Part 28 (1/2)

”Helped by the rumors we and the Scholars are spreading, of course,” Thionan said with a grin.

”And the Marked?” Tek-aKet asked.

Thionan's voice came low and rough. ”Two days ago they started being taken to the Carnelian Dome, and not to the Jaldean Shrines. None have been seen, city or country, since.”

The silence in the room was as thick as inglera fleece.

”We will hope there are some in hiding,” Cullen of Langeron said, as his bird Disha nodded.

Thionan cleared her throat. ”There's something else, though it's hard to know how significant it is,” she said. ”I'm sorry to say, Lord Tarkin, that your counselor, Gan-eGan, was yesterday found hanged in his private chambers. Hanged by his own hand, it appears. It seems a small tragedy in the face of everything else, and in the face of what the Marked have had to endure, but we thought perhaps you would want to know.”

Dhulyn shut her eyes, seeing again the two images of the skinny, overjeweled old man, one with green eyes, the other standing behind, weeping. She blinked. Green eyes again. Like the Mage in her Visions. And the Scholar. Who was on his way even now with information. Perhaps more information than he knew.

Dhulyn glanced at Tek-aKet. He was pale again, his face fixed and resolute. But before she could ask any questions a young woman appeared in the cave's entrance. Dhulyn recognized her as the same one, Rehnata by name, who had greeted them when they first arrived in Gotterang. Since then, the dark brown hair above her temples and ears had been removed in preparation for the tattooing of her Mercenary badge.

”They are here, my Brothers,” she said to Alkoryn, acknowledging Dhulyn as well with a bob of her head. ”Shall we bring them?”

”By all means,” Alkoryn said.

From the sound, the warning had come just a second too late for Karlyn-Tan, Gundaron thought. He himself was too short to worry about b.u.mping his head, but being led blindfolded through pa.s.sages and tunnels meant bashed elbows and stepped-on toes, no matter how careful your guides. As things were, however, Gun was grateful to have sore elbows and bruised toes to distract him from what was coming. He knew Mar and Karlyn-Tan were right-this was what he had to do. But just at the moment, he was more than half convinced he'd been persuaded against his will.

Finally the blindfolds came off. They'd had them on so long that even the soft light of the lanterns carried by their guides was enough to have all four of them blinking and squinting. Gundaron tried not to hang back as they approached the open doorway of the underground meeting room. Not that he could do much more than drag his feet a bit since there were Mercenary Brothers both in front of and behind him. From what Karlyn-Tan had said, he'd expected Dhulyn Wolfshead herself to lead them to Tek-aKet, but it had been two black-haired Mercenary Brothers with Semlorian accents. The smiles they'd given him when they'd met them at the fountain made the skin on the back of his neck crawl.

Dhulyn Wolfshead would be inside the room, he thought, watching Dal-eDal pa.s.s through the entrance. Along with the Brother he hadn't met, her Partner Parno Lionsmane.

The first Brothers he saw as he followed Mar into the room weren't the two he was dreading the most, however, but Fanryn Bloodhand and Thionan Hawkmoon, who went so far as to lay her hand on her sword hilt and grin at him. Gun looked away and, seeing Mar's face, followed her line of sight to where Dhulyn Wolfshead stood to the left of Tek-aKet. Mar stepped toward the Outlander woman with her hands lifted, reaching out, but hesitated, coming to a stop as the Wolfshead gave her the half bow that was the very knife edge of courtesy among the n.o.ble Houses. Such would be the greeting-Gun had seen it many times-between two n.o.bles who had some long-standing grudge, but were forced to be civil in some public gathering. Dhulyn Wolfshead straightened and turned her eyes away, and Gun braced himself . . . but her stone-gray eyes moved over and past him as if he was not even there.

He immediately looked down, heart thumping. It seemed he had nothing to fear from Dhulyn Wolfshead. It seemed that as far as she was concerned, he didn't exist. He found himself hugging his arms around his chest, to convince himself he was was there, he there, he was was.

When he had enough control of himself to listen, he found that he had missed Dal's first words. The Tarkin was speaking.

”To say that I am surprised to see you does not begin to describe my feelings, Dal-eDal Tenebro.” He put up his hand and Dal stilled. ”You are heir to your House, and now to the Carnelian Throne, and yet you come with your oaths of loyalty to me.”

It was not a question, but Dal-eDal answered it.

”My lord-” he cleared his throat and began again. ”I am not an ambitious man. I have never wanted more than my own Household. But my cousin Lok-iKol sees a mirror in every man, and his own image grinning back at him. Fate may lead even a distant cousin to become House of his family, whether he wished it or no, but the Tarkinate . . .” Dal shook his head.

