THE ELEMENT OF FIRE Copyright © 1993 by Martha Wells
All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book, or portions
thereof, in any form.
Cover art by Eric Peterson
A Tor Book
Published by Tom Doherty Associates, Inc.
175 Fifth Avenue
New York, N.Y. IOOIO
Tor® is a registered trademark of Tom Doherty Associates, Inc.
ISBN: 0-812-52097-1
Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 93-17046
First edition: July 1993
First mass market edition: July 1994


THE GRAPPLING HOOK skittered
across the rain-slick stone of the ledge before dropping to catch in the
grillwork below the third-story window.
Berham leaned back on the rope to test it. "That's it, Captain Sir. Tight as
may be," the servant whispered.
"Well done," Thomas Boniface told him. He stepped back from the wall and
looked down the alley. "Now where in hell is Dr. Braun?"
"He's coming," Gideon Townsend, Thomas's lieutenant, said as he made his way
toward them out of the heavy shadows. Reaching them he glanced up at the full
moon, stark white against the backdrop of wind-driven rain clouds, and
muttered, "Not the best night for this work." The three men stood in the muddy
alley, the dark brocades and soft wools of their doublets and breeches
blending into the grimy stones and shadow, moonlight catching only the pale
lace at the wrists or shirt collars ofThomas and his lieutenant, the glint of
an earring, or the cold metal sheen on rapiers and wheellock pistol barrels.
It was a cool night and they were surrounded by foiled counting houses and the
crumbling elegance of the decaying, once-wealthy homes of the River Quarter.
Thomas personally couldn't think of a good time to forcibly invade a foreign
sorcerer's house. "The point of it is to go and be killed where you're told,"
he said. "Is everyone in position?"
"Martin and Castero are up on the tannery roof, watching the street and the
other alley. I put Gaspard and two others at
the back of the house and left the servants to watch the horses. The rest are
across the street, waiting for the signal," Gideon answered, his blue eyes
deceptively guileless. "We're all quite ready to go and be killed where we're
told."
"Good," Thomas said. He knew Gideon was still young enough to see this as a
challenge, to care nothing for the political reality that sent them on a
mission as deadly as this with so little support. Glancing down the alley
again, he saw Dr. Braun was finally coming, creeping along the wall and
uncomfortably holding his velvet-trimmed scholar's robes out of the stinking
mud. "Well?" Thomas asked as the sorcerer came within earshot. "What have you
done?"
"I've countered the wards on the doors and windows, but the inside ... This
person Grandier is either very strong or very subtle. I can't understand what
protections he's used." The young sorcerer looked up at him, his watery eyes
blinking fitfully. His long sandy hair and drooping mustache made him look
like a sad-faced spaniel.
"You can't give us any hint of what we're to find in there?" Thomas said,
thinking, This would have been belter done iftve hadn't been saddled with a
sorcerer who has obviousfy escaped from a market-day farce.
Braun's expression was both distressed and obstinate. "He is too strong, or
... He might have the help of some creature of the Fay."
"God protect us," Berham muttered, and uneasily studied the cloudy darkness
above. The others ignored him. Berham was short, rotund, and had been wounded
three times manning barricades in the last Bisran War. He claimed that the
only reason he had left the army was that servants' wages were better. Despite
the little man's vocal quavering, Thomas was not worried about his courage.
"What are you saying?" Gideon asked the sorcerer. "You mean we could fall down
dead or burst into flame the moment we cross the threshold?"
"The uninitiated so often have ill-conceived ideas about these matters, like
the fools who believe sorcerers change
their shapes or fly like the fay. It would be exceedingly dangerous to create
heat or cold out of nothing ..."
"So you say, but. . ."
"That's enough," Thomas interrupted. He took the rope and tested it again with
his own weight. The first floor of the house would be given over to stables,
storage for coaches or wagons, and servants' quarters. The second would hold
salons and other rooms for entertaining guests, and the third and fourth would
be the owner's private quarters. That would be where the sorcerer would keep
his laboratory, and very likely his prisoner. Thomas only hoped die
information from the King's Watch was correct and that the Bisran bastard
Grandier wasn't here. He told Gideon, "You follow me. Unless, of course, you'd
Uke to go first?"
The lieutenant swept off his feathered hat and bowed extravagantly. "Oh, not
at all, Sir, after you."
"So kind, Sir."
The brickwork was rough and Thomas found footholds easily. He reached the
window and pulled himself up on the rusted grating, balancing cautiously. He
felt the rope jerk and tighten as Gideon started to climb.
The window was set with small panes of leaded glass and divided into four tall
panels. Thomas drew a thin dagger from the sheath in his left boot and slipped
the point between the wooden frames of the lower half. Working the dagger
gendy, he eased the inside catch up. The panels opened inward with only a
faint creak. Moonlight touched the polished surface of a table set directly in
front of the window, but the darkness of the deeper interior of the room was
impenetrable. It was silent, but it was a peculiar waiting silence that he
disliked.
Then the window ledge cracked loudly under his boots and he took a hasty step
forward onto the table, thinking, Now we'll know, at any rate. Dust rose from
the heavy draperies as he brushed against them, but the room remained quiet.
"Was that wise?" Gideon asked softly from below the win-dowsill.
"Possibly not. Don't come up yet." Thomas slipped the
20
MARTHA WELLS
dagger back into his boot sheath and drew his rapier. If something came at him
out of that darkness, he preferred to keep it at as great a distance as
possible. "Tell Berham to hand up a light."
There was some soft cursing below as a dark lantern, its front covered by a
metal slide to keep the light dimmed, was lit and passed upward. Thomas waited
impatiently, feeling the darkness press in on him like a solid wall. He would
have preferred the presence of another sorcerer besides Braun, the rest of the
Queen's Guard, and a conscripted city troop to quell any possibility of riot
when the restive River Quarter neighborhood discovered it had a mad foreign
sorcerer in its midst. But orders were orders, and if Queen's guards or their
captain were killed while entering Grandier"s house secretly, then at least
civil unrest was prevented. An inspired intrigue, Thomas had to admit, even if
he was the one it was meant to eliminate.
As he reached down to take the shuttered lamp from Gideon, something moved in
the comer of his eye. Thomas dropped the lamp onto the table and studied the
darkness, trying to decide if the hesitant motion was actually there or in his
imagination.
The flicker of light escaping from the edges of the lamp's iron cover touched
the room with moving shadows. With the toe of his boot Thomas knocked the
lantern slide up.
The wan candlelight was reflected from a dozen points around the unoccupied
room, from lacquered cabinets, the gilt leather of a chair, the metallic
threads in brocaded satin hangings.
Then the wooden cherub supporting die right-hand corner of the table Thomas
was standing on turned its head.
He took an involuntary step backward.
"Captain, what is it?" Gideon's whisper was harsh.
Thomas didn't answer. He was looking around the room as the faces in the
floral carving over the chimneypiece shifted their blank white eyes, their
tiny mouths working silently. The
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
21
bronze snake twined around the supporting pole of a candle-stand stirred
sluggishly. In the woolen carpet the interwoven pattern of vines writhed.
Keeping hold of the rope, Gideon chinned himself on the window ledge to see
in. He cursed softly.
"Worse than I thought," Thomas agreed, not looking away from the hideously
animate room. Unblinking eyes of marble-ized wood stared sightlessly, limbs
and mouths moved without sound. Can they see? Or hear? he wondered grimly.
Most Mkety they can. He doubted they were here only to frighten intruders,
however effective they might be at it.
"We should bum this house to the ground," Gideon whispered.
"We want to get Dubell out alive, not scrape his ashes out of the wreckage."
"How?"
Good question, Thomas thought. The vines in the carpet were lifting themselves
above the surface of the floor like the tentacles of a sea beast. They were as
thick around as a man's wrist and looked strong, and metallic glints that had
been gilt threads in the weaving were growing into knife-edged thorns. It was
only going to get more difficult. Thomas caught up the lantern and stepped
down into a chair with arms shaped into gilded lampreys. They were struggling
viciously but were unable to turn their heads back far enough to reach him.
From there he stepped down to the hardwood floor and backed toward the
doorway.
Gideon made a move to climb into the window but the vinelike tentacles were
reaching up above waist-height and groping along the edge of the table. Thomas
said, "No, stay back."
At the sound of his voice the vines whipped around and stretched out for him,
growing prodigiously longer in a sudden bound, and Thomas threw himself at the
door.
The latch was weak and snapped as his weight struck it. He stumbled through
and caught himself, just as something
22
MARTHA WELLS
thudded into the dark panelled wall in front of him. He dropped the lantern
and dove sideways, scrambling for cover between two brocaded chairs and the
fireplace.
Embedded in the wall, still quivering, was a short metal arrow; if he had come
through the doorway cautiously it would have embedded itself in his chest. The
lion heads on the iron fircdogs snapped ineffectually at him as he pushed
himself farther behind the chairs, thinking, Where the hell is he? The
sputtering candle sent shadows chasing each other across crowded furniture and
everything was moving. Then in the far comer he saw the life-sized statue of a
Parscen archer. Naked to the waist and balancing a candleholder on his
tur-baned head, he was drawing a second arrow out of the bronze quiver at his
side and putting it to his short bow.
Rolling onto his back to make himself a smaller target, Thomas dropped the
rapier and drew one of his wheellocks. He'd loaded both pistols down in the
alley, and now as he wound up the mainspring, an arrow thudded into the
over-stuffed chair seat. The other chair began to edge sideways using the
clawed feet at the ends of its splayed legs, and without thinking Thomas
muttered "Stop that." He set the spring, then braced the pistol on his forearm
and fired.
The plaster statue shattered in the deafening impact. The shot scarred the
wall behind it and filled the room with the stink of gunpowder.
Thomas got to his feet, tucking away the empty pistol and picking up his
rapier. Now the whole damned house knows I'm here. He hadn't planned to do
this alone either, but the vines filling up the first room and curling round
the doorway into this one committed him to it.
Avoiding the animate furniture, he went to the door in the opposite wall and
tried the handle. It was unlocked, and he eased it open carefully. The room
within was dark, but the archway beyond revealed a chamber lit by a dozen or
so red glass candelabra.
Thomas pulled the door closed softly behind him and moved forward. The dim
light revealed stealthy movement in
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
23
the carvings on the fireplace mantel and along the bordered panelling. In the
more brightly lit chamber beyond the arch, he could see an open door looking
out onto the main stairwell.
He stopped just before the fall of light from the next room would have
revealed his presence. There was something . . . Then dearly he heard the
creak of leather and a harsh rasp of breath. It came from just beyond his
range of sight, past the left side of the arch. They knew Grandier had hired
men to guard the house; it was the only way the King's Watch had been able to
trace the sorcerer, since there was no one in the city who could identify him.
The man in the next room must have heard the shot; possibly he was waiting for
the protective spells to dispose of any intruders. Thomas had planned on
something to distract the sorcerer's human watchdogs, to send them down to the
lower part of the house, if Gideon would just get on with it...
From somewhere below there was a muffled thump, and the floorboards trembled
under his feet. Thomas smiled to himself, shouts and running footsteps sounded
from the stairs as the hired swords hastened for the front door. In theory, he
wasn't disobeying die King's orders to keep the raid on Gran-dier/s house
secret. Placed correctly, a small charge of gunpowder could blow a wooden door
to pieces while making little noise, and the houses to either side of
Grandier's were empty anyway.
The waiting guard did not take the bait with the others, but went forward to
stand at the doorway into the stairwell, his rapier drawn. He was big, with
greasy blond hair tied back from his face, and dressed in a dun-colored
doublet. Thomas had already decided to kill him and had started forward when
the man turned and saw him.
The hired sword's shout was muffled by the clatter of his comrades on the
stairs and he rushed forward without waiting for help. Thomas parried two wild
blows, then beat his opponent's sword aside and lunged for the kill. The man
jerked away and took the point between die ribs instead of under the
24
MARTHA WELLS
breastbone, dropping his weapon and staggering back. Cursing his own
sloppiness, Thomas leapt after him, grappling with him and trying to drive his
main gauche up under the man's chin. In another moment Thomas was easing the
limp body to the floor. There was blood pooling on the rug and on his boots,
but hopefully the others were occupied below and there was no one left to
follow his trail.
He glanced quickly around the room and noted it was free of the sorcerous
animation. There was a closed door on the opposite wall, and it bore examining
before he ventured out onto the main stairs.
As Thomas was reaching for the handle, he felt a sharp stab of unease. He
stepped back, his hand tightening on his sword-hilt, baffled by his own
reaction. It was only a door, as the others had been. He reached out slowly
and felt his heart pound faster with anxiety as his hand neared the knob.
Either I've gone mad, he thought, or this door is warded. Testing it with his
own reactions, he found the ward began about a foot from the door and
stretched out to completely cover it. It was a warning, with a relatively mild
effect, more than likely meant to keep the hired swords and servants away from
this portion of the house. It could also explain why the dead man hadn't left
his post to investigate the pistol shot or to follow his comrades to the front
entrance. He had been guarding something of crucial importance.
Thomas stepped back and kicked the center panel, sending the door crashing
open. Beyond was a staircase leading upward and softly lit by candlelight
glowing down from the floor above.
Bracing himself, Thomas stepped through the ward and onto the first step, and
had to steady himself against the wall as the effect faded. He shook his head
and started up the stairs.
The banister was carved with roses which swayed under a sorcerous breeze only
they could sense. Thomas climbed slowly, looking for the next trap. When he
stopped at the first landing, he could see that the top of the stairs opened
into a long gallery, lit by dozens of candles in mirror-backed
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
25
sconces. Red draperies framed mythological paintings and classical landscapes.
At the far end was a door, guarded on either side by a man-sized statuary
niche. One niche held an angel with flowing locks, wings, and a beatific
smile. The other niche was empty.
Thomas climbed almost to the head of the stairs, looking up at the archway
that was the entrance to the room. Something suspiciously like plaster dust
drifted down from the carved bunting on the opposite side.
A tactical error, Thomas thought. Whatever is hiding up there isn 't doing it
to be decorative. He took a quiet step back down the stairs, drawing his empty
pistol. The air felt warm; beneath his doublet, sweat was sticking the thin
fabric of his shirt to his ribs. From the powder flask on his belt he measured
out a double charge and poured it into the barrel. He pushed the bullet and
wadding down with the short ramrod, thinking that it would be quite ironic if
the pistol exploded and ended the matter here.
Thomas wound and set the spring, then carefully aimed the pistol at the top of
the archway and fired. The fifty-caliber ball tore through the light
ornamental wood and into the body of the plaster statue that had perched up on
the opposite side of the arch. Thomas shielded his face as splintered wood and
fragments of plaster rained down. A sculpted head, arm, and pieces of a foot
thudded to the floor in front of him.
He climbed the last few steps and stopped at the front of the gallery, which
was now wreathed in the heavy white smoke of the pistol's discharge. This next
trap wasn't bothering to conceal itself. Ponderously the angel statue turned
its head toward him and stepped out of its niche in the far wall. Thomas
shoved the empty pistol back into his sash and drew the second loaded one,
circling away from the angel. It was slow, its feet striking the polished
floor heavily, plaster wings flapping stiffly.
It stalked him like a stiff cat as he backed away. He wanted to save the
pistol for whatever was behind the next door, so he was reluctant to fire.
26
MARTHA WELIS
Then his boot knocked against something that seized his ankle. He fell heavily
and dropped the wheellock, which spun across the polished floor and somehow
managed not to go off. Rolling over, he saw that the hand and arm of the
broken statue had tripped him and was still holding onto his ankle. He drew
his main gauche and smashed at it with the hilt. The hand shattered and fell
away, but the angel was almost on top of him. Scrambling desperately backward,
he caught the base of a tall bronze candlestand and pulled it down on the
angel. The heavy holder in the top struck the statue in the temple, knocking
loose a chunk of plaster. It reared back and Thomas got to his feet, keeping
hold of the candlestand. As it lurched toward him again he swung the stand. A
large piece of the wing cracked and fell away as the blow connected, and the
creature staggered, suddenly unbalanced.
