"For what, exactly?" Lady Weston asked. "I saw it, felt it, but I have little idea of what actually happened. It almost seemed that the Kellian were casting."
"Almost." Sebastian looked down, and noticed for the first time that his trousers were soaked with blood where he’d been kneeling. He went perfectly white, and jerked in his seat, but then began speaking rapidly: "The Kellian, the originals, were part of Queen Solace. She sacrificed a piece of one of her fingers making them, and they were true extensions of her will until she went away. The Kellian descendents aren’t quite the same, but the spell which makes them Kellian means they had no barriers against Solace. Her will overrode them totally.
"When our great-grandfather was killed, and our family guessed at who was responsible, my great-grandmother realised that the Kellian’s weakness to Solace might be true in reverse. They can’t protect against her at all, but she can’t stop being linked to them either. That was something new. For years, centuries, we’ve been trying to find a way to stop the cycle of the Grand Summoning’s return. Mostly we tried to find ways to move in the Eferum, to be able to reach her before the Summoning began so we could kill her before the power levels became too dangerous. But we’ve never succeeded, and when we realised the possibilities of the Kellian descendents, we hit upon a different approach.
"They’re not quite Montjuste-Surcleres. Ren did wonder if they counted as a kind of cousin, but Lieutenant Faral couldn’t pick up the attuned focus, so I guess the spell excludes them in some way. But they are – were – part of Queen Solace, and gave us access to her, the opportunity to cast a spell which ordinarily she would see and spot easily. Symbolic magic, strengthening the ties between Solace and us through the Kellian. Ren’s the direct heir and so her blood made the strongest link. She marked Solace with it – the expression of Solace at Falk – and ever since then we’ve marked every Kellian we met with a drop of mine or Ren’s blood. And then cast a small start to a very large spell." He glanced at his knees again, but only for a moment. "I missed four, ones who were never called to the city, but we’d attached a link to the rest, a tiny casting so we could use them to make Solace cast a spell. So that’s what happened. We prepared the room that night after Ren put up all those divinations, and set the trigger of both spells there. Then it only needed the Kellian and Queen Solace to be in the Hall of Summoning, and one of us to trigger it. After that, her own magic would end it, whether she killed us or not." He stopped and took a deep breath, looking a lot like he wanted to cry.
"So, you held the trigger?" Prince Justin asked, looking puzzled. "Where were you? How did you escape the sleep spell?"
"No. I would only have needed to trigger the spell if Ren couldn’t. I was in the Eferum."
"But why?" managed Lady Weston, in a tone which said impossible!. "More to the point, how? The risk of being discovered–"
"Small," Sebastian said. "In the Eferum, it’s your thoughts and feelings which make you exist. Ren made me sleep – more than sleep – before she put me in there. Unless I was conscious, thinking and feeling, I didn’t fully exist there."
Going to the Hells asleep. Even the Queen looked disbelieving. But still angry. The Claires had lied to her, had meant all along for the Grand Summoning to be completed. Had done things their way without telling anyone.
"How many Kellian were needed to trigger this spell?" Prince Justin asked abruptly.
"Two," Sebastian said. "Well, one, but with just one Queen Solace would have been able to cast in the early stage of the spell."
"But there were three Kellian here, the entire time. Yet your sister stood there baiting the Black Queen."
Sebastian looked down at his knees again. "It would have killed them," he explained, his voice hardly loud enough to hear. "Channelling power like that, it’s not true casting. And for that spell, the amount of Efera involved would be – like a flood ripping away the banks of a river. Three Kellian would have been destroyed. Even – how many were there? Eight?"
"Nine," Lady Weston murmured.
"How deadly is a ninth of a lightning bolt? There was no way to test how much they could bear. The most we could do was arrange for as many Kellian to be present as possible, but this sleep spell took control out of Ren’s hands. With so few in the room when the Grand Summoning completed, Ren wouldn’t have – Ren would have held the trigger till she had no choice."
Sebastian’s voice broke on the last word and he jerked to his feet. "I’m sorry we didn’t tell you, but we couldn’t," he said, the words so fast they fell over each other. "Any hint that we wanted the Kellian present was too much to risk. It’s what we had to do, we had to stop her, and that was the only way we could find. I – please, can I go back? She could be – I want to be there."
The Queen still looked less than happy, but maybe she was softened by the tears running down Sebastian’s face. "Very well," she said. "Go."
Chapter Twenty-Six
Going was one thing, seeing another. Rennyn had been taken to a bedroom not too far from the Hall of Summoning, but the healer had woken assistants to crowd every corner, all murmuring and bustling and fetching things in and out. Sebastian hadn’t been allowed more than a glimpse, and they’d ended up sitting on an ugly couch listening to snatches of conversation from the next room. They would, Kendall supposed, at least hear if Rennyn died.
"Sukata was there."
So he’d noticed. "Mm."
Sebastian picked at his trousers above the drying patches of blood. He’d ignored suggestions he go change, just kept worrying at the cloth. There was probably some way to magic it clean, but Kendall doubted he was in any state to cast.
"Tell me what happened."
That took a while. Kendall wasn’t sure how much he listened, attention only partially on her, straightening at every change of tone in the next room. Finally she said: "What was she trying to cast? All that did was make the Black Queen beat her up."
"Probably just a distraction." Sebastian shrugged. "The trigger wasn’t linked to her casting."
"Was the focus on her necklace always a fake?"
"No. I researched that concealment for her. Nothing to do with the Black Queen." Sebastian hunched his shoulders. "She just, she was worried our Great-Uncle would…do things to her."
The way the demon had touched her made it pretty clear what he wanted. Rennyn had hated that he’d bitten her. It was the most upset Kendall had ever seen her, outside when she’d told the Kellian she owned them.
"If she dies, the Kellian will belong to you."
"I’d inherit the ability to control them. That’s all." Frowning at the words, Sebastian worried his trousers again. "Did they hate her for it?"
"Not…hate."
"She’s dreaded telling them for years, even before we knew them. Perhaps after all it would have been better if we’d been able to stay hidden till we had to prepare the Hall of Summoning. Easier to mark them over a month, of course, but it was cruel that they grew to trust us."
"But that helped," Kendall protested. "They hated the idea of it, and what the Black Queen would do to them, but at least they knew what kind of person Rennyn was. Is."
Sebastian gave her a dark look, then said: "The kind of person who makes decisions for other people? Who takes their choices away from them?"
Kendall fought a flush which left her hot all over. "Well, she does."
"I know. You think she never asked herself if she was doing the right thing? Hells, she wasn’t even sure it was right to kill Solace."