“I am a Scion of Jern, Torvin. That will never change. My bloodline may have contained traitors, but it also contains heroes. Heroes like Felan. And that is who I will emulate. He would never have even listened to this sort of thing. And neither will I. Understand? Don’t ever mention it to me again!”
Jeren swept from the tent, too enraged by the thought of what she might have done, of what they wanted her to do. The cold grip of the sword still filled her hand. She couldn’t let go of it, now she had it. It wouldn’t let her go. Striding to the edge of the camp, she kept going, out into the forest, to the place where she and Shan had last met. This couldn’t be happening. She couldn’t let it happen. Every time she turned around, the past was trying to drag her back. Because some of what they said was true.
Nobody wanted another insane Scion of Jern loose on the world. To pillage their way across the Holtlands, to burn the temples and spill blood across the fertile soil of her home. And they feared that in Gilliad, such a monster was rising again.
So did she.
But worse, far worse, was the fear that if she did what they wanted, if she helped them defeat her own brother, he would be killed.
And then she’d be the monster.
Even Shan had forsaken the spectre of revenge to spare her that.
Shan. She needed him. She wanted him so much it felt like her heart was breaking all over again. Shan understood her, loved her, helped her. Gods, he had done nothing but help her and still duty had taken him away from her. Just as her duty wanted to drag her away from him.
Duty. Why did it feel like a curse now? Duty. A chore. A weight.
The ground rose up beneath her. Or maybe she fell. Her knees slammed into the earth and she cried out.
Arms encircled her, strong and yet gentle. For a moment her heart leaped in wild and unbounded joy as she was wrapped in an embrace. But it wasn’t Shan.
“Do not fear, Jeren,” said Indarin. “You are one of us. Nothing will change that. Not a sword, nor a Sect Mother.”
He held her while she sobbed, but when she looked in his face she saw nothing of the pity or disgust that she expected. For the first time, Indarin looked more like his brother than he would ever admit.
“He is coming back,” he murmured. “For you. I know him. He is coming back for you.”
It took time before Jeren could find her voice beneath her sobs. Mortified and yet comforted by Indarin’s presence, she wasn’t aware that Lara was back until her voice sounded out through the trees.
“How is she?”
“She’ll be fine,” said Indarin softly, like a man handling a spooked colt. “You were right to fetch me.”
“You should have seen her in there, Indarin.” The girl’s voice glowed with pride. “She was amazing. The way she moved, the way she spoke.”
“What did they offer?” he asked, ignoring Lara’s passionate description.
Jeren lifted her face, wiped her eyes furiously. “This.” She let the sword fall from her hand, clattering onto the rocks. “And war. And death. Death upon death. They want to use me as a reason to attack River Holt, to kill Gilliad. They don’t understand. They don’t have a clue. They’re just…fools.”
“Well…” Indarin helped her to her feet. “Some would say we all are.” He picked up the sword, turned it over in his hands and then offered it back to her. Jeren hesitated before taking it and her teacher gave her a thin smile. “Yes, an uncomfortable thing to carry, isn’t it?”
“Makes my skin crawl. And the magic within me revolts.” She wrapped her hand around the hilt and took it back.
“It was designed to control magic, to focus it, and to offer Felan a way to drain off the power that would drive him insane. When I was young our Shaman trained your ancestors how to do it, to use it rather than be used. That’s the secret of things, isn’t it? Not just magic but people, politics, perhaps even families.”
Jeren met his eyes and saw both amusement and insight there. “And he taught you?”
“Yes. Our days are longer than your kind’s, Jeren. Much longer. He died soon after your brother left. His only failure, he said. I sometimes think it broke his heart.” For a moment she saw pain in Indarin’s eyes as well. “I feel you’re already most of the way towards mastery of the sword, Jeren. It responds to you as heir, but it doesn’t try to dominate you. Any thoughts as to why?”
Giving a small shake of her head, she stared at the Shaman, waiting for him to continue. Indarin rolled his eyes.
“My magic is healing,” she said at last. “I felt it, when I took the sword. First I was so angry…so insanely angry, and then my magic responded, defending itself I suppose, and it was like a fire inside me, burning away the anger, cauterising the pain.”
“When you answer my questions, you answer your own as well. You can use this sword, Jeren, perhaps better than many of your ancestors. Your magic isn’t rooted in violence. I think only Felan’s was as close.”
“Felan’s magic?”
“Yes. He could make things grow.”
For a moment she couldn’t fathom it, couldn’t take it in. It wasn’t possible.
And suddenly, Jeren laughed. She couldn’t help herself. Felan, the warrior, Felan the consort of the Goddess Incarnate who had fought a thousand enemies, Felan who had won back River Holt from their foes and ruled it with a just, wise and firm hand until his death, the greatest warrior her line had ever produced, the paragon held up before every Scion of Jern since… Felan made things grow.
“Yes,” Indarin agreed, smiling now. “One doesn’t expect someone with the soul of a gardener to be a warrior. Nor one with the soul of a healer. Yet here you are, about to go to the Vision Rock and see what will become of you.”
That killed her mirth. “I’m not ready,” she whispered.
Indarin took her hand, wrapping it more firmly about the hilt. The healing magic began to flood through her again, like warm honey, golden light flowing beneath her skin. “You are, you know. The key to facing the vision is to know who you are, and what you want. And now all that is clear to you. Who are you?”
And he was right. She knew it. Knew it in her soul. What she was, and all she wanted.
“I am Jeren, Scion of Jern, and I am the mate of Shanith Al-Fallion. And I want him back.”
Chapter Nine
As they climbed the mountain to the sacred pools at Aran’Mor, the Shistra-Phail started singing. Their voices blended in a high and intricate harmony. It was the most beautiful thing Jeren had ever heard. It stirred her soul, made tears sting her eyes, and yet she had to listen.
“What song is it?” asked Elayne. Jeren hadn’t heard the warrior woman come up beside her. Her face looked bemused, as if she had never heard music before. “What are they singing about?”
“Home,” said Jeren, and the word caught in her throat. “This is their temple, their holy of holies, their home.”
“I…I had no idea. I thought they were warriors, killers.”
“They are.” Then she corrected herself. “We are. We’re all the same. Or at least not so different. Are you sorry you came?”
“I came with him, with Lord Vertigern.” Elayne glanced back to where her Lord walked behind them, deep in conversation with Torvin. And there it was, in her voice, in that glance.
“You love him, don’t you?”
A smile ghosted across her lips. “It doesn’t matter. I’m his bodyguard, nothing more. And why would someone like him ever look at me?”
Jeren winced inwardly. She had been his betrothed. But more than that, she’d been the thing to which he had aspired, possibly still did. Elayne stood on a lower social level, but she too aspired. How could that be wrong? Why was it accepted for Vertigern to want her, but not for Elayne to want him?