Past the stumbling statue he saw movement on the stairs. There were dark
writhing shapes climbing the steps, dragging themselves upward on the
banisters. He backed away, realizing it was .the vines that had sprung out of
the carpet in the first room. Are they filling the entire house? He had known
he couldn't get out the way he'd gotten in, but he had hoped to have the front
door as an option. Now that way was blocked. Thomas dropped the candlestand
and turned to the other door.
He pulled the heavy ironbound door open and one quick glance told him the room
seemed unoccupied by statues. He slammed the door closed as the angel lumbered
awkwardly toward him, bracing against it as he shoved the bolt home. He
stepped back as the thing battered against the other side.
Moonlight from high undraped windows revealed shelf-lined walls stacked with
leatherbound books, most chained to the shelves. It was a large room, crowded
with the paraphernalia of both library and alchemical laboratory, quiet except
for the erratic tick of several lantern docks. There was a writing desk
untidily crammed with paper, and workbenches cluttered with flasks and
long-necked bottles of colored glass. It smelled of tallow from cheap candles,
the musty odor of
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
27
books, and an acrid scent from residue left in the containers or staining
floors and tabletops. He drew his rapier again and moved around the overladen
tables, inbred caution making him avoid the stained patches left by alchemical
accidents on the floor. He knew he would have to come back to this house at
some point: the desks and cabinets crammed with scribbled papers would
undoubtedly hold some of Grandier's secrets, but now he hadn't time to sort
the vital information from the trash.
Thomas circled the rotting bulk of a printing press and a cabinet overflowing
with ink-stained type, and stopped. At the far end of the room, hidden by
stacked furniture and shadows, was a man seated in a plain chair. He faced the
wall and seemed to be lost in thought. Dressed in a black cope and a baggy
scholar's cap, his face was angular and lean in profile and his hair and beard
were gray. He didn't seem to be breathing.
Then Thomas saw the shimmer of reflected moonlight from the window and
realized the man was encased in an immense glass b^ll. Wondering at it, he
took a step forward and the enigmatic figure didn't move. He went closer and
lifted a hand to touch the glass prison, but thought better of it.
As if the gesture was somehow perceptible to the man inside, he turned his
head slowly toward Thomas. For a moment his expression was vacant, eyes fixed
on nothing. Then the blue eyes focused and the mouth smiled, and he said,
"Captain Thomas Boniface. We haven't formally met, but I have heard of you."
Thomas had not known Galen Dubell closely, the fifteen years ago when the old
sorcerer had been at court, but he had seen the portraits. "Dr. Dubell, I
presume." Thomas circled the glass prison. "I hope you have some idea of how
I'm to get you out of there."
There was another heavy crash against the door. The statue, the animate vines,
or something else was intent on battering its way in.
28
MARTHA WELLS
"The power in this bauble is directed inward, toward me. You should be able to
break it from the outside," Dubell said, bis composure undisturbed by the
pounding from the door.
It would be dangerous for the old sorcerer but Thomas couldn't see any other
way. At least the heavy wool of his scholar's robe would provide some
protection. "Cover your head."
Using the hilt of his rapier, Thomas struck the glass sphere. Lines of white
fire radiated out along the cracks. The material was considerably stronger
than it looked, and cracked like eggshell rather than glass. He hit it twice
more, then it started to shatter. A few of the larger shards broke loose, but
none fell near the old man.
Galen Dubell stood carefully and shook the smaller fragments out of his robes.
"That is a welcome relief, Captain." He looked exhausted and bedraggled as he
stepped free of his prison, glass crackling under his boots.
Thomas had already sheathed his rapier and was overturning one of the cabinets
beneath the window. He climbed atop it and twisted the window's catch. Cool
night air entered the stuffy room as he pushed it open. An ornamental sill
just below formed a narrow slanted ledge. Leaning out, he could see the edge
of the roof above. They would have to climb the rough brickwork.
He pulled his head back in and said, "I'm afraid we'll have to take the
footpad's way out, Doctor." He just hoped the old man could make it, and
speedily; the battering at the door was growing louder.
Dubell scrambled up die cabinet easily enough. As if he'd read Thomas's
thought, he said, "It's quite all right, Captain. I prefer the risk to more of
Urbain Grandier's hospitality." He might have the easier time of it; he was
almost a head taller than Thomas.
As Dubell pulled himself carefully out onto the narrow sill, the door gave
way.
The sorcerer used the scrollwork around the window casement as a ladder,
drawing himself up toward the roof. Thomas
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
29
swung out onto the sill after him and stood, holding onto the window frame.
Broken fragments of brick sprinkled down as Dubell grasped the edge of the
roof above.
Thomas boosted him from below and the scholar scrambled over the edge. Digging
fingertips into the soft stone, Thomas started to pull himself upward. Dubell
had barely been able to grasp the ledge from here; Thomas knew he would have
to stand on top of the cornice before he could reach safety.
There was a crash just inside as the cabinet they had used to climb to the
window was torn away. Straining to reach the edge of the roof, Thomas bit his
lip as something gave way beneath his left boot. Fingers wedged between die
soft brick, he groped for another hold and felt the mortar under his hand
crumble.
Then from above, Galen Dubell caught his arm in an iron grip, supporting him
as he found another foothold. For a man who must do little with his hands
besides write or do scholarly experiments, Dubell was surprisingly strong. The
man's gentle demeanor made it easy to think of him as nothing more than an
aged university don and to forget that he was also a wizard.
Thomas scrambled over the edge, his muscles trembling with the strain. "I
thank you, Doctor," he said, sitting up, "but there are those at court who
won't appreciate it."
"I won't tell them about it, then." Dubell looked around, the damp breeze
tearing at his gray hair and his cap. "Are those your companions?"
There was a shout. The two men he had stationed atop the tannery were waving
from the edge of the next roof.
"Stay there," Thomas shouted back. "We'll come to you."
Slowly they made their way up the crest of the pitched roof to the edge where
the others were throwing down some planks to bridge the gap. The slate tiles
were cracked and broken, slipping under their feet. They had just crossed the
makeshift bridge to the tannery when Thomas turned to say something to Dubell
and in the next instant was lying flat on the rough planks with the others as
the timber frame of the
30
MARTHA WELLS
building was shaken by a muffled explosion. Then they were all retreating
hastily across the tannery roof, choking on acrid smoke, as flames rose from
the Bisran sorcerer's house.
"So much for keeping this quiet," Thomas remarked to Gideon. The two men sat
their nervous horses, watching from a few lengths down the street as
Grandier's house burned. There was a crash as the facade collapsed inward,
sending up a fireworks display of sparks and an intense wave of heat. The
neighborhood had turned out to throw buckets of water and mud on the
surrounding roofs and mill about in confusion and panicked excitement. The
real fear had subsided when the residents had realized the fire was confining
itself to the sorcerer's home, and that only a few stray sparks had lit on the
surrounding structures.
Three of the hired swords had been taken alive, though Thomas doubted they
would know much, if anything, about Grandier's intentions. His own men had
obeyed their orders and come no farther than the front hall, so they had been
able to escape the fire. There had been one casualty. Gaspard, one of the men
who had been posted in the court behind the house, had been hit by a
splintered piece of flaming wood as he tried to escape from the explosion. His
back and shoulder had been badly burned and he'd only escaped worse by rolling
in the muddy street. Dubell had insisted on treating the injury immediately,
and Thomas had been only too glad to permit it. Now Gaspard sat on a stone
bench in the shelter of a hostler's stall, his shirt and doublet cut away so
Dubell could treat the blistering wound. The servant Berham was handing the
sorcerer supplies from Dr. Braun's medical box and Dr. Braun himself was
hovering at DubelTs elbow. Thomas suspected that Berham was being more help
than the younger sorcerer.
"The fire is hardly our fault" Gideon shrugged. "Blame Grandier for it."
"Yes, he's a cunning bastard."
Gideon glanced at him, frowning. "How do you mean?"
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
31
Thomas didn't answer. Dubell had finished tying the bandage and Martin helped
Gaspard stand. As Castero led their horses forward, Thomas nudged his mare
close enough to them to be heard over the shouting and the roar of the fire
and said, "Gaspard, I want you to ride with Martin."
"Sir, I do not need to be carried." The younger man's face was flushed and
sickly.
"That was not a request, Sir." Thomas was in no mood for a debate. "You can
ride behind him or you can hang head down over his saddlebow; the choice is
yours."
Gaspard looked less combative as he contemplated that thought, and let Martin
pull him unresisting to the horses.
Berham was packing the medical box under Braun's direction and Dubell was
staring at the fire. Thomas had been considering the question of why Grandier
had not killed Galen Dubell. The answer could be simple—Grandier might have
wanted to extract information from the old scholar, and his plan had gone awry
when the King's Watch located the house. But somehow he didn't think it was
going to be simple. The fire should have started when I broke the glass ball.
Yes, it served the purpose of destroying Grandier's papers, butwhy not kill
all the birds with one stone? Unless he wanted us to rescue Dubell. But why?
To announce his presence? To show them how powerful and frightening he was? To
make them distrust Dubell?
As Berham took the box away to pack on his horse, Thomas waved Dr. Braun over
and leaned down to ask him, "Is it possible for Grandier to ... tamper with
another sorcerer, to put a geas on him?"
Braun looked shocked. "A geas can be laid on an untrained mind, yes, but not
on a sorcerer like Dr. Dubell."
"Are you very sure about that'"
"Of course." After a moment, under Thomas's close scrutiny, Braun coughed and
said, "Well, I am quite sure. I had to put gascoign powder in my eyes to see
the wards around the house, and a geas, or any kind of spell, would be visible
on Dr. Dubell."
32
MARTHA WELLS
"All right." That was as good as they were going to get without taking the old
scholar to Lodun to be examined by the sorcerer-philosophers there, and there
was no time for that.
Dubell turned and came toward diem. "An unfortunate fire," he said. "There was
much to learn there."
"I thought you said it was dangerous to create fire out of nothing?" Thomas
asked Braun.
"It is," Braun protested, flustered.
Dubell smiled. "It depends on one's appreciation of danger."
"So much does," Thomas agreed. "They'll have some questions for you at the
palace."
"Of course. I only hope my small knowledge can aid you."
"We'll find Grandier," Gideon said, coming up beside them.
DubelTs eyes were troubled. "If he continues his mischief on such a grand
scale, he will be hard to miss. He'll also be a fool, of course, but he may
not see it that way."
"Oh, I hardly think he's a fool," Thomas said. Castero and Berham had gotten
Gaspard mounted up behind Martin, and they began to turn their horses away
from the crowded street. As the others went down the alley, Thomas took one
last look at die burning house. So far Grandier had shown an odd combination
of ruthlessness and restraint, and he was not sure which he found more
daunting. The sorcerer had snatched Galen Dubell out of his home in Lodun,
indiscriminately slaughtering the servants who had witnessed it. For no
practical reason, since Lodun University was full of wizards and scholars of
magic who had been able to divine Grandier's identity within hours of
examining the scene. Yet the fire that could have been so devastating stuck to
Grandier's house like pitch and refused to spread to the ready tinder of the
other old buildings. As much as he might wish to, Thomas couldn't see it as a
gesture of defiance. He only wondered where, in what corner of the crowded
city, the word had passed to watch for a sorcerous blaze in the night, and
what to do then.
"DOES THE MASK fit?" Anton
Baraselli looked up at the young woman who sat on the balcony railing, her
feet swinging under her tattered red skirt.
Gray eyes stared back at him from die pale features of the distorted
half-mask. "It fits. Do I have the part?"
Baraselli sat at his table on a balcony overhanging the main room of the
Mummer's Mask tavern, where his acting troupe made its home. He was
middle-aged, his dark hair diin and wispy on his nearly bald head, but his
plumpness and the newness of his clothes reflected his troupe's recent
prosperity. He could barely hear the woman's deep voice over the shouted
conversation, drunken arguments, and the competing strains of mandolin and
viola that rose up from the rowdy crowd on the tavern's main floor below. The
wealthier patrons were drinking in the small private rooms off the
second-floor gallery, the shutters propped open so the music could reach them
clearly.
"Well, you've no troupe to recommend you," Baraselli said, leaning back. He
didn't want to pay her as much as she might ask. His last Columbine had run
off to be married, leaving without a backward glance yesterday morning.
Baraselli had come to Ile-Rien from conquered Adera years ago when all forms
of the Aderassi theater were despised and confined to back alleys and peasant
festivals. Now the war with Bisra was over and Ile-Rien's capital was more
cosmopolitan and free with its money. Vienne was a jewel of a city in a rich
setting, standing on temperate plains roughly in the
34
MARTHA WELLS
center of the country, with rolling hills and olive groves on the warmer coast
to the southwest, rich forested midlands, and black-soiled farmland in die
terraced valleys of die high country to the north. Baraselli had liked it, and
now that Commedia and other foreign theatricals were popular he liked it a
great deal more.
The woman took the mask off and tossed it onto the table. Her long hair was
dirty blond and her narrow face with its long nose and direct eyes was plain,
too plain to ever play the unmasked heroines. Her faded red dress was old and
well-worn, better than a country woman's but no bawd's false finery either.
Whatever the rumomiongers thought, whores made terrible actresses.
She looked toward him with a grin. Smoke from the candles and clay pipes below
had reached up to touch the tavern's high beamed ceiling and had spread out
like a cloud behind her. It was an interesting theatrical effect, but there
was something about the image that Baraselli found faintly disquieting. She
said, "I'm not here to make my fortune. I'll take what you paid the last one."
She had good teeth, too. "All right, you're our Columbine. But on sufferance,
mind. WeVe got an important engagement—a very important engagement. It happens
when you attract the crowds and praise we have. If you don't give a fine
performance, you're out. If you do, well, it's one silver per fortnight and a
fair share of whatever they throw onto the stage."
"That's well, I agree."
"Anton! Look out the window." Garin, still wearing the gray beard from his
Pantalone costume, came pounding up the stairs.
"What? I'm busy."
Garin pushed past him and threw open the shutters of the window behind
Baraselli's table.
"Damn it, you'll let die night air and the bogles in, you fool." Baraselli
stood abruptly, jarring the table and slopping wine onto the stained floor.
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
35
"But look at this." Garin pointed. The Mummer's Mask stood in a huddle of
taverns and old houses on the side of a low hill commanding a good view of die
River Quarter. Lying before diem were the narrow overhung streets of the older
and poorer area, which eventually led into the vast plazas and pillared
promenades surrounded by the garden courts of the wealthy. Farther to the west
and standing high above the slate and wooden roofs were the domes of churches,
die fantastic and fanciful statues ornamenting the gables of the fortified
Great Houses, the spires of die stone-filigree palaces on the artificial
islands on the river's upper reaches, all transformed into anonymous shapes of
alternating black and silver as clouds drifted past the moon. But now, against
the stark shadowy forms of the crowded structures of the River Quarter, diey
could see the bright glow of fire, a harsh splash of color in die darkness.
"Down near Cross Street, I think," Garin said.
More of die troupe had drifted up the stairs in his wake, curious. "Lord save
it doesn't spread," one of them whispered.
"Another bad omen," Baraselli muttered. One of die clowns had died of fever
last month. Clowns were traditionally good luck in Adera, if not in Ile-Rien,
and having one of them die unexpectedly had shaken the other performers. Gods
and spirits, no more omens before this of all performances, Baraselli prayed.
"Maybe it's a good omen," the new Columbine said, selecting an apple out of
the bowl on the table and watching the worried actors widi oblique amusement.
"Some people think fire is."
Dark smoke streamed into die night sky.
