Dragon Prince 03 - Sunrunner's Fire Read online

  “Sioned—please,” Ostvel whispered, the words raw with emotion.

  She gave a start and the Fire vanished. “Ostvel—I’m so sorry, I didn’t think—”

  Riyan was biting his lip, as heart-caught as his father but for a different reason: he had few memories of the mother who had died before he was two winters old.

  “Forgive me,” Sioned murmured, ashamed.

  Ostvel shook his head. “It’s all right. Just—a shock. Seeing her again.”

  Sioned thanked the Goddess that Alasen was not present, and returned her attention to what she was supposed to be doing. The Fire leaped up again in response to her call, just in time for those watching to see Andry finish the circle and rejoin Urival by the bonfire.

  She felt the latter’s colors as she had known she would, his moonlight weaving necessary to confirm Andry’s Sunrunning. Again it was eerie to see his face as his voice spoke on skeins of moonrays.

  He’s a little miffed at you for using dranath, you know.

  He’ll get over it.

  Why did he go to you, I wonder?

  A rhetorical question, I assume. Ah, dear old friend, I feel your sadness tonight. It grieves me.

  Don’t worry. I have a very large flask of your brother’s best wine waiting for me in my rooms. I intend to get good and drunk tonight in Andrade’s memory.

  To blot out the memories, Sioned corrected gently. I wish I could be there with you.

  No, you don’t. You have quite enough to occupy you, High Princess. Well, on with the festivities.

  And he was too suddenly gone. Sioned ached for him, watching his face in the Fire as he announced that Andry had indeed completed a Sunrunning to Stronghold. The fifth ring went onto his right thumb, a circle of the special reddish-gold used only by faradh’im.

  It was a ring Andry had never before worn. Up until that moment, he had only been reconfirming skills already betokened by the four rings he had earned before this night. But now he was a full Sunrunner, with all the rings, the honors, and the responsibilities this implied.

  And there would be more to come, too quickly.

  The scene in the brazier continued, showing Andry as he proved his skills at weaving moonlight, attested to shortly thereafter by Urival. Sioned did not know to whom Andry spoke; she suspected it would be someone approximately as far away from Goddess Keep as she herself was at Stronghold. The faradhi at Balarat in Firon, perhaps, or Meath at Graypearl. The idea was for Andry to prove his strength; from the expressions of respect on Sunrunner faces as confirmation came from Urival, he had succeeded admirably.

  And here came the next departure from tradition. Instead of the silver ring, the sixth, given for the right little finger, Andry had directed Urival to present him with that plus another silver for his left middle finger. This reflected the change Andry had made in the order of things: now, the sixth would be for an apprentice, and the seventh for full abilities as a Moonrunner. Formerly, the seventh had been for the ability to conjure without Fire. Andry had not yet learned that skill from Urival. Rather than show himself lacking, he had altered the rules.

  Sioned tensed as she stared into the flames. She knew what was to come next. The eighth had always been for the teachers, those skilled and subtle enough to instruct others in the faradhi arts. Andry conformed to ritual by calling forward a student of one ring and showing the boy, only a little younger than he, how to call Air. But rather than silver for the left thumb, Urival placed there another gold and pronounced Andry a Master—a distinction formerly reserved for the ninth ring.

  Andry had other plans for that ninth ring.

  As for the fifth, the Sunrunner’s ring, Andry as a Master was now required to make the circuit of faradh’im. Sioned’s apprehensions betrayed her. As she watched, the Fire flickered and she felt Hollis’ hand on her arm to steady her. But the flames died out, leaving them all in the silvery darkness of moonlight.

  “Sioned?” Rohan asked in a low voice, concerned.

  “It’s nothing.” She reached for the cup of wine.

  Hollis put her fingers over it, frowning. “You must rest. Please, Sioned. I know what dranath can do.”

  “I’m not tired. Not exactly, anyway.” She smiled at her nephew’s wife. “I’m all right, I promise.”

  “Hollis is right,” Rohan said briskly. “We’ve seen enough. And you’ve certainly had enough.”

