. He sipped and nibbled while studying meticulously prepared, hand-pressed woodcuts of the architectural wonders of the age.
He had seen the real structures during the war. The representations were woefully inadequate. "Damn!" he swore softly. "There's got to be a better way."
Michael claimed there were painters in Hellin Daimiel who could portray people perfectly. Why didn't they try place portraiture?
"Aral?" Her voice was soft. Its edges tinkled like tiny silver bells. Her beauty punished ugliness for existing. He rose, gulped.
"Sit down, Aral." She took a chair beside him. He imagined he felt the heat of her burning across the foot of air separating them. "That book again. Why?"
He swallowed. "The technical challenge. There has to be a better way to illustrate." Did his voice sound like a frog's croak? How could she do this to him? He wasn't a kid anymore.