They rode through St. Anne's Gate and into die cobbled court between the high
walls of the Mews and the Cisternan Guard Barracks. The facades of the two
buildings were almost identical, though time and weather had scarred the
dressed stone in different ways. Each was entered by three great archways that
faced one another across die length of the court. Now torches
36
MARTHA WELLS
threw reflections up onto the mist-slick stone as grooms and stablenands
hurried to take the horses or curious Cistemans wandered out to see what the
excitement was.
Thomas dismounted and handed the reins to one of the grooms. He took off a
glove to rub the horse's nape, then let the man lead her away. This was
Cisternan Guard territory, but it was also the closest entrance to the palace,
and he wanted Galen Dubell within a warded structure before Gran-dier made
another attempt on the old sorcerer.
The palace wards repelled fay, sendings, and any other form of magical attack.
They were fitted together like the pieces of a puzzlebox, or a stained glass
window, and drifted constantly, moving past each other, folding over each
other, wandering at will over their domain. They would prevent the sorcerous
abduction that Grandier had used to snatch Galen Dubell from his home in
Lodun, and the palace's other defenses were more than adequate to hold off any
more hired swords.
As Thomas crossed the court toward the two sorcerers, the Cisteman Commander
Vivan joined him. The Cistemans were the regular guard for the palace, their
ranks drawn from the families of the wealthy merchant classes or the gentlemen
landowners. Vivan had held the post of Commander for the past five years, and
even though the Cistemans were ultimately under the King's authority, Vivan
had no particular political ax to grind, and Thomas found him easy to deal
with. The Commander said, "A midnight expedition? How exciting."
"I would have preferred to stay here and help you guard the stables, but duty
called," Thomas told him.
Vivan snorted. The old king Fulstan had made the Cister-nans his bodyguard out
of dislike for the Albonate Knights, who had held the post traditionally. When
Fulstan ,s son Roland had taken the throne, his mistrust of anything belonging
to his father had led him to demote the Cistemans and return to the Albons.
Going from the King's Own to the King's Old had been a great loss of prestige
for them and the Queen's
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
37
Own had never let them forget it. Another sore point was that their ceremonial
tabards were dark green trimmed with gold, making them good targets and
appropriate decor during midwinter festivals.
Gideon reined in near them and dismounted, asking, "Captain, what orders?"
"Send these gentlemen back to the Guard House." As the lieutenant came closer
and Thomas could lower his voice, he added, "Go to Lucas. Tell him what
happened and then wait to see if the Dowager Queen has questions for you. I'll
see him after this meeting." He wanted to double his share of the guard
placements and put a watch on Dubell.
"Yes, Captain." Gideon nodded.
Vivan was eyeing the old sorcerer with grudging curiosity as Galen Dubell and
Braun dismounted. He asked, "What were you doing, kidnapping scholars out of
the Philosopher's Cross?"
"Exactly," Thomas said as he went to join the sorcerers. "I could never keep
anything from you."
Thomas led Dubell out of the wet chill of the courtyard and through the inner
gate at its far end, passing under the spikes of an old portcullis. Dr. Braun
trailed behind them. In the wall beyond, a heavy ironbound door guarded by two
alert Cistemans led into one of the corridors that ran inside the protective
inner siege walls. The corridor was raw stone, lit by oil lamps and
undecorated except for scribbled writings by present and long-dead occupants.
Dubell shook his head. "I lived here for many years and there are still parts
of this place I have never seen. I am quite lost, Captain."
"We're in the siege wall opposite the south curtain wall. The Summer Residence
and the Adamantine Way are behind us at the opposite end of the corridor, and
we're going toward the King's Bastion." This siege wall divided the newer
section of the palace with its open garden courts, domed Summer Residence, and
the terraces and windowed facades of the Gallery Wing from the jumbled
collection of ancient blocky bastions, towers, and walls on the west side.
38
MARTHA WELLS
A steep stairway led up into the King's Bastion, which loomed above the Old
Courts and the Mews. As they climbed, the surroundings began to show rapid
signs of improvement, the rough stone softened by hangings and overlaid by
carved panelling. The ancient cracked tiles had been recently scrubbed and
polished, reflecting the light from hall lanterns of stamped metal and glass
as soft pools of gold. They passed Cisteman guards posted on each landing, and
began to hear the bastion's hum of activity, never still at any time of night.
At the fourth level, Thomas led them out of the older stairwell and across the
landing to the carved-oak Queen's Staircase. They were in the heart of the
bastion now, and the men posted here were Queen's guards.
Dubell paused on die landing, looking up at the wide staircase with its dark
wood carved into flowing bands and banisters set with fragments of mirror
glass. Then he shook his head as if at his own folly and said, "It has been a
long time."
The old sorcerer had been led this way the day of his exile ten years ago, to
see the Dowager Queen and to hear his sentence, which so easily could have
been death. Thomas acknowledged the guards' salute, and thought it fortunate
all around that Ravenna had been lenient with Galen Dubell.
The top of the staircase opened into a vestibule, the first room in the
Dowager Queen's State Apartments. The King's State Apartments were on the
opposite side of the bastion, and the young Queen Falaise lived in another
suite on the floor just below. They passed the young pages waiting in the
vestibule and went in to the Guard Chamber, a long richly panelled room lit by
several glass drop chandeliers. Gideon was already there and several Queen's
guards surrounded him, demanding to know how the night's work had gone. They
called greetings as Thomas entered, and he went forward to ask Gideon, "Did
you see Lucas?"
"Yes, and he spoke to Ravenna. But the Bisran ambassador came in and demanded
to see her. They're in the Privy Council Chamber now."
"Damn. What does he want at this time of night'"
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
39
"Who knows?" Gideon shrugged. The ambassador was a diplomat, not a soldier,
and the young lieutenant didn't think him a matter of much importance.
Thomas considered a moment. Something to do with Grandier? If it was, then
there went all hope of keeping the River Quarter incident quiet.
"Queen Falaise has been asking for me." Gideon looked uncomfortable. "Will you
need me anymore tonight?"
"No, you can go on."
As Gideon left, Thomas looked around and saw Dubell was taking his leave of
Dr. Braun, who had apparently decided not to brave an interview with the
Dowager Queen. The other guards were eyeing the sorcerer curiously, which at
least meant that news of their adventure hadn't flown too far ahead of them.
There were also two young Albonate squires waiting self-consciously in the
corner. So Renter is already here, Thomas thought. Whether that was good or
bad depended on what mood the King had been in when he'd sent him. He said,
"We'll wait in here, Doctor," as Dubell turned back toward him, and they went
into the anteroom.
Tapestried hangings with a Garden of Paradise theme matched the carpet and
table covers, cloaking the large, high-ceilinged room in rich shades of green.
Renier stood before the immense marble hearth, abstractedly watching a
manservant build up the fire. He was Preceptor of the palace's chapter of
Albonate Knights, which was a military order founded for the protection of the
King's person, and the only order of knighthood in Ile-Rien that still meant
more than a courtesy title. They were members of some of the highest families
in Ile-Rien, brought into the Order as boys, living in monastic discipline
until they were knighted by the King. Renier would probably have made a better
country bishop than a preceptor, but in his tenure he had kept the Order's
tendency toward religious fanaticism under tight control. He had broad
shoulders and was muscled like a bear, and still rode to tourney on King's
Ascension Day, easily managing the weight of the heavy ceremonial mail. Over
his court doublet and lace-
40
MARTHA WULS
trimmed collar, the big red-bearded knight wore the bedraggled coat of
sackcloth and poorly cured leather all Albon knights wore in honor of St.
Albon, who had done some wandering in the wilderness before his sainthood.
Renter looked up at their entrance, saw Dubell, and smiled. "Success."
Thomas watched the Preceptor greet the old sorcerer, and wondered just how
much Renier had known of tonight's expedition.
The door opened again and Lord Aviler stood there a moment, eyeing them
thoughtfully. He was dark haired, dressed in the blood red state robes of the
Ministry, and his handsome sallow face was carefully controlled. He nodded to
Renier and Galen Dubell, then his gaze shifted to Thomas and he said, "The
River Quarter is on fire."
Thomas smiled slightly to himself and went to lean casually against the
mantelpiece. "Only a small portion of it." Aviler had followed so quickly
behind them that he knew the man must have been lying in wait.
"A stupid mistake." He moved farther into the room, his folded hands covered
by the hang of his sleeves. Thomas wondered if the pose was intentionally
copied from the High Minister's late father, or if it was only habit. Aviler
had recently inherited the post of High Minister of the body of nobles and
wealthy merchants who formally advised, or were supposed to advise, the King,
and had a great deal of theoretical power. But the Dowager Queen Ravenna
actively opposed him, Queen Falaise ignored him except on social occasions,
and no one had been able to do anything with Roland one way or the other since
he had taken the throne at the end of Ravenna's regency last year. Aviler was
statesman enough to resent this and just inexperienced enough to occasionally
reveal his feelings.
"Really, my lord, what do you want me to say?" Thomas raised his brows
inquiringly. "That the mission was in danger of being found out so I set the
city on fire to confuse the issue?"
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
41
Before Aviler could reply, Galen Dubell said quietly, "It was unavoidable."
"Dr. Dubell." High Minister Aviler acknowledged him stiffly. "It's a pity you
couldn't have returned sooner and avoided this consternation."
"That was my intention, my lord, but my plans went somewhat astray when my
household was murdered and I was abducted." Dubell said it with such good
grace that Aviler was actually caught off guard.
"So Galen Dubell is a diplomat as well as a scholar," Renier said softly to
Thomas as Aviler recovered his composure. "He was something of a recluse when
I knew him, but I suppose years of academic infighting at Lodun will give
anyone eyes in the back of his head. It's good he's returned."
Thomas wasn't about to admit he missed Dr. Surete, who had held the post of
Court Sorcerer since he could remember and had died suddenly last month of
pleurisy. Surete had been seventy years old, had called every man under the
age of sixty "boy," and had been the terror of the court for his ability to
use sardonic invective like a bludgeon.
Thomas said, "Let's hope Dubell's not anxious to get back to Lodun anytime
soon. We're going to need his help." Dr. Surete's assistant Milam had.been
killed in an accident before Surete himself had died, and since then there had
been nothing but argument over who would receive the appointment while lesser
talents like Dr. Braun vied for attention.
Renier looked at him thoughtfully. '.'Lose anyone?"
Thomas's expression betrayed nothing. "Does it matter?"
Renier said softly, "Forgive him, Thomas. He's a boy and he was angry."
"I thought you'd given up on the priesthood," Thomas answered, thinking, If
His Majesty Roland wants me to die in the line of duty, it's his business, but
he could have chosen a better time. If he doesn 't see that Grandier is a
danger to the state ... At Renter's look he added, "It isn't my place to
condemn him or forgive him. But tell me, did Denzil suggest the plan to
Roland, or was it someone else?"
42
MARTHA WELLS
Renier stiffened visibly. "I know of no plan."
The double doors into the Privy Council Chamber beyond the anteroom opened and
the Bisran ambassador stepped out, his expression grim. He was an older man,
with the olive skin and hawklike profile of the Bisran aristocracy. Ile-Rien
and its capital and court were alien to him, and his disapproval was evident.
The excessive formality of the Bisran Court made it stagnant and stultified,
while in Ile-Rien landlaw had traditionally permitted high officers and even
personal servants to address kings and queens as "my lord" or "my lady," and
to forgo obeisance in informal circumstances. The ambassador's dark plain
clothing and simple white collar also marked him as a member of their sect
that regarded any kind of ornamentation as a work of Hell; the opulence of the
palace must seem almost a personal insult.
The ambassador's hard eyes swept the room, pausing on Galen Dubeti's scholar's
cope and narrowing in dismayed disgust. Turning to the High Minister he said,
"Another sorcerer for the King's menagerie, Lord Aviler?" In Bisra, the
magical as well as most of the philosophical arts were condemned, though the
theurgic magic their priest-magicians practiced had been a deadly barrier
against outside attack during the war. Sorcery that was not performed under
the auspices of the Bisran Church was outlawed, and punishable by death.
Aviler hesitated, his diplomatic smile turning thin with annoyance, unable to
find the right words to defend DubeU's honor without insulting the ambassador.
Before the silence could last long enough to give the Bisran a victory, Thomas
interposed, "Perhaps that's a subject you should discuss with the King
himself?"
The ambassador flicked a resentful glance at him and received only an
ingenuous smile in response. As a matter of policy, Roland did not receive the
Bisran ambassador, who was not very pleased with this arrangement, since it
required him to address his demands to the considerably less malleable Dowager
Queen. But why is he here in the middle of the
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
43
night? It could be only obstinate determination to get a hearing no matter who
he inconvenienced, but Thomas doubted it. To compound the Bisran's discomfort,
he added, "But I'm sure my lady Ravenna dealt with you to her best ability."
The ambassador said, "Her Majesty was most... civil," and favored him with the
same cold scrutiny he had employed on Dubell. The Bisran Court did not allow
favorites to wield political power, so the ambassador tended to discount
Thomas's position and influence, and cordially hated him as well. It probably
didn't help either that the shape and tilt of Thomas's black eyes gave his
face a naturally cynical slant, and that with his dark hair and beard this
effect made him resemble certain popular portraits of the Prince of Hell. If
the ambassador had noticed the evidence his climb on a wet and dirty building
had left on his clothing, no doubt he attributed it to some adventure in
debauchery.
Turning stiffly back to Aviler, the ambassador said, "Another matter. I wanted
to make certain you understood that if Ile-Rien offers shelter to the devil's
son Grandier, the cost may be more than you are prepared to pay."
Aviler bowed, his reserved manner masking a certain wariness. "I assure you,
my lord Ambassador, Ile-Rien has no intention of offering shelter to a
criminal sorcerer who has caused your land such pain."
Besides, Grandier hasn't asked for shelter, Thomas thought. Unfortunately. And
since the Bisran sorcerer had announced his arrival in Ile-Rien by abducting a
prominent Lodun scholar of Galen Dubell's reputation, it hardly seemed
possible that he would.
But it was likely that the ambassador was only using Gran-dier's presence in
the city as an excuse for a confrontation with Ravenna, and if he was being
prodded by the Bisran War College to take a more aggressive stance with the
Dowager Queen, it could only mean trouble. Bisra was miles of dry flat plains,
and only tribute from its conquered states kept its coffers full. The Bisran
Church exercised rigid controls on a populace that was land-poor and
half-starved in the country
44
MARTHA WELLS
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
45
and hovered at the brink of mob violence in the crowded cities. fle-Rien had
its uprisings and city mobs as well, but usually over taxes, and they were
scattered outbreaks that were settled within a few days. Bisra seemed to
teeter always on the edge of chaos, and with He-Rien's rich land and its
Church's policy of tolerance toward the pagan Old Faith as a constant
irritant, war had been inevitable and frequent.
And now Urbain Grandier's depredations had made them even more desperate.
Thomas watched critically as the ambassador nodded with bare courtesy to Lord
Aviler and strode to the anteroom door, the page stationed there barely
managing to swing open the heavy portal in time.
As the door closed Aviler shook his head and said softly to Galen Dubell, "My
apologies, Doctor. To a Bisran, any man in a scholar's gown is half demon."
DubelTs expression was closed and enigmatic. "And a sorcerer, of course, is
all demon."
From the Privy Council Chamber two Queen's guards entered and stepped to
either side of the doors as the Dowager Queen came into the room. Everyone
bowed and she acknowledged them with a nod and a slight smile. "Gentlemen.
Forgive the delay." Her graying red hair was tucked up into a lace cap and she
wore a dark informal morning gown. She was over fifty now, and the years
hadn't diminished her beauty, but transformed and refined it. Only the faint
laugh lines around her mouth and the shadow of strain at the corners of her
eyes betrayed her age. She took a seat in the brocaded canopy chair beside the
hearth, her attendant gentlewoman settling on a cushioned stool behind her.
"Dr. Galen Dubell, I'm glad to find you in good health. Perhaps you can help
us in explaining this matter."
