Part 42 (1/2)
”She was to choose, from among three amulets, the most important one.”
”They were?”
”Healing, Clear Sight and Wisdom. She chose Wisdom.”
”Why?”
”Because Wisdom is the foundation of all knowledge. What good is either Healing or Clear Sight if you don't know how to use it?” He grinned. ”It's like when I first found this sword. I had the thing, but not a clue how to wield it.”
Taminy smiled back at him. ”A good a.n.a.logy. Your aidan, Airleas, is like that sword. The might of Cynes.h.i.+p is like that sword. Possession of either is only the beginning of things.”
”I know this,” he hastened to a.s.sure her. ”I understand the need for wisdom.”
Taminy sat back in her fleece-covered chair, closing her eyes for a moment and absorbing the movement and chatter in the hall around them.
”Mistress, are you all right?”
She opened her eyes. ”Tired, is all. But, better than yesterday.” That was true, she realized. Yesterday, after weeks of near sleepless nights, she had felt transparent, as if every sluggish beat of her heart was visible to all eyes. Last night, she had slept the night through and today she felt merely translucent. Dear Catahn seemed to have found some way to guard her dreams after all.
”Airleas, answer me this: Given a choice, would you choose wisdom . . . or the honor of your father's House?”
”My father . . . my father dishonored our House-your House. I realize that now. I'm the only one who can restore that honor.”
”How would you do that?”
”By stripping Daimhin Feich of any place or power and taking back the Throne.”
Taminy gazed at her hands, folded upon her lap. ”And?”
”Being a better Cyne than my father. I want to be as good a Cyne as Ciarda.”
”You have powers Ciarda saw only in your grandmother, Brann Hillwild. They could make you an even better Cyne than he, or . . . they could make your every act of foolishness, weakness or selfishness a disaster.”
The boy blanched. ”I don't want to be weak or foolish or selfish.”
”You didn't answer my question. Which would you choose, honor or wisdom?”
He looked very unhappy for a moment-consternated. Then his face cleared. ”Why, that's a false choice, isn't it? For there can't be wisdom without honor or honor without wisdom.”
”I suppose that depends on your definition of honor.”
His brow furrowed. ”I don't understand. How many definitions of honor can there be?”
”When you know, tell me,” she said and sent him to study with Wyth.
No sooner had Airleas left the hearthside than Catahn took his place. He said nothing for a moment, but only studied her, eyes troubled. ”You slept well, Lady?” he asked at last.
She nodded. ”But you did not. Were you guarding my dreams?”
He s.h.i.+fted uncomfortably, turning his eyes to the flames within the cavernous fireplace. ”I . . . Wove an inyx of my own device. I am pleased it worked.”
She leaned toward him. ”Catahn, you can't do that every night.”
”Nor can you protect yourself as you sleep. Someone must guard you from such . . . horrors.”
She glanced up at him sharply, sensing his uneasiness as something heavy and dark. ”What have you done?”
”A simple channeling Weave. I thought that if the inyx could not be blocked at its beginning, it might be turned aside at its end.”
Taminy's hands gripped the arms of her chair. ”You took the nightmares upon yourself, you mean. You absorbed them.”
His eyelids fluttered and swift color flooded his face. She put her hand on his to claim his attention, but he flinched away and rose, turning his back on her.
Stunned, wounded, she said, ”Catahn, you can't do this. I won't have you . . . I wanted no one to know what those nightmares were. They were between me and him.”
”There should be nothing between you and him!” Catahn growled, still not looking at her. ”Nothing but six feet of earth.”
He strode away from her then, across the Hall, and would not let her call him back.
The air at this alt.i.tude was chill and brittle; it entered the nose and lungs sharply, as if made of invisible shards of frozen gla.s.s. A light powder of snow dusted the ground under foot, but did not slow the advance of the mult.i.tude at Daimhin Feich's joint command. They climbed easily through the dry valleys, Feich blessing the rain-shadow each morning when he rose to clear skies.
”This won't continue indefinitely,” Ruadh told him one morning, as he squinted up at the shrouded bulk of Baenn-an-ghlo.
To the east the so-called Wailing Mountain, Baenn-eigh, towered, flanks gleaming with snow. ”When we get up there”-Ruadh nodded at the shadowy pa.s.s between the two giants-”we're going to have to fight the storms.”
Feich let out a streamer of breath. ”Then we'll fight the storms. Or perhaps I shall fight them myself. We will not be beaten.”
”So certain?”
”Ruadh, you are such a pessimist. The pa.s.s is low and sheltered. We shall come upon Hrofceaster from the southeast-also sheltered. Only the last miles of the journey will be as dangerous as all that. When it's over, we shall have the Ren Catahn's back to the ice. There will be nowhere for him to run.”
Ruadh shook his head. ”Sometimes I wonder if you know who or what it is you've come after out here, or what you hope to get out of all this. How hard would it have been for you to have compromised with Claeg and Jura? It would have put you close to Airleas, given you some control over him, over Creiddylad-”
”Some control? Not enough, Ruadh. Oh, for you perhaps, for my father, for all the other complacent elders of the House Feich. But I see a way to have complete control.” He laughed. ”My G.o.d, more control than any Cyne has ever wielded in Caraid-land. Not just temporal power, cousin, but spiritual power.”
”You believe your . . . your aidan is that strong?”
Feich pointed a finger at his cousin's nose. ”Colfre thought he was fey because of his Hillwild ancestry. I thought he was, too. It wasn't until the end-until just before his death that I realized the truth.” He laughed again. ”It was me, Ruadh. I was the one with the Gift. Oh, he had some ability, true enough, but it was weak. Enough for me to make use of, fortunately.”
Ruadh made no reply to that, but only stared at him in wide-eyed amazement.
”You ask me why we come here. The reasons are not as simple as you would have them be. I've come here for Airleas, obviously. But yes, I want Taminy in my grasp, as well, for she is the key to spiritual power.” He paused, wondering how honest he could be with his cousin, then said, ”You've noticed my . . . ways with women.”
”I'm not blind.”
”Practice. For the time when I have Taminy-Osmaer at Mertuile. You understand, of course, that it's not mere physical gratification I seek-and get-from them.”