Part 20 (1/2)

'The Dasati could not have known how to do this much harm in so focused a way. Varen had to have told them. In a single attack they've decapitated the Empire of Tsuranuanni.'

'There's still the Emperor,' said Caleb.

'But who is there to command?' Miranda stood and began to pace as was her wont when under stress. 'Eldest sons? Daughters? Wives? The leaders.h.i.+p of every house in the Empire has been disrupted, which means every political party and every clan as well. Right now the balance of power in the Empire is completely overturned, and for every house that has an eldest son groomed to rule and step in to his father's place, there are a score who are torn by grief and without effective leaders.h.i.+p.

'This is a far worse disaster than had the Emperor been slain.'

Caleb said, 'At least he lives.'

'Yes, and that gives the Tsurani a single advantage.'

Caleb asked, 'What is that?'

Miranda turned and said, 'Blind obedience.'

Caleb's expression turned doubtful. 'How does that become an advantage if there's no effective leaders.h.i.+p?'

'The Tsurani need generals. We can give them generals. They just have to be ordered to obey foreigners-'

'And if the Emperor orders them to obey generals from Midkemia, they will,' finished Caleb.

Miranda said, 'Now, how is that meeting Tomas asked for coming along?'

'Everyone who is willing to come will be here by sundown.'

'Good, I don't know exactly what Tomas will say to everyone, but I have a pretty good idea. I've only met him a few times, but from what your father has said about him, he's hardly a man to panic, but I think he's worried, Caleb.'

'Did Father ever speak to you about the Dread?' He sat down in a chair in the corner. Miranda sighed. 'There are lots of things your father doesn't talk about, mostly from the early days. I think it has to do with a lot of different things.'

'Such as?'

Caleb was not the sort to probe idly, so his mother knew him to be genuinely interested. She realized once again how different he was from Magnus and his parents. As the only member of the family without the ability to practise magic he was always somehow detached from their shared experiences, no matter how much they tried to include him in their lives and how much they loved him.

Miranda said, 'I don't have much time before Tomas's meeting, but I can speculate a little.' She closed her eyes as if remembering something, then said, 'I also haven't talked a great deal about my youth, and I am older than your father.'

He grinned. 'You've told us not to remind you.'

She returned the smile, for while she was truly not vain, she played the role as a way of nettling her husband and children. It was one of her failings, but a tiny one. 'What you remember, it's real. It doesn't matter how accurate your memory of something is, it is real to you. What you perceive as reality is is reality.' reality.'

'I'm not sure I understand,' said Caleb.

'I have no doubt, because of all of us, you most of all live in a real world, Caleb. You don't deal in the abstracted concepts of magic. You live a life of things you can touch, see, smell. You are out in the forests hunting, tracking-' She interrupted herself. 'If you see bear tracks, let us say. Artfully fas.h.i.+oned, created by some manner of boot-maker, it's a pair of boots worn by a man to make it look as if a bear had pa.s.sed.'

Caleb shook his head. 'The depth would be wrong, because a bear weighs-'

Miranda raised her hands. 'That's not the point. Let us suppose I use magic to create perfect bear prints and you encounter them. What do you think?'

'Perfect?' he asked, not sure that was possible. Shrugging, he said, 'Fine, I find these perfect bear tracks. I think you're a bear.'

'Exactly. You follow them expecting a bear and until the moment you discover I was making the tracks, you think ”bear, bear, bear”. And then when you discover it wasn't a bear, what happens?'

'I don't know. I'm supposed to laugh at the joke?'

She almost rolled her eyes, but resisted the temptation. 'Until the moment you discover I made the tracks, if your brother showed up and asked you what you were doing, you would say you were tracking a bear. But from the moment you discover I made the tracks, you think ”Mother made the tracks”. She looked him in the eyes. 'Do you understand?'

'I'm not entirely sure I do.'

'Your perception changed. From that moment onward, whenever you think of that set of tracks or tell the story to someone else, it's ”Mother made those tracks”. You might even tell someone, ”I thought it was a bear”, but in your mind there was no bear.'

'There was no bear,' said Caleb, now looking more confused.

Miranda laughed. 'If I hadn't given birth to you, I'd wonder who your parents really were.'

'I'm not stupid, Mother.'

'I know,' she said, laughing harder. 'It's just that you like only in the real world of things you can touch, feel, and smell.' Her humour vanished. 'Your father lives in a world of the mind, more than anyone I know, including myself or your grandfather. He may some day be eclipsed by your brother, but Magnus has a lifetime of experience to go through to catch up to your father. Your father is like others, though, in that his life experiences are real to him, and his perceptions of those experiences may have changed, but not his feelings about them but not his feelings about them.'

Caleb suddenly understood. 'So I can remember how I felt when I thought I was tracking the bear, even if now I have stopped thinking of it as a bear!'

'Yes! Your father went through a great deal of pain and suffering in his youth, and he's endured much since then, but the tribulations he faces now are being faced by a man with a lifetime of experience and hard-earned lessons.

'But the feelings of his youth, muted they may be, are still the feelings of his youth, and are remembered the way he felt at the time he lived them. Did he ever tell you of Princess Carline?'

'Not that I can recall.'

'She was the daughter of Lord Borric, and by adoption Pug's ”cousin” of sorts, but when he was a lad in the kitchen at Crydee Castle, he thought himself in love with her. Fate conspired to give him the opportunity to press his suit, and then took it away from him, when he was captured by the Tsurani. She eventually wed a friend of his and became d.u.c.h.ess of Salador, and she died. But somewhere within your father is a tiny memory, a distantly recalled echo of a boy's love for an un.o.btainable princess.' She paused. 'He misses his wife,' she added calmly.

Caleb took a second then said, 'Katala.'

'I know your father loves me, and in many ways I am his perfect match, as he is mine, but to be as powerful as your father is, and to stand helplessly by and watch the woman you love die of a wasting disease...' She sighed. 'More than once I have tried to imagine what that must have felt like, and I can't. And he misses his children.'

Caleb nodded. William and Gamina had both died in the battle for Krondor, at the end of the Serpentwar, years before Caleb's birth. 'It is easy to forget that I had a brother and sister who died before I was born.'

'But your father loved them desperately. And he never forgave himself for his estrangement from William at the time of William's death. It's one of the reasons he has never tried to tell you which path in life you should take.'

Caleb shrugged. 'I thought Father let me go wandering around, hunting, fis.h.i.+ng, and trapping because I was useless at magic'

Miranda smiled gently. 'If Magnus had wanted to wander around, hunting, fis.h.i.+ng, and trapping, your father would have let him. That was the lesson he learned from William.'

'So Father doesn't talk much about the past.'

'No, mostly because he doesn't need to dredge up the painful memories; he has enough pain right now to deal with.'

'So you're saying Father never talked about the Dread.'

'Only a little, and I suspect he'd say much the same that Tomas has and will say.' She stood up. 'We must go. I really didn't mean to talk so much about your father, but the question you asked put me in mind of something that has long since been a struggle for me, the part of my husband I cannot touch: his memories and feelings for his first family'