"Yes, my lady. You saw my letters concerning Urbain Grandier?" Dubell said,
stepping forward.
"Yes. Dr. Surete brought them to me when he requested your return to court.
His unfortunate death delayed the matter just long enough, it seems. When the
messages came from
Lodun telling of your disappearance I had already sent an order lifting the
ban and requesting your return." As she spoke she was already unfolding a
square of half-completed black-work embroidery and looking for the needle that
marked her place. Ravenna always had to have something to do with her hands.
It was a habit mat disconcerted all but the most resolute of petitioners and
foreign ambassadors, but Thomas noted it didn't seem to faze Dubell.
The old sorcerer bowed to her. "I am honored, my lady."
Ravenna gestured that away. "Tell me more about this Grandier. He has an odd
name for a Bisran."
Watching the Dowager guardedly, Aviler said, "We have some knowledge about his
early life. Urbain Grandier was a Bisran sorcerer and scholar, though it is
believed his father was from Ile-Rien, possibly a visiting priest, or even a
noble, journeying there during one of the temporary treaties in force in the
year of Grandier's birth. This would explain his surname, which is certainly
not Bisran. Stubbornly, he refused to take another name, and this probably
contributed to the suspicion with which he was regarded there."
She frowned at her embroidery. "His original bffense was some outrage
concerning nuns, and the Bisran Church removed his sanction to perform
sorcery? And then he was arrested by the Inquisition?"
"Yes, my lady. After his escape from the Inquisition, Grandier brought on a
plague and apparently made subtle changes in the weather over the Kiseran
plain, some of their richest farmland, and destroyed most of their last year's
harvest. The Bisran theurgic sorcerers are said to be near exhaustion with
holding off magical attacks on Church officials and the War College."
Ravenna smiled tightly without looking up from her embroidery. She hated Bisra
even more than she had hated her dead husband, the old king Fulstan. "One
might point out that it is nothing more than they deserve."
"One might," Aviler agreed. "But the point is that Grandier has suddenly
chosen to come to Ile-Rien."
46
MARTHA WELLS
Thomas shook his head, briefly amused. Aviler's relationship with the Dowager
Queen was an acrimonious one.
For her part Ravenna merely studied the High Minister a moment. Her fine
long-fingered hands had paused on the embroidery, the gold needle catching the
firelight. That might mean anything; Thomas had known her to order an
execution, explain to the culprit why it had to be done, and deny the family's
fervent pleas for mercy, all without missing a stitch. Then she drew the
strand of blue thread up tight and said, 'Tell me about the events at the
convent, Lord Aviler." She nodded to her gentlewoman. "Lady Anne knows she has
permission to leave the room should she hear anything that causes her to fear
for her modesty."
As Lady Anne bit her lip and looked studiously at the floor, Aviler frowned
and said, "The original incident took place at a convent in a town called
Lindre, in the northern part of Bisra. Grandier was accused of corrupting the
nuns, causing them to blaspheme against their own Church, to attack each
other, to perform rituals that. . ."
"According to the Inquisitors General of Bisra," Galen Du-bell interrupted
gently, "he caused them to corrupt themselves." The old scholar had moved
toward the hearth and was staring into the fire, an expression in his eyes
that Thomas couldn't interpret. "They found evidence of human blood used in
rituals, symbols and books banned for centuries, the darkest magic ... There
was even some evidence of an agreement with a Lord of Hell."
As the others watched Dubell in silence, Thomas said, "In Bisra they still
burn hedgepriests for putting curses on cows. Why do you feel you can trust
the Inquisition's reports?"
"True, Captain." Dubell turned back to them. "The Inquisitors were, of course,
lying. They manufactured the evidence, or most of it. Scholars who are not
even sorcerers have items in their possession that an evil mind can
misinterpret. And Urbain Grandier was a scholar. He studied the stars, as well
as die body and its ills and humors. He was also very outspoken in his
opinions, and involved in the printing of inflammatory
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
47
pamphlets. It was for this that he came under the Inquisition's scrutiny. The
incident of some hysterical nuns at the Lindre Convent was used against him
and he was given the usual sentence of torture and imprisonment."
Dubell's voice had an enthralling quality. It might have been facilitated by
the growing warmth in the room or the fatigue that was catching up with
Thomas, but the old sorcerer seemed to be painting a particularly vivid
picture of the man Grandier had been.
After a moment Dubell shook his head. "It turned him, you might say. He
escaped eventually, and began to commit many of the crimes of which they had
accused him, but on a larger scale. The plague, for instance. It caused
pockets of a poisonous humor to form beneath the skin, which burst when the
victim was in death agony and spread the disease to anyone who stood nearby.
It caused so much chaos entire cities were disrupted; the sick went untended.,
. Only a man well versed in healing-sorcery could have devised something so
terrible, and only a man driven mad with the lust for revenge could have
brought himself to implement it." In the firelight, Dubell's face was a mask
of pain. Then he sighed. "When I heard that a man calling himself Grandier had
become established in the city and was believed to be a sorcerer, I thought it
best to bring the matter to Dr. Surete's attention. I only wish I'd acted
sooner."
Renier had gone to the round table in the center of the room and was looking
through the faded parchment and leather maps stacked there. He pulled one out
and found Lindre, then dioughtfully tapped the red cross that marked the town
and asked, "You knew Grandier very well?"
"No. His excesses and the motivation for them were much discussed at Lodun,
where there is great interest in the natural, as well as the magical, arts."
Dubell smiled. "And the printing of an occasional pamphlet."
"We know," Aviler said dryly. He paced a few steps, his face severe and only
half-visible in the candlelight. Aviler's late father had made his fortune in
trading voyages to the East
48
MARTHA WELLS
before he had settled down to take over the Ministry, and the stigma of those
origins made Aviler the Younger careful to preserve the proper aristocratic
disdain toward the occasional political commentary from Lodun. But the High
Minister dropped the subject and only asked, "Why does Grandier come here
now?"
Dubell spread his hands. "I don't know. But whatever his reason, he must be
stopped and driven away."
Ravenna nodded. "Excesses in Bisra are all well and good, but he cannot be
allowed to commit them here. I agree, Doctor. But why did he seek you out?
Some special grudge?"
"It has been ten years since Dr. Surete and I last tended to the palace wards.
With Surete dead and Grandier rumored to be in the city, I thought it best
that I should see to them again. The warding stones that hold the etheric
structure of spells in formation around the newer sections of the palace must
be examined individually, though in the Old Courts where the wards are tied to
the structures themselves such attention is not necessary. But now I realize
the situation is even more urgent than I thought If Grandier meant to keep me
from examining the wards after Dr. Surete's death, then he must have some way
to circumvent them."
Aviler looked up. "How is that possible?"
"The wards are not unlimited or infallible. The sorcerers who constructed them
directed them to react to certain situations in certain ways. But their
creators could not, and did not, think of every situation. If a fay knew where
the gaps were that their movement occasionally creates, it could pass through
them unharmed." Galen Dubell smiled. "Dr. Surete knew the most about the
wards. He could tell you their names."
"I see," Aviler muttered.
"Do you? Good." Ravenna finished part of the pattern and spread the square of
needlework out on her lap. "Dr. Dubell, when can you begin this examination of
the wards?"
"Immediately. It will take several days, as some portions may only be
performed during certain hours of the night."
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
49
"Good, but we must continue the search for Grandier."
Thomas said, "The King's Watch found that house; they'll find him." The King's
Watch was a euphemism for the network of spies set up by the late Aviler the
Elder to keep an eye on discontented nobles living in the city and the foreign
cults that had begun to appear at that time. It was they who had been able to
find Grandier's River Quarter house when the Lodun sorcerers had named him as
Galen Dubell's abductor.
"Very well. That is enough for now. Dr. Dubell must rest before he begins his
work and I know you gentlemen have much to attend to."
As they made to leave, Ravenna added, "Stay a moment, Captain."
Thomas waited, and when the doors had closed behind the last of the others,
she asked, "It was difficult'"
"Fairly."
"That's hardly an answer."
He watched her a moment thoughtfully. That Roland had sent him on a mission
designed to cause his death probably rankled her more than it did him. "Is
that why you wanted me to stay, to indulge my sense of self-pity?"
"Oh, don't start. Roland could send you to the edge of the earth and I would
not care." She smiled for a moment, but her expression became bitter as she
smoothed a section of the embroidery. "Master Conadine was sent for today from
the Granges to help deal with Grandier. He should be here within the week. It
was the worst stupidity not to wait for him and to send you with only Dr.
Braun."
"If I'd had the choice, I might have gone anyway," he admitted. "If we had
waited any longer Grandier could have killed Dubell."
"And taken a handful of men, and only Dr. Braun? Never mind. Roland did it to
aggravate me, and we know who encouraged him to it, don't we?" Ravenna tested
the sharpness of her needle with a finger, then selected another out of the
case Lady Anne held ready for her. "And what other mischief has Denzil been up
to lately?"
so
MARTHA WELLS
Thomas went over to the hearth and took a seat on one of the stools near her
chair, feeling his weariness as a tight pain across his shoulders. The episode
with Grandier had worried Ravenna more than she had revealed to Aviler or the
others, but he let her change the subject. He said, "He visited a banker on
the Riverside Way yesterday, but that was about a gambling debt. If he's
planning something now, he's taking more care with it."
"Perhaps. Someday he will miscalculate."
Thomas shrugged. "Roland can always pardon him." Den-zil was Duke of Alsene,
Roland's older cousin on his father's side, and acknowledged favorite. There
were men who had more respect for the finer feelings of their dogs than Denzil
had for Roland, but the young King still clung to him. It was undoubtedly the
Duke who had talked Roland into sending a small contingent of the Queen's
Guard to beard Grandier in his lair, knowing Thomas would be bound to lead
them, and knowing that it would infuriate Ravenna. Thomas reminded himself
there was nothing to be done about it tonight. But he was looking forward to
the moment when the news reached Denzil that he had gone into Grandier's house
and brought Galen Dubell out alive without losing a single man. "What did the
Bisran ambassador want'"
"To accuse us of harboring Grandier." She made a gesture of exasperation,
willing to be led away from the subject of her son's favorite, "And also to
present a new list of their heretics sheltering in Ue-Rien, so they could be
arrested and returned to Bisra to bum for their crimes. That the Bisran
Inquisition has no authority within our borders is immaterial, apparently. I
wish I knew why the ambassador is so certain that Grandier is here with our
blessings." She coughed, and Lady Anne hastily produced a lace-edged cloth for
her.
Watching her accusingly, Thomas said, "You're not feeling well." She had
caught a lung flux last winter when they'had gone to Bannot-on-the-Shore to
quell a minor upheaval among the March Barons. Her vitality made it difficult
to
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
51
remember that she was not a young woman anymore, and Thomas still regretted
allowing her to ride with the Guard instead of going in an enclosed carriage,
even if it had let her surprise the barons in the middle of their secret
conference. The disease had weakened her lungs despite the best efforts of
apothecaries and sorcerer-healers, and she wasn't up to any more midnight
rides over ice fields, whatever she might think. "You didn't have to see
Dubell tonight, or the ambassador."
"It is very damp out, and you are not my nursemaid." She tucked the doth into
her sleeve, unperturbed, "I wanted to get this over with as quickly as
possible. And if the palace wards are weakening..." After a moment, Ravenna
shook her head. "And what do you think of Dr. Dubell?"
Thomas knew she wasn't asking about the old scholar's abilities as a sorcerer.
"He's no fool. He handles himself very well."
"Lord Aviler, the old Lord Aviler, not that young puppy of a High Minister,
had great faith in Dubell. Despite his past disgrace." She sighed. "But I've
kept you long enough."
Thomas stood up, took her hand, and kissed it. She said, "Oh, and I'd almost
forgotten." She rummaged in her sewing case, and pulled out a ribbon-tied
packet of letters to hand to him.
"What is it?"
"An annoyance for you to deal with."
He accepted the packet with an expression of distaste. "And I was afraid I
might have to sleep tonight."
"Oh, it isn't urgent. At least not to me." She smiled. "Enjoy."
Stepping out into the Guard Room, Thomas turned the packet over curiously.
Ravenna never forgot anything; it must be something she didn't want to
discuss. Before he could untie the bound letters, he saw that Galen Dubell was
waiting for him. "A moment, Captain?" the old sorcerer asked.
"Yes?"
"Forgive me if the question is intrusive, but Lord Aviler
52
MARTHA WELLS
does not care for you?" The High Minister had already gone, though Renier was
still in the Guard Chamber, speaking quietly to the two Albonate squires.
"Lord Aviler is like that." DubelTs expression held nothing but mild
curiosity. After a moment, Thomas found himself saying, "He doesn't approve of
favorites. He's studied enough history to know what damage I could do if I
were inclined to it."
"I see." Dubell smiled. "Does Queen Falaise still have, her entourage of
poets?"
Falaise had been a princess of Umberwald when Ravenna had chosen her to marry
Roland a year ago. At eighteen she was four years younger than the King, and
if Ravenna's motive in choosing her for a daughter-in-law had been to pick
someone she could teach and influence, she had made one of her few mistakes.
Falaise might have been the quiet studious girl that the ambassadors had
described when she was a third daughter with few prospects, but once here and
safely wed to Roland she had taken to palace life like a beggar child let
loose in a bakery. "Yes, she does. City gossip reaches you all the way out in
Lodun?"
"City gossip is a treasured commodity. The servants bring it in with the milk
every morning. The general opinion, I gathered, was one of relief that she had
chosen to turn her attentions to harmless poets, considering what else she
could have done."
"She could have had guardsmen."
"Or sorcerers." Dubell's expression turned serious. "I owe you a great debt,
Captain."
Thomas looked at him sharply. "I think you've already repaid that debt."
Dubell gestured that away. "Nevertheless, if I can help you in any way, do not
hesitate to call on me."
As the sorcerer turned to follow the servants waiting to take him to his
rooms, Renier intercepted Thomas.
"There's something I have to show you." He looked worried.
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
S3
Resigned, Thomas followed the Albonate Preceptor to a quieter corner of the
Guard Room. "What is it?"
"A letter. It arrived today in a packet of dispatches from Portier. The
courier's a trusted man who swears he never let the packet out of his sight."
The big man unfolded a square of paper. "This is a translation I had a priest
do."
Thomas took the paper. "What language was it in?"
"Old Church Script."
Thomas read the first scribbled sentence aloud, " 'O Best Beloved'?" He looked
up, puzzled. "To whom was it sent?"
"Roland. But the priest said that's the proper way to begin an old
riddle-song, which is what this is."
Where the music is not heard,
There was a light not seen,
There are barren Mils home to multitudes,
And dry lakes where fish are caught above a
city's towers. Catch the incantation, solve the song.
"The answer is a simple one: the Fay," Renier said.
There was only one person acquainted with Roland whose feelings would
naturally express themselves in poetic forms of the past. "You know who this
is from," Thomas said, looking up at the knight.
"The countryfolk are calling her Kade Carrion now." Renier shrugged, uneasy.
"I suppose we're lucky; she could have sent somediing that exploded or told
the secrets of whomever picked it up."
Roland's older sister, the bastard princess who had never forgiven anything.
Thomas tapped the rolled paper against his palm. "An odd coincidence, with
Galen Dubell here. Ravenna decides to pardon the man who first told the bane
of our lives that she was a witch, and the witch herself starts meddling
again." She had chosen her moment well. We have more than
54
MARTHA WELLS
enough to deal with from Grandier, and Kade is too dangerous to ignore.
"She's been quiet for almost six months. Why now?"
Across the room, a musician had taken a seat at the spinet and now played the
opening verse of a popular new ballad, about a man who fell in love with a
fayre queen and was taken away by her. He couldn't have chosen an air more
inappropriate to the moment, Thomas thought. He said, "One hundred and
ninety-seven days. I keep count. She might be in league with Grandier." Though
Grandier had killed to protect himself, and Kade was rather like a cat—if the
mouse was dead it was no good playing with it anymore. But people change.