  “We have to see what he’ll do,” Sioned replied stubbornly. “I’ll take a few moments to rest, but I’ve got to renew the conjure.”

  Maarken, leaning around Ostvel and Hollis, plucked up the wine. “I’ll do it.”

  “No!” Hollis exclaimed.

  “Don’t be a fool!” Chay rasped.

  “I want to know,” Maarken said simply, and drained the cup to the dregs.

  Sioned tightened her lips over a furious protest. She met Rohan’s gaze. He said, “ ‘I want to know.’ That’s probably the most dangerous sentence in any language. More than one of us here tonight has succumbed to it.”

  She shifted uneasily. “Including you,” she pointed out.

  “Of course.” And you, my Sunrunner witch of a High Princess, his eyes said.

  Turning to Maarken, she asked, “Well? What’s it like for you?”

  “Just as Hollis described it. Dizziness, and spreading warmth. . . .” He looked startled, then smiled slightly. “And the most amazing need to be alone with my wife—and not just because we’re so short a time married.”

  Hollis blushed in the dimness. “That will pass,” she told him.

  “Goddess, I hope not!” But his laugh was strained. “This is the damnedest feeling! Like I could use my thoughts to change the tides!”

  “Don’t try it,” Sioned warned. “Maarken, be careful.”

  “I’m not saying I want to. I just feel as if I could.” He rubbed one hand over his face; the other was immobilized in layers of bandages, wrist broken in his battle against the pretender. “So this is what it’s like to be a sorcerer.”

  “Partly, I suppose. But you haven’t the gift for it.” She glanced at Riyan, who did. “Don’t you go getting any ideas.”

  “Not if the moons fell out of the sky.” The young man eyed the empty wine cup warily, his right hand worrying at the rings on his left. Then he shook himself and looked across the carpet at Ostvel. “Father . . . I’m glad I got to see Mother tonight. I didn’t know she was so beautiful.”

  Ostvel stared down at his hands. “Her face and her spirit.”

  Chay’s eyes were fixed on his eldest son and heir, dark brows shading his gray eyes nearly black. When the young man’s gaze lost focus and he turned pale, Chay demanded, “Maarken—what is it? Tell me!”

  Rohan gripped Maarken’s elbow. “What are you watching?”

  He gave a start at the touch, gulping in a great lungful of air. “I—I think somebody’s watching us!”

  Riyan held both hands out before him. They were trembling. His eyes—Camigwen’s eyes, dark velvet brown with bronze glints—were glazed with pain. “My rings,” he whispered, staring at Maarken. “Just like when you were fighting Masul and sorcery was used—”

  Ostvel jumped to his feet and hauled his son up. They stumbled toward the silent fountain, where Ostvel plunged Riyan’s hands into the shallow pool of brackish water. Maarken was gasping for breath, supported by Rohan and Hollis. Sioned wove moonlight with desperate speed, but could sense nothing and no one along it.

  Then she looked straight up at the stars.

  Beautiful, aren’t they? a voice said in her mind, rich with mocking laughter. And you know how to use them, High Princess. Why not use them now to find me? You’ve already made an excellent start by drinking that wine. You’re beginning to understand power—the kind your son will have once he’s grown. Oh, yes, we know all about him, your Sunrunner child who also has the Old Blood flowing through his veins. Someday I’ll figure out whether he got it from you or his princely father.

  Wh-who are you? Sioned didn’
t dare think. She drew into herself, knowing that to accept the invitation and weave starlight was to court disaster.

  Who? You’ll have to wait some years before you find that out. Or perhaps you meant “what.” That’s something you know very well, Sunrunner.

  What do you want?

  I’ll let you puzzle that one out too for some little while. We’re not quite ready yet, you see. Masul was an interesting beginning, but only a feint. The real battle is before you, High Princess. Do you think you’re up to it? Do you honestly think you can prevail against the ones you call sorcerers?

  And the last thing she heard was gleeful laughter on a breath of starlit wind.