”I was warned to be skeptical of your loyalty,” Tek-aKet said, nodding at where Fanryn Bloodhand and Thionan Hawkmoon stood leaning against a small table to Gundaron's left. ”Perhaps you do not want the Carnelian Throne, but you would have me believe that you choose this moment to act against your House?”

Dal licked his lips. ”I do not believe I go against my House, my lord,” he said, in that quietly strained voice that had been all Gun had heard from him for the last day. ”I believe my House has Fallen.”

At this everyone, Gun included, edged forward. Fanryn Bloodhand straightened to attention and Thionan Hawkmoon put a restraining hand on her Partner's arm. Even the Wolfshead and the Lionsmane exchanged glances.

”Who is it, then, who sits on my throne?” Tek-aKet's voice was hard as the rock overhead.

”I do not know,” Dal said. ”Outwardly, it seems to be my cousin.” Dal glanced suddenly at Parno Lionsmane, but Gun couldn't see that the Brother had moved in any way. ”Possibly, in some way, it is. But I do not believe it. Something else occupies . . . something else is there.” He straightened, and Gun saw for the first time the dark smudges under the man's eyes. ”Indulge me, my lord,” Dal said. ”I have waited what seems an age to tell the full story only once, and it is choking me.”

Tek-aKet glanced at the older Mercenary Brother seated next to him. When the man nodded, the Tarkin gestured at Dhulyn Wolfshead, indicating that she should take the seat next to him. That left an empty seat across the table.

”Sit, Dal-eDal Tenebro. Refresh yourself, tell your story.”

Dal nodded, waited until a cup was poured for him, but made no move to pick it up. He took the chair, though, Gun thought, feeling the ache of his own muscles.

”I have spent my whole life waiting, and watching, my lord; so long that perhaps I forgot what it was that I was waiting for.” As Dal folded his hands on the table in front of him, Gun saw them trembling. ”Lok had my father killed, and I believed I was waiting for the right moment to avenge him. I wonder if I would ever have found it.” Dal drew in his brows, frowning at his hands on the table.

Mar s.h.i.+fted, stepping forward as if she would move closer to the table. Gun put his hands on her shoulders, and pulled her back a little, until she was standing against his chest. Her skin felt warm, even through two layers of clothing, and she relaxed under his hands, though she kept her eyes on the faces of the four seated at the table.

Dal glanced up at Tek-aKet and waited until the man nodded before he continued. ”Perhaps three days after he took the Dome, my lord, my cousin called me to him, saying that he had an errand for me.” Keeping his eyes fixed on Tek-aKet, Dal's voice did not falter. ”For years he has kept me under his hand, and I have not left Gotterang unless as his companion. Yet he has now, suddenly, asked me to do so, in order to find the Mercenary Dhulyn Wolfshead.”

Mar glanced at Gun over her shoulder, her eyebrows raised; Gun pressed his lips together and nodded. A quick look around the room showed much less puzzlement than he would have expected. She's told them, She's told them, he thought, he thought, by all the Caids, she's told them by all the Caids, she's told them.

Dal, too, had noticed the change of atmosphere in the room. ”Apparently, you know more of this than I, though I knew that my cousin had shown interest in this Brother before he took the Carnelian Throne.

”He said no more of her at that moment, and I walked with him to the room where your crown, my lord Tarkin, and your treasures, and the jewels that your wife brought with her to her marriage are kept. He said he was looking for a relic of the Sleeping G.o.d.”

Tek-aKet nodded. ”An old bracelet,” he said, ”with green stones. I know of it. The Jaldean Shrine here in Gotterang has been asking for it for months.”

”As you say, my lord. Lok found it, a gold bracelet in the antique manner of the Caids, and he put it on.” Dal picked up the cup of ganje that had been poured for him, looked inside it, and put it down again. He's not looking anyone in the face, He's not looking anyone in the face, Gun thought. Gun thought. When did When did that that start start? Dal had always been the most watchful of men.

”What of it,” the Tarkin said. ”My mother wore it often. I've worn it myself.”

Gun wouldn't have thought it possible, but at these words Dal paled even more, the shadows around his mouth stained a faint green.

”Drink something, man; you're no use to us if you faint,” Dhulyn Wolfshead said in her rough voice. The Cloudman to the Tarkin's left stood and with his own hand poured out water from the gla.s.s jug on the table and handed the mug to Dal-eDal.