Renier shook his head. "There's not much else we can do. The sentry positions
have already been doubled and tripled for Grandier's sake." The knight's eyes
flicked up to meet Thomas's. "Dubell is going to tend the wards."
"Yes, he is, isn't he?"
"We've nothing to go on."
Thomas handed him back the letter. "Watch him anyway."
AT THE FIRST creak of the door,
Thomas was up on one elbow and drawing the main gauche from the belt hung over
the bedpost. Then he recognized the man entering the room and shoved the long
dagger back into its sheath. "Damn you, Phaistus."
The young servant shrugged and knelt beside the hearth to scrape the ashes
out, muttering to the unresponsive andirons, "Well, he's in a mood."
Thomas struggled out of bed. Despite the high ceiling and the natural tendency
for drafts, the room was almost too warm; daylight shining through the high
windows was reflected dazzlingly off the whitewashed plaster of the walls. His
scabbarded rapier leaned against a red brocaded chair and his other three
civilian dueling swords hung on the wall, along with the heavier, broad-bladed
weapons used for cavalry combat. He ran a distracted hand through his hair,
working the tangles out, and said, "What's the hour?"
"Nearly midday, Sir. Ephraim's outside. He said you wanted him. And Master
Lucas brought that Gambin fellow in."
"Good." Thomas stretched and grimaced. A few hours of sleep had done little
besides give his bruised muscles time to stiffen. While Phaistus banged things
on the hearth, he found his trousers and top boots on the floor underneath the
bed's rumbled white counterpoint and started to dress. "Clean that pistol."
The servant stood, wiping his hands on his shiittatl and
56
MARTHA WELLS
glancing over the draw table where Thomas had left his wheellock and reloading
gear. "Where's the other one?"
Thomas grabbed up a pewter jug and threw it at Phaistus, who ducked, grinned,
and went on with what he was doing. Phaistus had come to the Guard House as
a.kitchen boy, silent and terrified, but had grown out of it before his voice
changed. "I obviously don't beat you enough," Thomas said, going over to the
table and pushing back his sleeves to splash water on his face from the bowl
there.
Undisturbed, the boy asked, "Going to kill Gambin, Sir?"
"It's a thought." Deciding he could wait to trim his beard. Thomas picked up
the scabbarded rapier and went into the small anteroom.
Ephraim was waiting for him. He was a little old man, the pockets of his faded
brown doublet and breeches stuffed with sheaves of paper, the ballads he sold
on the street. His stockings were mud stained and one of his shoes had a large
hole in the toe. He grinned and pulled his battered hat off. "You wanted to
see me, Captain?"
"Someone sent a packet of letters to the Dowager Queen through Gambin. I want
you and your people to find out who hired him."
Ephraim rubbed his grizzled chin. The best of the civilian spies Thomas
employed, Ephraim was discreet enough for the occasional official mission as
well as for Thomas's own needs. "That could be difficult, Sir. That Gambin lad
hires out to so many there's no telling whose business he's on today, and he
mightn't have a reason to go back to the fellow, you know."
"Gambin's here now. I'll make sure he does."
"Ahh. That's a different matter. The usual wages?"
"A bonus if you find out by tomorrow."
"Oh, I can't make any promises." Ephraim looked flattered. "But we'll do our
poor best."
Thomas left him and went down the staircase toward the clash of steel and loud
talk from the large hall on the lower floor. The old, rambling house stood
just inside the Prince's Gate, where it was dwarfed by the bulk of the King's
Bastion
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
57
and the Albon Tower. For seventy years the house had been the headquarters of
the Queen's Guard and the property of whomever held the commission of Captain.
The carved knobs topping the stairway's balusters were gashed and chipped from
practice bouts up and down the steps, and the walls still bore the faint scars
of powder burns from more serious skirmishes.
The Queen's Guard were all scions of province nobility or second sons of
landed families, with few expectations of large inheritances. The requirement
for membership was a term of service with a crown troop, preferably cavalry,
and an appointment from the Queen. In general the Queen's Own were unruly and
hard drinking, and carried on jealous and obsessive rivalries with both the
Osternans and the Albon Order. They were also the most effective elite force
in a country where until a few years ago private armies had abounded;
commanding them had been Thomas's only ambition for a long time.
As he reached the second-floor landing, Dr. Lambe was just coming out of the
archway that led into the other wing. Dressed in a stained smock, the
apothecary was followed by a young boy weighed down with various satchels and
bags of medical paraphernalia. Thomas asked Lambe, "Did you see Gaspard?"
"I did, Captain, and I'm not sure I believe it." Lambe adjusted the cap on his
balding head. Apothecaries prepared the herbal remedies used by
sorcerer-healers, and many, like Lambe, also made good physicians, even
without any sorcer-ous skill. Healers learned in magic were in short supply
everywhere but in Lodun, where the university drew them by the dozens.
"What do you mean?"
"The bums are scarred over already." He shrugged. "I knew Galen Dubell had a
reputation for healing-sorcery, but what did the man do?"
"Whatever it was, he did it quickly. He used some things Braun had."
MARTHA WELLS
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
59
"Dr. Braun's not so bad." Lambe caught Thomas's expression and added, "He's
not a steady sort, I'll give you that, Sir, but he has the makings of a fine
practitioner in him. But this work of Dr. DubelTs... It would be an honor to
hand the man bandages."
Thomas watched Lambe go, thoughtfully, then turned into the small second-floor
council room where Lucas waited for him.
The dingy walls were hung with old maps and a lew tattered remnants of flags,
some of which were trophies from the last war, while others were more recent
acquisitions from the Cisternan Guard, who would undoubtedly give a great deal
to learn where they were. In the glass-fronted bookpress were classical
treatises on warfare, manuals of drilling, musketry, fencing, and tactics, The
Compteat Body of the Art Military and Directions For Musters. Lucas, the First
Lieutenant of the Queen's Guard, was leaning back in a chair, nursing a
tankard, his boots propped up on the heavy plank table beside a wine bottle
and another tankard.
Gambin was standing in the corner in an attitude that suggested he wanted to
be as far away from Lucas as possible, and his long face was sullen. Gambin
was a spy as well, but without Ephraim's sense of professional integrity. He
worked most often for the lesser lords of the court, and this was the first
time Thomas had considered him anything more than a minor irritant. He was
dressed in a red and gold slashed doublet, the peacock finery of a court
hanger-on that was particularly hateful to the eyes after a hard night and
little sleep. Gambin said, "I've business elsewhere, Captain, if you dbn't
mind." The bravado in his voice was unconvincing.
Lucas raised an eyebrow. Thomas glanced at the lieutenant as he set his rapier
down. Ignoring Gambin, he poured wine into the other tankard, tasted it, and
winced in disgust. He said to Lucas, "Adijan '22? Are you mad?"
Lucas shrugged. "It wakes me up."
"It wakes the dead." Thomas dropped into a chair and
looked at the spy. He waited until Gambin's pale eyes shifted away from his,
then said, "Someone gave you a package."
"They do. I'm handy for that," Gambin muttered.
"This was for the Dowager Queen."
The spy licked his lips. "Was it'"
"Was it?" Lucas echoed.
"It was," Thomas said. He drew the rapier from the fine black leather of the
scabbard and out of die corner of his eye saw Gambin shift nervously. The hilt
was unadorned beyond the inherent elegance in die shapes of the half-shell
guard and the blunt points of the quillions, and the metal was worn smooth
from use. Thomas ran a finger down the flat of the narrow blade, apparently
giving all his attention to the shallow dents and scratches it had collected.
"Who gave it to you?"
"I'm not saying I had any package."
Lucas pulled the packet of letters out of his rumpled doublet and dropped it
on the table. Last night, after discovering that it was Gambin who had
delivered the packet to one of Ravenna's gendewomen, Thomas had given it to
Lucas along with instructions to bring in the spy.
Thomas held the rapier up and sighted along the blade. Despite last night's
misadventures, it was still unbent. "Where'd this package come from, then?"
Gambin laughed nervously. "There's no proof I had anything to do with that."
Thomas looked up at him. "A Queen's word is not good enough?" he asked softly.
"That's dangerously close to treason."
"I ... That's . . ."
"Who gave it to you?"
Gambin made the mistake of changing defensive tactics. "I can't tell you
that."
" 'Can't? Surely not 'can't,' " Lucas pointed out. "Perhaps you mean
'shouldn't'? There is a distinct difference."
"I meant I don't know who it was; he had his man give it to me," Gambin
protested.
60
MARTHA WELLS
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
61
"That's a pity." Thomas laid the rapier gently back on the table and stood up.
"You're no use to us, then, are you?"
"So I'll be on my way, then."
"Yes, do that."
The spy hesitated, started to speak, then made a sudden dash for the door.
Thomas caught him as Gambin faltered in the doorway at the sight of a group of
guards dicing in the next room. He slung the spy around and slammed him face
first into the table.
Lucas deftly rescued the wine bottle and moved out of the way.
Gambin yelped, the cry escalating into a scream as Thomas twisted the spy's
arm upward at an unnatural angle. He said, "Keep yelling. There's no one to
hear you who gives a damn. Now I suggest you consider an answer."
"Look here, I ... I'll find out who it is for you. I swear, he ... I've got
friends that can find him." The spy's voice rose in desperation.
"I think you're lying. Doesn't it seem like he's lying?" Thomas asked Lucas.
"Well, he is handy that way."
"No, no, it's the truth," Gambin panted. "I'll find him."
"Are you sure?" Thomas put a little more of his weight on the man's abused arm
bone.
Gambin shrieked. "Yes, yes! I swear it!"
Thomas let him go and stepped back. Gambin fell to the floor, gasping. He
staggered to his feet, clutching his arm, and stumbled for the door.
Thomas stood his chair upright and recovered his tankard from the floor. He
gestured at the wine bottle Lucas was holding protectively. "Are you keeping
that all for yourself?"
Lucas passed it to him as he took his own seat. "I thought it woke the dead."
"It does. That's what bad years are for." He poured the tankard full and took
a long drink. He resented wasting the time on Gambin, and wanted to get back
to the problem of Grandier. The three prisoners they had taken last night had
known nothing. The man who had hired them had worn a hood and a mask, which
was a common practice for nobles and the wealthy slumming in low taverns, and
they had not been able to decide if he was a Bisran. Which might mean Grandier
spoke without an accent, that the man who had done the hiring had not been the
sorcerer but another confederate, or that the hirelings were too witless to
have known him for Bisran if he had been wearing a Bisran cornet officer's
tabard. We know nothing about Grandier, Thomas thought in disgust, except
rumor and common knowledge. "I suppose Gideon relieved you at dawn."
"Yes, and he was disgustingly cheery about it. I can't recall being that
energetic as a youth. Who's following Gambin?"
"Ephraim, the one that pretends to be a ballad-seller."
"Oh, hiring out, are we?"
"Had to. AH the regulars from the King's Watch are still looking for
Grandier."
"Grandier's a bad business." Lucas picked up the packet of letters and glanced
through it. "So you're having an affair with the Countess of Mayence?"
"A long, torrid affair. I get very effusive about it in the one dated last
month." He didn't mind his lieutenant's raillery. Lucas was perhaps the first
man Thomas had learned to trust entirety, when with the rest of the Queen's
Guard they had been employed as couriers and intelligence-gatherers during the
last Bisran War. Since they were both dark enough to pass for Aderassi, the
two of them had once spent six days disguised as mercenaries from that small
country in a Bisran cavalry encampment on the wrong side of a wide and rising
river. The Bisran commander had staged executions of captured officers of the
Ile-Rien army as after-dinner entertainment, and the bounty he had offered for
Queen's Guardsmen was enough to support a well-to-do merchant family for a
year.
"Yes, I particularly enjoyed that one." The older lieutenant spread the letter
out on the table to examine the signature. "It's a good forgery. I'd think
there were some truth to it if I
62
MARTHA WELLS
didn't know you were too proper a gentleman to stand in line with the good
countess's grooms and lackeys. I expect it's a lucky thing the Dowager thinks
so too."
"It's hardly luck. If Ravenna had asked me if I'd actually slept with the
countess, I would've had to tell her I honestly couldn't remember. Most of the
court ladies are starting to look alike to me." Thomas and Ravenna had not
been lovers for more than a year, since her health had first begun to fail,
and she knew that he'd had other women since then. It had not changed anything
between them; their relationship had passed that point long ago. The only
woman she would have objected to was Falaise. Not too many years ago palace
coups had ignited as quickly as fises in a dry summer; Ravenna could not
afford to have the man who commanded her guard become attached to a
daughter-queen who in many ways was still an unknown quantity, and who one day
might like to rid herself of a dominating mother-in-law.
But even though the letters had failed in their purpose, they were an
annoyance at a time when Ravenna needed him free to help her, and not
constantly guarding his own back. Thomas tapped the packet. 'This was done by
someone who doesn't know Ravenna."
Lucas nodded. "Someone who doesn't realize how little she appreciates people
who trouble with her personal . . ." —he paused and his mouth
quirked—"matters."
Thomas strongly suspected his friend had been about to say "affairs." He let
it pass and said, "It's more the sort of thing that would work with Roland. I
wonder if our anonymous schemer plans to try it." If some disgruntled courtier
also tried to drive a wedge between Roland and his cousin Denzil in this
manner, Thomas wished him luck, but it was far more likely this asinine trick
was the brainchild of one of the Duke of Alsene's cronies. Inspired by a few
casually dropped hints by Denzil himself, of course.
Lucas looked thoughtful. "I wonder if it's been tried already."
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
63
"I'd think the screams would have been audible even over on this end of the
court. But there's no way to be certain."
"Surely Renier, the ideal of perfect knighthood, would know."
Thomas snorted. As the ideal of perfect knighthood, Renier was not without
flaws. He was a skilled swordsman but tended to depend too much on his weight
and size, using his greater strength to bowl over smaller opponents. This
technique had some merit: there were many men who unwisely dueled with the
Preceptor of the Albon Knights only to end with his footprints down their
backs. Renier had knocked Thomas down once in a friendly duel, and when the
Preceptor had stepped in close to follow up, Thomas had retaliated by slamming
him in the groin with the hilt of his main gauche. Renier didn't seem to hold
it against Thomas, and his good humor never seemed to suffer. But Renier had a
misguided perception of loyalty, and while he was not a bad influence on the
young King, he was not a good one either. He often went out of his way to
repeat to Roland what everyone else in his hearing said, without regard for
Roland's sensibilities or the safety of those whose careless words were later
used against them. Thomas said, "The ideal of perfect knighthood thinks it's
his duty to tell Roland every word I say to him, and God knows what His
Majesty would make of the question."
"Well, whatever you think." Lucas got to his feet slowly. He was only a few
years older than his captain, but he moved like a much older man when he was
tired. The reflexes go, Thomas thought, looking at the rapier lying on the
table. And that's that.
Lucas said, "I'm off to a well-deserved rest. Oh, there's that entertainment
at court tonight. Will you need me?"
"No, Gideon and I will take it. I've doubled the duty list for it, what with
all our other little troubles." The acting troupes brought to court by the
Master of Revels didn't ordinarily present much of a problem. Before they
reached the palace they were examined for foreign spies or suspected
anarchists,
64
MARTHA WEUS
and the actors seldom turned mad and attacked anyone. "What sort of play is
it'"
"An Aderassi Commedia."
"Well, it could've been a pastoral." Thomas drained the tankard.
"Oh, there's this. I'd forgotten." Lucas picked up a leather dispatch case
from a pile along the wall and tossed it onto the table. It was stuffed with
papers.
Thomas looked at it without enthusiasm. "What's that'"
"The King's Watch sent it over. It's some writings and copies of documents
from Grandier's heresy trial in Bisra."
"You're joking," Sitting up, Thomas pulled out the papers and thumbed through
the pages of faded script. "How did they get it?"