  Morning sunlight spilled across the floor as Ostvel gratefully accepted a winecup from Alasen, who settled uneasily on a chair near him. “Can you tell me about it now?”

  “As much as I know.” He took a long swallow and closed his eyes. “Which isn’t much.”

  “But everyone’s all right.”

  “Yes. Still stunned, I think, but not from anything Andry did.” He looked at Alasen, touched her free-flowing hair. It was an unusual shade of gold-lit brown, straight and fine as silk thread. Her cheeks were pallid with worry and her green eyes, the same shape and color as Sioned’s, were strained. He made himself smile at her. “Don’t look so grim. There’s plenty of power among us to use against these sorcerers, you know.”

  “Riyan doesn’t much like the idea of being of their blood.”

  “But we learned something very useful last night.” He explained his son’s experience with his rings. “So at least we can know when they’re working their spells.”

  Alasen shivered. “I can understand why they’d be watching tonight, with Andry’s ritual taking place. But why here? Why not Goddess Keep?”

  “Perhaps they consider what happens here more important. I don’t know. Sioned says there was no contact, no communication. Besides, can we be sure they weren’t watching Goddess Keep as well?” He drank again and set the cup aside. “We missed the last part of it,” he added idly. “I would have liked to see him conjure with light from the stars.”

  “With knowledge gained from the Star Scroll?” Alasen shook her head. “He’s doing dangerous things, Ostvel. And there will be more.” She rose and went to the windows, where dawnlight seeped across the Desert far below Stronghold.

  Ostvel gazed at her for a long, silent time. It would be difficult to find a woman more different from his first wife in either looks or character; where Camigwen’s personality had been all angles and bright light, Alasen was made of intriguing spirals and a more subdued glow hinting at shadows. In Camigwen there had been no fear, but Alasen had that summer discovered absolute terror. What for Cami had been joyous and exhilarating gifts were to Alasen things to flee from as fast as she could. Both Sunrunners, one trained and one who would never be trained. That he loved both women was no surprise. That both loved him was a blessing from the Goddess. And he knew that Alasen’s love for Andry had nothing and everything to do with the fact that she had Chosen him instead.

  He rose and stretched, then went to slip an arm around her slender waist. “I do love you, you know,” he murmured.

  She tilted her head back and smiled up at him. “And I love you. So no more chatter about how scandalous it is that I’m half your age, hmm?”

  He laughed. “Well, it is a scandal. A little one, anyway. But I’m feeling younger all the time.”

  Alasen pressed closer to him. “Rohan left orders that no one was to be disturbed until noon at the earliest. Are you feeling that young, my lord?”

  “My lady, by the time we get to Skybowl for the winter, you’ll have made me eighteen years old again.” The sunlight rippled along her hair and he buried his lips in its silken thickness. Alasen’s hands skimmed up and down his back, lingering over the muscles of his shoulder. Ostvel smiled into her hair and bent his head to take her mouth with his own.

  All at once she broke away from him and cried out. Sun flooded her white face and sank its light deep into her green eyes. “No,” she whispered. “Andry, please—no!”

  Ostvel caught her up in his arms and carried her to the bed. Once out of the direct glare of the morning sun, she stopped trembling. He smoothed back her hair and waited for the terror to fade from her eyes.

  “I’m sorry,” she breathed. “It was Andry—he—”

  Ostvel cursed himself. He ought to have remembered, and kept Alasen out of the sunlight. At dawn after the ritual, the new ruler of Goddess Keep wove the colors of all faradh’im present into one vast fabric of light, spreading it across the continent and as far away as the islands of Kierst-Isel and Dorval. With Andry dominant, directing the flow, every Sunrunner everywhere was touched. Through the weaving it was announced that a new Lord of Goddess Keep had been accepted, having demonstrated his worthiness to wear the ten rings. Ostvel ought to have realized that of all faradhi-gifted people, Andry would have singled out Alasen in particular for his touch.

  “I should have known,” he told her now. “He loves you. And it’s the only way he can touch you.”

  “Sioned must tell him never to do it again.” She raked her hair back from her brow and sat up. “Ostvel, I don’t want him intruding in our lives!”