”Thank you.” His voice was a thread of air. He sipped at the water and set the mug down next to the untouched ganje. He cleared his throat, but his voice when he continued was still rough. ”Lok found the bracelet,” he said, ”and slipped it over his hand. As I watched, the bracelet faded, dissolved, and was absorbed into his skin. I looked up, and Lok was watching the spot where the bracelet had been and smiling. And his shadow, on the wall behind him, was not his own, but larger, darker, than it should have been-” Dal sucked in a short, sharp sip of air, ”and was the wrong shape, as if it had wings about to open.”

Parno Lionsmane's cup tilted, but he caught it before it fell.

”The lantern-” Tek-aKet started to say.

”No, my lord,” Dal interrupted. ”My own shadow was there, pale and ordinary, as familiar to me as my own hand. Except that my shadow seemed to shrink from his, as if it knew something I did not.” This time, when Dal stopped speaking, no one else moved or spoke, so obvious was it that he had not finished. ”There is more, my lord. When I looked again to my cousin, to ask him about what I had seen, his eye was green. Not blue as it has always been, and, his eye patch-” Dal lifted his left hand to his own face, as if to show them where the eye patch should be. ”I don't know, perhaps because of the angle at which we were standing, perhaps because he had touched it somehow-” Dal looked across the table at his Tarkin. ”My lord, I could see that both both his eyes were green. his eyes were green. Both Both of them.” of them.”

Mar s.h.i.+fted abruptly and Gun loosened the suddenly tight grip he'd taken on her shoulders. His breathing came uncomfortably quick, and in his mind he saw again the barricade of shelves and books that kept away the Green Shadow. The Cloudman at the table with the Tarkin made the old sign against evil, thumbtip to tip of index finger, the Mercenaries standing around the room developed suddenly neutral expressions, and Wolfshead and Lionsmane looked at each other, recognition in their faces. But Dal spoke matter-of-factly like a man beyond caring what other people thought.

”Clearly, you believe what you saw,” the Tarkin said finally. ”What do you believe it means?”

”It means you must not wait, my lord,” Dal said. Suddenly reaching out his hand to the man across from him, Dal looked the Tarkin directly in the face. ”Listen to me. This is no ordinary coup. I have thought that it did not matter to me who sat on the Carnelian Throne, but I tell you, it matters to me what what sits there, and that green-eyed thing is not my cousin.” Once again he spoke, not as a frightened man who expects to be held in contempt, but as a man freely owning a fear in the face of which the opinions of others were meaningless. ”It has the Marked brought to the Dome, and they leave broken and mad. The Carnelian Guard-” He broke off, frowning. ”Elite troops injure themselves with carelessness or in quarrels, except for those who go off duty and disappear. Gan-eGan has killed himself. Children are weeping in corners. Whatever this is, its poison is spreading. You must waste no time. You must act sits there, and that green-eyed thing is not my cousin.” Once again he spoke, not as a frightened man who expects to be held in contempt, but as a man freely owning a fear in the face of which the opinions of others were meaningless. ”It has the Marked brought to the Dome, and they leave broken and mad. The Carnelian Guard-” He broke off, frowning. ”Elite troops injure themselves with carelessness or in quarrels, except for those who go off duty and disappear. Gan-eGan has killed himself. Children are weeping in corners. Whatever this is, its poison is spreading. You must waste no time. You must act now now.”

Gun licked his lips. One pair of eyes had left off looking at Dal-eDal and had fixed on him. One pair of stone-gray eyes that had slid over him, unable to see him when he had entered the room, were focused on him now.

”Let's ask the Scholar,” Dhulyn Wolfshead said. ”I'll wager my second-best sword he knows what this is, or can guess. He knows more than anyone what the formerly one-eyed Lok-iKol has been up to.”

Gun's hands formed fists at his sides. It felt like every eye in the room was on him. Even Mar had turned around and was searching his face, her eyebrows drawn down, her lips parted.

”Come, Gundaron of Valdomar.” Gun winced at the tone in Dhulyn Wolfshead's husky voice. ”From the look of you, Dal-eDal's not the only one here who's seen this green-eyed thing.”

Everyone was was looking at him, Gun saw as he tried to swallow with his suddenly dry mouth. Everyone except Parno Lionsmane. He stood behind the Wolfshead, his hand on her shoulder, his eyes squeezed shut. looking at him, Gun saw as he tried to swallow with his suddenly dry mouth. Everyone except Parno Lionsmane. He stood behind the Wolfshead, his hand on her shoulder, his eyes squeezed shut.