"A Viscondin monk who was travelling in Bisra attended the trial. He asked one
of the officiating priests if he could copy the documents, and they allowed
it. None of it was considered secret, or important, apparently. The King's
Watch said it wouldn't be of any use, but they know how you are about these
things so they sent it along."
As Lucas left, Thomas spread out the papers. The Viscondin Order was one of
the few brotherhoods that could still cross the border to Bisra freely. The
Church of Ile-Rien and the Church of Bisra had declared ecclesiastical war on
each other when the bishops of Ile-Rien decided against purging the
countryside of the pagan Old Faith. The Bisran Inquisition had started its
persecution of sorcerers at about the same time, and the Church of Ile-Rien's
objections to it had caused Bisra to outlaw most of the independent religious
orders.
The Viscondin monk had copied the court documents in the original Bisran.
Thomas could read Low Bisran, but not the elaborate High Script used for their
official documents. He doubted the monk had been able to either, and the
King's Watch had probably not bothered. He sorted the unreadable documents
aside to send to the palace clerks for translation.
It was clear even from the monk's crabbed notes on the evidence that Grandier
had been a victim. The nuns' testimony
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
65
had been confused and contradictory, and the details of how Grandier had
enchanted them were vague at best; if they had brought such charges in
Ile-Rien a magistrate would have had them all hauled off to gaol for false
witness and wasting the time of a law court. According to the monk, one nun
had even tried to recant her testimony but the judges had refused to hear her.
Grandier had been tortured with fire, the choking-pear, and the other devices
the Inquisition used to obtain confessions of heresy. Despite this the
sorcerer had refused to confess, and had been sentenced to the question
ordinary and extraordinary. He had been subjected to both strappado, having
been hoisted by his bound arms and dropped to a stone floor, and squassation,
during which the executioner had attached heavy weights to the victim's feet,
then hoisted and dropped him to within a few inches of the floor until limbs
had been dislocated. The scars would be visible on his face, his hands. Even
if he's healed himself, he can't conceal that kind of injury. It would be a
miracle if he could straighten his back or walk without limping, Thomas
thought.
Grandier disappeared from his cell a few weeks after his torture. A month
later the priest who had brought the original complaint died insane. Within
another month the bishop who headed the Inquisitorial Committee followed him.
The witch-pricker, who had probably falsified the demon marks he had reported
finding on Grandier's body during torture, died later in "terrible delirium,"
as the monk described it. The account ended there, before the plague and the
other horrific disasters now attributed to the outlaw sorcerer.
If he wasn't working dark magic before the trial, Thomas thought, he is now.
The afternoon at the Mummer's Mask passed slowly as the tavemkeepers recovered
from the night before and the acting troupe prepared for the night to come.
Baraselli and his assistants sat at a big round table on the tavern's main
floor arguing over which characters they would use tonight, while the
66
MARTHA WELLS
actors lounged nearby feigning disinterest. Shafts of sunlight from the
cracked windows glittered off the dust in the air and the various
paraphernalia of the stage that had been hauled out for inspection.
Silvetta, the actress who played one of the heroines, said, "What did you say
your name was?" to the woman who had been hired for the Columbine mask.
There was a moment of hesitation before the woman answered, "It's Kade." She
was sitting on top of one of the wine-stained tables, her legs folded beneath
her skirt in a position that most women of better breeding would have found
difficult if not impossible. The playing cards she shuffled ^ere a tattered
pack belonging to the tavern.
"Really? Don't tell Baraselli." Silvetta shuddered, rolling her eyes in a
gesture better suited for the stage. "Bad luck, ill omens, that's all he talks
about. But they don't give children that name here anymore, do they? Except in
the country. Are you from the country?"
"Yes."
"When did you learn Commedia?"
"I travelled around with one for a while and learned the Columbine mask. That
was after I got out of the convent," Kade told her.
"Why were you in a convent'"
"My wicked stepmother sent me there."
"Oh, you're telling me a tale." Personal questions out of the way, she said,
"Do my fortune again."
"I doubt it's changed any in the past hour."
"You can't tell; it might have."
"You can tell," Kade said, but began to lay out die cards for the fortune
anyway.
Corrine, the other heroine, appeared out of one of the back rooms carrying two
dresses visible only as tumbled confections of sparkled fabric and lace. "What
do you think, this blue or that blue?"
Both women paused to give the matter serious consideration. "That one,"
Silvetta said finally.
THE ELEMENT Of FIRE
67
"I think so," Kade agreed.
"What are you wearing?" Corrine asked her.
Kade suspected she was anxious to make sure she wasn't going to be outshone by
the woman playing her maid. With a shrug of one shoulder, Kade indicated the
loose red gown she wore over the low-necked smock and said, "This.11
"You can't wear mat," Silvetta objected.
"I'm playing a maid." She laughed. "What else should I wear?"
The free fortune-telling had won Silvetta over completely. She said, "At least
let me curl your hair."
Kade ran a hand through tine limp hair that the dusty sunlight was temporarily
transforming into spun gold. Ordinarily she considered it the color of wheat
suffering from rotting blight. "With an iron?"
"Of course, you goose, what else?"
"I hate that."
Corrine draped the gowns over a chair and said, "The thing to do is to attract
attention to yourself. There's plenty of men there, gentlemen, lords, wealthy
men, on the lookout for mistresses. Of course, it's not often you can get
something permanent, you understand, but it's worth a go."
"Really?" Kade asked, her tone a shade too ingenuous, but not so much so that
the other two women suspected subtle mockery.
"Much better than an actor," Silvetta said, and jerked her head in the
direction of the tavern entrance. The actor who played the Arlequin stood
there talking to one of the tavern-keeps, having just come in from the street.
He was darkly handsome, clean-shaven after die current fashion in Adera, and
didn't look at all like the other actors who played clowns.
After a moment, Kade said, "How well do you know him?"
Silvetta answered, "He's new. Baraselli hired him last month when the other
Arlequin died."
"Was he an old man?"
"Oh, no, all our clowns are young. He died of a fever. It was very bad luck."
68
MARTHA WELLS
The Arlequin had glanced in their direction, and seemed to be staling at Kade.
Corrine, who apparently had only one thought in her head, grinned and said,
"He likes you."
But Kade, who could read wolfish contempt in those dark eyes, snorted and
said, "Hardly," and by sleight of hand managed to insinuate the card for
future wealth into Silvetta's fortune.
Thomas had spent the afternoon checking on the progress of the inquiries he
had set in motion last night, but the King's Watch had made little headway so
far. He had wanted to sound out Galen Dubell on the subject of his one time
student Kade Carrion, but last night hadn't seemed the right moment after the
sorcerer's rescue from three harrowing days as Urbain Grandier's prisoner.
Galen Dubell had moved into the late Dr. Surete's old rooms, and Thomas found
him there when the afternoon sun was glowing through the windows and filling
the high-ceilinged room with light. The old Court Sorcerer had needed this
room when his eyes had started to fail; the multipaned windows in the west
wall took full advantage of the daylight. Gold-trimmed bookshelves covered the
other walls and a globe still shielded by its protective leather cover stood
in the corner. The rest of the furniture was buried under piles of more books
and a fine layer of dust.
When the servant led Thomas into the room, Dubell looked up from his writing
desk and smiled. "Captain." He was wearing a battered pair of gold-rimmed
reading spectacles and open books were spread out on one side of the partners
desk Dr. Surete had once shared with his assistant Milani.
Thomas said, "I wanted to thank you for what you did for my man last night. He
would have died if you hadn't healed him."
"You are welcome, but I don't think that is the only thing you came to speak
about. Please be direct."
Well, well. Thomas leaned on a bookshelf and tipped his
THE ELEMENT OF Hftf
69
plumed hat back, finding himself more amused than discomfited. Directness was
not something one encountered often at court. "We've had a message from an old
acquaintance of yours. His Majesty Roland's half sister Kade."
"So that is it." Dubell took off his spectacles and tapped them thoughtfully
against the carved arm of his chair. For the first time he looked like a young
man who had gradually grown old rather than the model of an aged
wizard-scholar who had sprung fully formed out of the fertile ground at Lodun
University. "Indeed, I know Kade."
"She was your apprentice."
"Not quite. I was the first to show her the uses for the talent she already
had. A mistake I have already paid for. Ten years is a long time to be
banished from the city of one's birth." He shook his head, dismissing the
thought. "But you have had a message from her?"
"Yes. It seems to suggest she's about to pay a visit."
"In person? That is odd. She usually sends tricks disguised as gifts, doesn't
she?"
"If you can call them that." Kade's tricks ranged from the dangerous to the
ridiculous. The goblet that no adulterer could drink from had provided some
embarrassing and humorous moments for the entire court. A gift of a necklet
that, once clasped, contracted and cut the wearer's head off had been
considerably less entertaining. The ancient knight who had arrived last
midwinter with his beheading game had been one of the most frightening but the
least substantive. Of course, Renier had fallen for it like a sack of rocks
off a wall. It had taken the Preceptor of the Albon Knights off on a two-month
quest that was notable for its pointiessness and not much else. Presumably the
fay sorceress had watched from a distance, laughing her own head off. When
violent, Kade was about as subtle as a thrown hammer; when devious, she still
preferred to sign her name to the deed. As an enemy Thomas would have
preferred Kade over Urbain Grandier; she, at least, was a known danger. "Could
she be coming to see you?" he asked Dubell.
70
MARTHA WELLS
The sorcerer got to his feet and went toward one of the windows that looked
out on the Rose Court five stories below. Thomas followed him. The stone paths
below formed gray rivers among islands of small red and white fall roses. On
one of those shaded rivers were a gallant and a court lady, standing close
together in conversation. There was something furtive in the turn of the
woman's head that spoke of an assignation. They couldn't know they were being
watched by the Captain of the Queen's Guard and the man who would probably be
made Court Sorcerer sometime in the next few months, but in the palace someone
was always watching.
After a moment Dubell said, "Kade could have seen me more easily at Lodun. Why
should she wait until now?"
"I can't answer that, Doctor. She's only half human and I don't understand why
she does anything." No one had been able to answer the question "why" when
Kade's mother appeared at court twenty-five years ago to captivate the old
king Fulstan. No one had known she was Moire, a great queen in her own right
from one of the multitude of fayre kingdoms that hid under ancient barrows,
deceptively deep lakes, or the disappearing islands that lay off the southern
coast. She had held Fulstan's attention constantly, day and night, for one
year before departing and leaving behind her a baby daughter like a forgotten
piece of baggage and a man who was far worse a king than he had ever been
before.
Dubell had a way of seeming to pick up on someone else's train of thought. He
said, "I remember her mother. I was a young man then. The King's Company was
performing The Fortunate Lands and suddenly she was there, dressed in black
and her jewels like stars. The Queen of Air and Darkness." He picked up a book
from the window ledge and absently added it to a stack on a nearby chair. "A
wiser man might have seen a potential danger in Kade. The fay who appear the
most human are often more changeable and vindictive than their monstrous
brethren. But I saw only an isolated child with the first stirrings of real
power and the wit and the will to use it I admit I have never felt guilty,
Captain. I gave her only an
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
71
elementary tutoring in the craft. If I hadn't, she would have found someone
else. I'm sorry for what she has done with the knowledge since then, but I
assume no responsibility for it." He looked back at Thomas seriously. "I
suspect that may be lese-majeste."
"Perhaps, but it's a mild form of it." Compared to most of what goes on here.
"And we do need your help." He was sure Dubell realized that until another
court sorcerer could arrive he had them over a barrel, and Thomas was curious
to see if the old scholar would come out and admit it.
Dubell shook his head. "I took a vow of fealty when I first came here years
ago. Whatever differences of opinion have arisen since then can have no
bearing on it."
The old sorcerer stood there watching the garden below, his stooped shoulders
revealing his bone-weary exhaustion. Galen Dubell spoke so freely it made
suspicion difficult, even for someone in whom suspicion was a deeply ingrained
habit. And how many times does a man have to swear undying loyalty before you
have to take him at his word? Thomas thought. At least until events prove
otherwise.
The couple in the court below had moved somewhere out of sight. Dubell asked,
"Has anything been heard of Gran-dier?"
"No, not so far. He's not going to be so easy to find again. You haven't
remembered anything else you heard that might hint of his plans?" Thomas asked
without much hope. They had gone over all this exhaustively last night on the
way back to the palace.
"No, I saw and heard very little of anyone. A thing to be glad of, since I
expect that is why they allowed me to live."
"I don't know. This is a very complex game he's playing."
Dubell nodded. "So it is," he agreed. "So it is."
With winter on the way, the days were growing shorter, but as night dropped
over the city on this particular day, Thomas felt he had done a great deal and
gotten absolutely no results for any of it. As he leaned on the balustrade of
the Queen's
72
MARTHA WELLS
loggia and repeated to his young lieutenant Gideon the last message from the
King's Watch commander, he was even more convinced of it.
One of the roofed terrace's walls was open to the night and to a view of the
park and the river canal where it ran for a time within the towering bulk of
the palace's outer curtain wall. Paintings on oiled silk hung from the edge of
the roof, rippling slightly in the sharp coolness of the evening breeze.
"They've lost Grandier's trail completely," Thomas told Gideon. Both were
dressed in dark brocades for court, with lace at collars and cuffs and
overlapping their top boots. Thomas wore Ravenna's signature color of red in
the ribbons on his sleeves and his sword knot. "Which isn't surprising at this
point. He was here secretly long enough to establish that house; he could have
bolt holes all over the city by now."
"That's not very encouraging," the lieutenant said with a rueful expression.
One of Gideon's duties was the command of the group of Queen's guards that
formed Queen Falaise's escort, and he had been attending to her most of the
day instead of participating in the more exciting search for Gran-dier.
"That's an understatement." Thomas watched the breeze ripple the surface of
the canal. Gideon had been Falaise's lover for the past month, and he wondered
if the younger man realized that he knew it. Thomas hoped it didn't become
awkward. I've known Him since he was a boy, he thought. I'd hate to have to
kill him. Muted music and laughter drifted up the graceful staircase to the
loggia. The open doors in the archway below led into the entrance hall of the
Grand Gallery where the night's entertainment for the court was being staged.
Thomas said, "Grandier's playing with us. I think he wanted us to find him the
first time, and the question of why isn't an easy one." He shook his head.
"I'll have to talk to the King's Watch commander again tonight."
"Yes. Well, there's one other thing." Gideon lowered his voice. "My lady
Falaise wants to see you. I know what you've said about that, Captain, and I
have put her off, but. . ."
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
73
"I'll take care of it." You'd think the woman didn't have any sense of
self-preservation, he thought. Thomas was trying to avoid giving Queen Falaise
an opportunity to make him any offers he would be honor-bound to tell her
mother-in-law Ravenna about. "Who is she with at the moment'"
"Aristofan, he calls himself." Gideon grinned. "His real name is Semuel
Porter."
"Which one is he?"
"The pimply one."
"They're all pimply, Gideon."
"The pimply one with the red hair." He hesitated. "Braun's coming this way."
Thomas looked around. Dr. Braun, dressed for court in.a black velvet scholar's
gown, was gesturing erratically at them from the landing below the loggia. "He
seems to have something on his mind," Thomas said.
Gideon looked down at the young sorcerer with thinly veiled contempt. "He
nearly got Gaspard killed fumbling around with the wards at that
wizard-house."
"Then perhaps it will offset all the times that Gaspard has nearly gotten
himself killed. Go on back to Falaise. See if you can tactfully encourage her
to show up for court."
"Sir," Gideon saluted and headed for the stairway leading to the upper levels
and Thomas went down to meet Dr. Braun.
"I have something I need to discuss with you," the sorcerer said hurriedly as
Thomas reached him.
Dr. Braun was worried, and his normal hangdog expression had given way to a
look of frightened intelligence. Thomas found himself asking seriously, "What
is it?"
"Captain!" The voice hailed him from the arched entrance to the Grand Gallery.