  Ostvel spoke very softly. “He’ll always love you, my dear. And I know that you’ll always love him—just as you know I’ll always love Cami.” He took both her hands in his. “Both of us must undertake not to be jealous.”

  “I Chose you, not him. He’ll have to accept that.”

  Ostvel pressed a kiss into the warm hollow of each palm, and smiled.

  Sioned did not tell Rohan about the words exchanged on starlight. She told no one but Urival. And he promised that as soon as he could, he would come to Stronghold—with a translated copy of the Star Scroll.

  Chapter Two

  721: Castle Crag

  On taking possession of Castle Crag in the spring of 720, Ostvel had set about several formidable tasks—the most immediate of which was to learn his way around the labyrinthine keep.

  After spending much of his youth at Goddess Keep, an imposing and logical structure, he had become chief steward of Stronghold, a castle built for defense with a correspondingly efficient design. Skybowl, his holding for fourteen winters, was a small place without need or opportunity for eccentricities. But his new home was something else again.

  Cut into the side of cliffs above the Faolain River and built out from those cliffs in cantilevered overhangs, Castle Crag was a maze of rooms, halls, suites, staircases, and the most exquisite oratory in all thirteen princedoms. Ostvel had taken his first tour of the place guided by a small battalion of functionaries, all eager to point out the wonders of his or her own domain within the keep. Their chatter had prevented him from gaining any reliable knowledge of where he was, let alone where he was being led.

  That night he had frowned over his problem, knowing that the next day would show him as ignorant of the castle’s environs as he had been at the moment he’d arrived. The servants, he knew, would be watching for mistakes; that afternoon Alasen had lost her way after what she suspected was purposeful misdirection on the part of a page. At midnight therefore he had enlisted her and their Sunrunner, an old friend of his named Donato, in a secret expedition through the twisting corridors. Each of them chose an essential location. Armed with a collection of trinkets—bronze, gold, silver, copper, blue ceramic—privately color-coded to each destination, they spent the rest of the night seeking out the best routes and at all important junctures left behind a vase, a candlestick, a figurine, a dish on convenient tables and shelves.

  “Copper to the kitchens,” Alasen had recited as they finally fell into bed, exhausted but well-pleased with their trick. “Gold to your library, silver to mine, bronze to the great hall, blue to the gardens. But, Ostvel, what if somebody moves everything tomorrow morning?”

  “You forget, my princess, that when you began rearranging our suite you ordered that anything
we changed or added be touched only to clean it.”

  “Did I?” She chuckled. “That was clever of me.”

  The next morning all their signposts were still in position. With supreme confidence they strode through their new home. The servants were astounded. Donato even waited three whole days before rearranging the entire system. But the joke had been on the Sunrunner; he was the one who had forgotten the direct route to the back gardens.

  Now, a year and a half later, Ostvel rarely needed a glance at the trinkets to remind him where he was. Still, every so often he found himself in an unfamiliar corridor without the faintest idea which hallway led where. On one of these confused wanderings, too embarrassed to ask directions from servants, he had discovered the archives.

  He never ceased being grateful to the impulse from the Goddesss that had made him go through the archives himself rather than send them untouched to Stronghold or Dragon’s Rest. The records of five High Princes—Roelstra and his ancestors—and a Regent of Princemarch were stored at Castle Crag, enough parchment to fill a square measure of bookshelves. He had been working methodically back through them since finding the locked door that led into a series of dark, dry chambers. Into history. At first he had thought to have Alasen help him, but one of his first discoveries had quashed that notion immediately. For in the archives he had found Pandsala’s precise, logical, oh-so-secret list of her murders.

  Rohan had told him the bare minimum of facts: that during her regency Pandsala had removed several persons she considered detrimental to Pol’s future as High Prince. The disclosure had been brief and bitter. Ostvel had not pursued the matter despite horrified curiosity about what Pandsala had done and how. But he had at last understood why she was a forbidden topic around Rohan and Sioned, and why they had not gone to Castle Crag for her ritual burning.