Hell, it's Denzil, Thomas thought. He told Braun, "If it can't wait, tell me
quickly."
Braun hesitated, his nervous eyes on the approaching Denzil. "It can wait," he
said. "I'll come to the Grand Gallery later."
"Are you sure?"
74
MARTHA WELLS
"Yes." The young man began to sidle uneasily away.
"Very well."
Braun nodded and all but bolted out of the entrance hall.
Thomas went to join Denzil.
The Duke of Alsene's father had been a wastrel and little better than a border
bandit who managed to lose most of the family properties by the time of his
death. Denzil had inherited the Duchy of Alsene at age eight, surrounded by a
large family of grasping and impoverished noble relatives. Seven years later
when he had come to court and captured Roland's favor, all those properties
had been restored, and he had been made generous gifts of land, court offices,
and the incomes that came with them. Now he had his own cadre of debauched and
worthless young nobles, and he encouraged them to plot and spread rumors and
otherwise annoy Ravenna, even though two of his foolish friends had gone too
far, and died for it on the Traitor's Block outside the city. Ravenna was
continually balked by his influence over Roland, and if Den-zil's family had
deliberately trained him for the part he played now, they couldn't have done
better.
"I've heard some unpleasant rumors about the crown's intentions toward my
manor at Bel Garde, Captain," Denzif said, adjusting the set of his gloves and
deliberately not looking at Thomas. The King's cousin was the mirror of the
perfect courtier. His blond hair was curled to perfection, his beard perfectly
trimmed, his handsome features unscarred by the ravages of battle, work, or
time, his amber doublet trimmed with aglets and his gold-embroidered breeches
die height of fashion. That might be part of the attraction Denzil had for
Roland; the King had always been an awkward boy. "Perhaps you can put me right
on it."
"I would be happy to put you right, my lord," Thomas said easily.
At tfiat the Duke's eyes lifted to meet his, cold blue and opaque, and very
much at odds with the pettiness he was affecting. After a moment he smiled
ingenuously. "I've heard
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
75
that a cavalry officer thinks my manor there is some sort of a threat."
That was enough to tell Thomas that Denzil already knew all and was only
trying to bait him. Bel Garde was built around a fortified tower overlooking
the city. In die last century it had withstood a two-year siege and it would
make an ideal staging area for an attack on the city wall. That Denzil should
be owner of such a valuable and potentially dangerous property was a sore
point with the older nobility and particularly 'Ravenna. Thomas silently
damned whoever had let slip their plans to the young Duke and said, "It isn't
a manor, Sir. It's a fortress, and in violation of the edict against private
fortifications." The edict helped discourage rebellious nobles, but Roland had
managed to avoid the issue of Denzil's property at Bel Garde for the past
year. He had finally given in to Lord General Villon's diplomatic prodding,
but the difficulty had lain in keeping it from Denzil until they could get a
signed warrant from Roland.
"Who has said this?"
"Lord General Villon, the commander of the siege engine cavalry."
"He's a fool."
"It is possible he was misled by the moat and the crenellated walls."
Denzil fingered one of the tawny stones set into the cup hilt of his rapier,
apparently trying to decide if the mockery was worth taking issue with or not
Thomas knew the gesture for an empty one, perhaps put on for the benefit of a
group of courtiers now crossing the foyer to the gallery behind them: Denzil
was a superb duelist, but Thomas couldn't challenge him because of his loyalty
oaths to the royal family. Denzil could initiate a challenge himself, but
despite provocation, he seemed to be saving it for a time when Thomas was
badly wounded or on his deathbed. Denzil finally said, "And so he will destroy
it'"
"Only fill in the moat and tear down the walls. The estate
76
MARTHA WELLS
itself will be better for it in die long run. I'm told by those who should
know that it presents a golden opportunity to extend the park and put in
formal gardens."
Denzil's expression suggested this was the equivalent of prostituting one's
children. He said, "Surely this plot did not originate with the King."
"This edict has been posted in the Council Chamber for two years and a great
many lords have already submitted to it. I would hardly call it a plot, Sir."
Denzil gestured that logic away. "You would not call it so, Sir," he said
stiffly. "I would like to know why you are my enemy, Sir, and despise me so."
It was one of Denzil's best tactics with Roland; he could turn any mild
criticism into a personal attack on himself. Thomas said, "I suppose if I ever
gave you any thought, I might despise you, Sir, but I can't imagine
circumstances in which I would be compelled to give you any notice at all."
The expression of artificial indignance in Denzil's eyes hardened to real
anger, and for a moment Thomas was hopeful, but the young Duke was only
foolish about things that endangered other people's lives, not his own, and
the moment passed.
"We will see, Sir," Denzil said softly.
Thomas waited until the Duke had vanished through the main doors of the Grand
Gallery before starting down the steps after him. Denzil couldn't have gotten
wind of the plans for Bel Garde any time before diis afternoon, at the
earliest, or he would have confronted Roland about it when he saw him this
morning. Wager then that Denzil had approached Thomas impulsively. Wager then
also that he would approach Roland sometime tonight, instead of waiting for a
private audience, in the hopes of provoking Ravenna into an unflattering and
public argument with the King,
Walking through the oversized double doors of the archway was like walking
into a wall of sound. The combination of the music from the musicians'
galleries above the raised dais and die babble of conversation noisily echoed
off the high
THE ELEMENT Of FIRE
77
sculpted contours of die ceiling and shivered die rock-crystal chandeliers.
The room was so immense that what Thomas knew to be a large crowd appeared
sparse. Visiting nobles, courtiers, ministers, and wealthy merchants invited
out of courtesy or political necessity milled in large groups around the bases
of the marble-sheathed columns, the orange trees potted in silver tubs, or the
fountains running witii wine.
Thomas made his way through the crowds toward the dais, occasionally greeting
an acquaintance, hi the center of the room, the play had just started on a
raised plank stage with wooden classical columns and a painted backdrop of an
Aderassi marketplace. A gaudily dressed Pantalone with a pointed beard and a
mask with a long hooked nose was in loud mock argument with a grotesque
Pulchinella with a humped back, protruding stomach, and a high peaked cap.
Some of the crowd were even paying attention to it.
Cisternan guards were stationed at all the entrances to the gallery, though
they were armed only with swords. The Queen's Guard and the Albonate Knights
were permitted to carry firearms in the royal presence at court, but no one
else.
The polished-stone dais supported the three chairs of state for Ravenna,
Falaise, and Roland. Roland was surrounded by his servants and a few courtiers
who had been called up to speak to him. An Albon knight stood guard at his
back. Next to him Falaise s chair was empty.
Ravenna was firmly established on the opposite side of the dais from her son.
Four guards were gathered near her and a lady-in-waiting sat on a stool at her
side.
Thomas swept off his hat and bowed to Roland who was hidden behind his wall of
servants and hangers-on, to Falaise's empty chair as a matter of form, and to
Ravenna, who smiled down at him. As he climbed the dais, the guard nearest her
caught his signal and stepped out of earshot. Thomas kneeled beside Ravenna's
brocaded chair and said, "There's news."
Ravenna put her sewing down. "Elaine dear, come and stand in front of me,
there's a good girl. Here, wind diis thread back on the spindle." The young
woman's full skirt, puffed
78
MARTHA WELLS
sleeves, and wide plumed hat effectively shielded them from curious eyes.
"Denzil knows about the plans for Bel Garde. It's likely he'll confront Roland
about it tonight. You know what will happen," Thomas told Ravenna.
"Villon's been working on Roland about this for the past two months. He said
he'd give the order." She shoved her sewing into her satchel and started to
stand.
Thomas said, "Don't."
She stopped, looking down at him, her hands white-knuckled on the arms of her
chair.
"Roland won't listen to you. Or worse, he'll do the opposite."
"He will do what I ..."
"Face it, Ravenna; it's a fact."
She sat back down with a thump. "Damn Denzil to hell. Damn you to hell. Hand
me that fan, Elaine. Oh, don't cringe so, child; I'm not angry with you, am
I?" She fanned herself rapidly, the delicate silk construction somehow holding
up under the pressure of her grip. "I want you to kill Denzil, Thomas."
"Fine. Is now soon enough? I believe I can hit him from here if Elaine would
step out of the line of fire."
"No, no. I'll get him eventually. I'll think of something. You'll think of
something; it's your duty."
"My duty is protecting you and Falaise."
"Damn Falaise to hell. What I mind most is that DenziTs making a fool of the
boy. Treating him like a puppy to be petted or kicked as the mood takes him.
God, I hate that."
Thomas didn't answer.
She twisted the fen between her fingers, then extended it with a snap. "Well?"
she asked softly.
"Send the order tonight. Tell them to start a breach in Bel Garde's curtain
wall."
She hesitated.
"There was a mistake. You thought Roland had signed the warrant, or was about
to sign it. You sent the order yesterday."
TH! ELEMENT OF FIRE
79
"Ah." She bit her lip thoughtfully and the fan's motion slowed. "I will order
them to stop work immediately when I realize what an unfortunate mistake has
been made. I will be properly apologetic. I will repair it with my own funds."
Thomas waited, watching her as she thought it over. A breach in a supporting
section of the curtain wall would be difficult to repair, especially with
gentle mismanagement, and could be made to buy them at least six months. It
would also keep General Villon, who was away with his troop at the moment,
from being compromised.
"It will do," Ravenna said. "Elaine, find me that lapdesk, please."
As the girl brought the flat wooden box with the ink bottle and pen set,
Thomas noticed the crowd around Roland had cleared and one of the stewards was
presenting Dr. Galen Dubell to the King. As the old sorcerer bowed deeply
Roland said, "Come up here, Sir, and tell me how things are at Lodun."
Roland had wanted to go to Lodun or the smaller university farther off in
Duncanny, but Ravenna had needed him here during her regency, and before that,
Fulstan had refused to even let the boy make a progress there to see the
place. It couldn't have hurt, Thomas thought as Ravenna's pen scratched across
the parchment. He'd have tired of it in a few months, but it would have made
him happy. God knows, they might even have been able to teach him something.
Roland resembled his father, with his curling brown hair and blue eyes, but
his features were a good deal more delicate. The King's servants would never
have let him out of his rooms looking anything other than immaculate, but he
still managed to look incongruous in his cloth-of-gold slashed doublet, and
the lace of his falling band was beginning to turn.
Galen Dubell climbed the dais and took a seat on the stool a servant whisked
into place for him. Roland asked a question and the sorcerer's answer made him
laugh. Thomas looked over the crowd for Denzil and spotted him in deep
conversation with a man he didn't recognize. Denzil's companion had
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MARTHA WELLS
dark hair and sharp features, and though he was dressed in the heavy brocades
of court finery, he was obviously ill at ease. That might not be due to the
lofty company: most of the city's monied class was here, bringing with them
all die rivalries and old scores that wanted settling. But something about the
way he was standing, the way he turned his head, made Thomas think he was
observing the crowd and the room with particular care.
If this was some new advisor of Denzil's, he hadn't been in the last report.
And if the spies paid to watch Denzil were taking bribes to leave out certain
details, then there were going to be a few new heads adorning the spikes on
the Prince's Gate come morning. But in that case, surely the man wouldn't
casually wander into a court function. He might be onfy an acquaintance,
Thomas thought. But Denzil seemed to draw all of his acquaintances into his
plots eventually.
Then Denzil broke off die conversation and started toward the dais. "Here it
comes," Thomas said quietly to Ravenna.
When the Duke of Alsene bowed in die Dowager Queen's direction she smiled
sweetly back at him and nodded graciously.
The steward caught Roland's attention unobtrusively and stepped aside as
Denzil bowed.
Roland said, "Welcome, cousin." He looked pitifully glad to see the older man.
With just the right amount of theater Denzil said, "Your Majesty, my home is
in danger."
Caught by surprise, Roland said, "You told me your home was here."
Thomas winced. Roland's reply had the distinctive sound of a lovers' quarrel
rather than a sovereign dressing down a lord, and die courtiers near the dais
were growing quiet to listen.
Denzil recovered smoothly. "It is, Your Majesty. I was speaking of my home at
Bel Garde."
"General Villon has spoken to me about it. It's in violation of my edict
because the walls are greater than twelve feet in
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
81
height." Roland shifted uncomfortably. "They will be careful of the
surrounding land, and it will improve the view."
"Your Majesty, it is my ancestral home. Its walls have defended our family for
generations, and are a symbol of my allegiance to your crown."
"I will give you another manor in compensation. There is an estate at
Terrebonne that ..."
"My cousin, it is Bel Garde that concerns me." The carefully calculated
interruption, the appeal in his expression, were all part of the deliberate
assertion of his personality over the younger man's.
Thomas could see Roland waver. The King said, "You are a trusted councilor."
Denzil bowed again. "There is none more loyal than I, my cousin, and I need
Bel Garde to defend that loyalty."
Then Galen Dubell, forgotten at the King's side, said something to Roland. The
King looked at him a moment.
Denzil caught a hint of something that worried him. Almost too sharply he
said, "What was that, Sir?"
Roland said, "It is an interesting point. Why do you need the fortress, Sir,
when you are under my protection?"
There was a tension in Roland's voice mat quieted die rest of the
conversations around the dais and stopped Ravenna's pen. Denzil hesitated,
staring at die young King. Then he made a gracious bow. "I need it... to
present it to you, Sire."
There was a moment's silence as the surrounding courtiers digested that, then
a polite murmur of congratulations and applause. "Oh, how delightful," Ravenna
exclaimed loudly.
"I accept it, Sir," Roland said happily. "I'll have my best architect put in
magnificent gardens, and then I will return it to you."
There was more applause. Ravenna folded the half-written order and handed it
to Thomas. "I shall like Bel Garde a great deal with a new formal park."
Thomas dropped the paper into a nearby brazier. "You'll like it even better
with your troops all over it."
BEHIND THE WOODEN backdrop
of the stage, in the small actors' area curtained off from the glories of the
gallery by dusty velvet drapes and a canopy, confusion reigned.
Ignoring die outcries and exclamations from the actors and clowns rushing
around in the lamp-lit gloom and musty heat behind her, Kade had enlarged a
hole in one of die dark blue curtains and was looking out at the rear of the
gallery. The back wall was mostly paned glass, its windows looking out onto
the terraces and A wide expanse of garden designed to provide a harmonious
view.
She remembered dial garden, though she could see little of it now through the
glare of candlelight on window glass and the darkness beyond. She could have
pointed to the stand of sycamore trees, or the hill widi its classical ruins
carefully constructed to look aged and abandoned. She had expected to remember
the palace, but she had not expected its sights, textures, and scents to press
in on her in such an overpowering way. The walls were stained with powerful
auras of old battles, old anger, love, pain. They hummed with die reve-nants
of die emotions and magics of long-dead sorcerers. She had left her own marks
here, somewhere. She was not pleased at the idea of coming upon one of them
suddenly.
Here Kade had learned her first real sorcery from Galen Dubeil. He had taught
her High Magic, with its slow painstaking formulas that used alchemy and the
powers of die astral bodies to understand and compel the forces dial governed
the
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
83
universe. Galen had been an excellent teacher, his instruction touching on
everything from the simplest healing charms to the architectures of the Great
Spells that eventually took on lives of their own. When he was banished for
that teaching, she had been sent to the Monelite Convent, where she had
learned about herbal poisons and the Low Magic of witchcraft from the village
women. Later she had learned what she could of fay magic from her mother, but
her human blood kept her from shape-changing and practicing many of the other
skills that came so easily to the fay. It had been Galen's teaching that had
enabled her to survive. Human sorcery was painstaking and slow, but powerful,
using numbers, symbols, carved stones, music, and other tools to explain the
unexplainable, to control and direct the astral forces the fay only played
with.
/ shouldn 't have come back, Kade diought. Somewhere between here and the
Mummer's Mask, her courage had fled, leaving her to pick up the pieces of her
plan alone. Not that it was a good plan to begin with. She felt an
overwhelming desire to discard it and stay with Baraselli's acting troupe for
a few weeks. The gods of the wood knew the actors could use the help. Only one
tiling stopped her.
/ might be able to stand feeling tike a coward, but I can t tive with feeling
like this much of a fool. And it would be foolish to turn back when she had
come this far. But the more she thought about it, the more the idea of
returning to Knockma or Fayre with nothing solved and facing the same old
difficulties seemed worse than continuing on this course.
It had become apparent to her that she needed to go home, to the palace at the
heart of Ile-Rien, to face her past. To face her half brother Roland, to see
if it was really him she hated or the memories and the father he represented.
And perhaps to face Ravenna as well, to show the Dowager Queen what that
once-unlovely changeling fay child had become. To get her approval? Kade asked
herself suddenly. / bloody well hope not. She bit her lip, fingering the
frayed edge of the curtain. So it's either stay with BaraselU's troupe
forever, or go on with what I came to do, what I said I had to do, she
84
MARTHA WELIS
thought. A group of women passed by in front of the windows, the light
glittering on their satin gowns, gems, and starched lace collars, their
motions hampered by layers of underskirts, hip rolls, and fashionable puffed
sleeves. Perhaps I'll wait and see how the play does before I decide.
She turned back to the troupe's frantic clamor as Garin hopped through the
curtained stage doorway. He was immediately attacked by three other actors and
their helpers, who began to tear off his Pantalone costume and wrestle him
into the Brighella outfit. Kade picked the wig and cap off the floor and
handed it to them, trying not to get her fingers torn off by their frantic
grasping.
Baraselli peered through a gap in the backdrop. "Terrible," he moaned. "It
isn't going well at all."
"Damn it, man, I've done my best," Garin snapped, his voice muffled because
Uoshe was forcing a new shirt over his head. "If it isn't good enough, then
you get out there."
Unlike other theatricals, Commedia had no playbook for the actors to learn.
The plot was determined by the characters, and the actors learned only the
standard lines for one role and supplemented them by whatever jokes or local
gossip came to mind. Garin was doing the unfamiliar Brighella role more ad lib
than usual and using the standard lines only when he could remember them; it
was confusing everyone else terribly.
Garin had taken the extra role because the worst had happened. The Master of
Revels and the Cisteman guards who examined entertainers for the court had
refused to allow the clown who played Brighella entrance into the palace. The
clown had a cousin who was on a list of participants in an ill-fated Aderassi
independence revolt. The officials had been terrifyingly polite about the
whole thing, and Baraselli, suspecting them all to be magicians of the
blackest kind for knowing about it in the first place, had not dared to speak
even a word of protest.
In the prisonlike barrenness of the questioning rooms of the St. Anne's Gate
Guard House, the troupe had been kept waiting for hours. Partly, Kade knew, to
give those who had
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
85
reason to be nervous a chance to betray themselves, but mostly to allow the
clerks to look through the rolls of "undesirable" names that the King's Watch
endlessly compiled.
"And what's your name, darling?" the Cisteman guard had asked Kade when it
came her turn.
Kade knew the robed academician in the comer of the whitewashed questioning
room was a sorcerer, using spells to search out hostile magic. As the guard
asked her the question, Kade felt the sorcerer's spell settle over her like a
cold mist, invisible and intangible to anyone not trained in magic. It met the
masking spell she had prepared and set around herself hours earlier, then slid
across and away without friction. The sorcerer's second and third spells did
the same. He stopped there, just as her masking spell was beginning to fray on
the edges. He might have cast five or six spells and caught her out; Kade,
being Kade, had taken that risk. If the sorcerer had detected either her magic
or that she was fay, she would have thought of something else.
In answer to the guard's question, she had said, "Katherine of Merewatch. They
call me Kade, short for Katherine." Mere-watch was a hamlet: near the place
she made her home much of the time, and so it was factual enough not to set
off the truth spell that blanketed the whole room. It was a complex spell,
older than she was, as intricate and detailed as the inside of a Portier
clockwork toy. It had the combination of ruthless logic and artistry about it
that marked it as old Dr. Surete's work, and despite great temptation, she
decided not to tamper with it.
The guard stared at her a moment. She had a minor qualm, wondering if they had
really burned the only portrait of her, as Roland had claimed they had so long
ago. But the man only said, "You ought to change that, you know. Could make
trouble for you."
"But it's what my mum calls me."
"Your lookout then. And how's your mum's family called?"
"She didn't have one that I knew of. In Merewatch they called her Maira." Also
true; the deep northern brogue of the
86
MARTHA WELLS
Merewatch inhabitants rendered Moire as Maira. Kade sensed a faint tremor in
Surete's truth spell, but her statement was on that very narrow line of truth
and falsehood, and it didn't betray her.
Neither questions nor spells had shown anything odd about the actor who played
Arlequin, and that puzzled Kade.
She had suspected him of something, of what she wasn't completely sure, but
she knew the palace's protections to be good ones. She had gotten through them
with a substantial helping of fayre luck and the willingness to take a risk,
and she knew that having been born inside the wards had let her pass them and
any other traps Surete might have laid in that questioning room as well. It
didn't seem possible dial an ordinary human sorcerer could accomplish it.
Perhaps he's Just an ass, she thought, watching the Arlequin now in the
backstage confusion. He was sitting on a props box, watching the others with a
grin, cool and unaffected by the frantic activity.
Kade lifted her leather Columbine mask and wiped the sweat off her face. She
knew she should be going onstage again soon, but with all the Brighella
confusion, she couldn't tell if they were getting close to her part or not.
Possibly overwhelmed with relief at sighting the end of the play, the others
might skip her last entrance entirely.
Kade moved to where she could glimpse the front of the Grand Gallery through a
gap where the curtain met the stage's edge. There was a good view of the dais
from here.
If seeing the palace again affected her, it was even more of a shock to see
its inhabitants. Roland has changed—-for the worse, she thought. Worse still,
Ravenna hasn't changed at all. Despite the new gray in her red hair, the
Dowager Queen was still delicate, still lovely, and still ruthlessly
self-assured. And every woman at court was still hiding behind a fan while
following Thomas Boniface with her eyes. That Kade had joined in this pastime
enthusiastically as a child somehow did not make it any better. She had to
admit, at least in the privacy
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE     87
of her own thoughts, that while he was a touchy and arrogant bastard, he was
still well worth looking at.
She remembered deep-set dark eyes, and a remarkably ironic smile. He had long
been known as one of the jewels of the court, even when blond gallants were
more often in fashion. She watched him leave the dais and cross the crowded
gallery until he was out of her view. He must be nearing forty now, but the
years hadn't changed him much and there was only a little gray in that dark
hair. Don't be an even bigger fool than you already are, Kade told herself. He
and Ravenna had been made for each other.
Baraselli had given off moaning and was now racing around like a madman trying
to collect the props for the finish. He rushed up to Kade and thrust a gold
candelabrum at her. "Quick, hold this."
An instant later she realized it was gold paint over iron and dropped the
thing with a curse. It clanged on the tiled floor.
"What is it?" Baraselli cried out, with the same hysterical urgency he
would've shown if she'd fallen to the floor in a dead faint.
"I sprained a finger," she growled at him, tucking her smarting hands under
her armpits.
"A sprain? Oh god, it could've been your foot!" He grabbed up the candelabrum
and fled toward the stage with it.
Fayre luck, hell, Kade thought. She could hear Silvetta shouting at one of the
heroes and vaguely remembered she should be onstage for that.
She headed for the curtain. If she hadn't stood there like a dolt and held the
thing . . . The intensity of her magic could be affected for a short time.
When Queen Falaise entered with Aristofan, or Semuel Porter, on her arm, and
Lieutenant Gideon and the rest of her escort trailing her, Thomas had decided
it would be more politic at the moment to leave the dais and take a turn
through the
88
MARTHA WELLS
crowd. He also wanted to find Dr. Dubell, and caught up with him. as the
sorcerer was leaving the gallery.
They stood in one of the gracefully arched doorways at the opposite end of the
room, just far enough away from the milling groups of guests to be able to
hear each other.
"You may have made an enemy," Thomas told him.
"Possibly, but I certainly didn't intend to provoke all that." Dubell looked
back toward the dais, frowning a little.
Thomas leaned back against the curve of the archway and regarded him
thoughtfully. "What did you say to Roland?"
"Well, he asked me what I taught at Lodun besides sorcery, and I told him it
was debate and logic, and we spoke a bit about how orators use it. Then Lord
Denzil started his speech. Finally I couldn't contain myself. I said, 'It's an
invalid argument.' His Majesty said, 'What is?' and I said, 'He seems to be
claiming that he needs the fortress to protect you, but under landlaw of
course you're his protector.' The King quite liked that idea, I think." Dubell
shook his head, ruefully amused. "It's almost the right phase of the moon to
start the crucial work on the palace wards, and I'd hate to be distracted. At
Lodun we're all very experienced in how to give each other the cold shoulder
at dinner, but I've been away from court so long I'm out of practice dealing
with quarrels of this kind."
"The thing to do would be to bring it to my attention, at least in your case,"
Thomas said.
"Would it?" Dubell met his eyes seriously.
"It would."
"Then I will remember to do that. Goodnight, Captain."
Dubell left, and Thomas turned back into the gallery. He had never offered
either support or protection to anyone at court lightly, and he wasn't really
certain what had prompted him to do it for Galen Dubell. Except perhaps that
the old sorcerer had survived decades of court intrigues and still seemed to
have retained both his optimism and his honesty, and Thomas didn't want to see
that change. He looked back toward the dais where Denzil now sat at Roland's
feet, making
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
89
his King laugh at something, all ill feeling apparently forgotten. Apparently.
Thomas turned away from the dais and looked around for Dr. Braun, but if the
young sorcerer was here he was lost in the crowd.
The Commedia was almost over. Thomas hadn't paid much attention to it, except
to notice that it was a little better than the farces performed almost nonstop
for market-day crowds. This troupe had apparently altered its performance to
accommodate a more sophisticated audience. He stopped near the stage beside a
group of outland nobility to watch two of die clowns performing the climactic
sword duel. Instead of uncoordinated acrobatics that would have bored most of
their audience, with its connoisseur's appreciation of dueling, they did it in
exaggeratedly slow motion, allowing them to perform intricate moves that would
otherwise have been beyond them.
Thomas had also noticed the masked actress who was playing Columbine. She was
standing within about twenty feet of him on the opposite end of the stage from
the other actors and was the apparent instigator of the duel for some reason
that he assumed would make sense if he had seen the entire thing. With tousled
blond hair and a red dress that would have been more appropriate on a
disreputable wood nymph, she was hardly as glamorous as the two demure
heroines, but she had her tattered skirts kilted to the knee for the
acrobatics and undoubtedly had the most attractive legs.
Oddly, the actor playing the Arlequin was standing behind her in the shadow of
a painted scenery column, not quite off the stage but not on it enough to be a
part of the action. There was something in the man's stance that kept Thomas's
attention. The Arlequin seemed to be focused on the actress a few feet in
front of him, and not on the mock duel. His half-mask was dark and trimmed
with coarse false hair, with deep scarring wrinkles around its pinhole eyes
and snub nose. His brown baggy clothes were patched and torn, and there was a
bedraggled rabbit tail on the top of his cap. Then the Arlequin
90
MARTHA WELLS
took a half step forward and the air around his bare feet seemed to blur. The
shadows near the column were pooling around him as if their consistency were
solid.
Thomas turned and brushed past the spectators, heading toward the Qsternan
guard stationed at the nearest archway. He grabbed the guard's pike and said,
"Get Galen Dubell; get him now."
"Sir . . . ?"
"He should be on his way to the North Bastion. Tell him we're under attack.
And give me that."
This settled the Cisteman's hesitation at taking orders from another officer.
He surrendered the pike and slipped back out of the archway.
"What is it?" The Cisternan Commander Vivan was coming over from his post.
Thomas said curtly, "The actor playing the Arlequin is in the process of
transforming into something. Get ready to contain it or we're all going to be
dead."
Vivan looked toward the stage, startled, then headed toward the next Cisternan
guardpost at a run.
Thomas took the pike and started toward the Arlequin, ignoring the curious
stares. His pistols weren't loaded and there wasn't time to do it. He came up
behind the Arlequin at an angle, out of its line of vision. Through the breaks
in the scenery he saw more Cistemans moving up behind the stage. A murmur of
unease grew as the crowd saw the guards moving and began to sense something
wrong.
The change was so quick it was moments before the panic started. Suddenly the
Arlequin's exposed flesh was turning mottled and patchy and the actor's
leather mask and rough costume seemed to enlarge and meld with its face and
body. Then it was twice the size of the man it had been and its legs were
taking on the demon-shape of a goat's hindquarters.
A woman in the crowd screamed, and up on the stage the Columbine actress
whirled and saw the Arlequin just as the creature rocked forward to leap at
her. Not close enough yet to do anything else, Thomas threw the pike.
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
91
The weapon struck the Arlequin's arm, staggering it. Wailing, it jerked the
pike out and tossed it away, scattering yellowed bits of flesh.
The crowd and the actors were scattering in panic and the Cistemans were
fighting their way through the rush.
Trying to push past the panicked spectators himself, Thomas saw the Arlequin
strike one of the actors who hadn't fled quickly enough, slamming him through
the wooden backdrop. It pushed a column aside, knocking another actress down,
then charged the woman playing Columbine. Incredibly, she waited until the
last moment, then ducked out of the way and leapt off the stage. Its own
momentum carried the Arlequin to the end of the platform before it could stop
itself and turn.
Thomas broke free of the crowd and picked up the fallen pike. The Cisternan
guards were circling the stage, pikes levelled at the snarling creature.
Thomas moved to join them, noting that some of his own men were coming up to
help. He hoped Gideon was getting Ravenna and Falaise out of the gallery, but
he couldn't spare a look over his shoulder.
A shot went off from somewhere behind them, then another, echoing thunderously
against the marble facings, but the Arlequin wasn't affected. Thomas knew
there were some creatures of Fayre immune to gunfire and silently damned Galen
Dubell for not being here. The Arlequin made a darting motion at one of the
Cistemans, testing them. It seemed reluctant to face the pikes again. Thomas
shouted, "Steady, we can hold it"
He glanced sideways and saw the masked Columbine actress, a little to the side
and behind him, watching the Arlequin.
Everyone else with any sense had long since fled. "Get out of here," he yelled
at her.
She glanced at him and obligingly backed up a few steps. Madwoman, Thomas
thought.
Abruptly the Arlequin rushed forward, moving with sudden and blinding speed.
It slammed into two Cistemans,
92
MARTHA WELLS
knocking both men aside with a force that must have broken their necks, then
changed course and darted toward Thomas.
It caught the top of his pike before he could brace the butt against die
floor. He let go and dove out of the way. The Arlequin overshot and crashed
into a brandywine fountain in an explosion of plaster and brass pipes.
Dripping with brandywine, it struggled out of the debris and turned to come at
him again as he was rolling to his feet. A guard threw anether pike at the
creature and caught it a glancing blow as Thomas drew his rapier. The Arlequin
pounced forward and was almost on top of Thomas when he shoved the sword into
its chest.
The creature's forward motion against the rapier sent Thomas falling backward,
his back striking die hard floor, momentarily knocking the breath out of him.
Then the Ar-. lequin was straddling him, falling forward on top of him. Its
smell was foul, like rancid milk. Desperately he twisted die hilt and pushed,
the creature's own weight helping to drive the rapier through cartilage and
muscle. He fete the vibration through the hilt as the blade snapped, then the
Arlequin shrieked and leapt away from him.
Thomas scrambled back and got to his feet. One of the Cisternans tossed him a
sword, but the Arlequin had leapt backward onto the stage. At least die thing
was slowing down—and still dripping brandywine. Thomas glanced around and
spotted one of his men. "Martin, go get a torch."
The Arlequin paced around on the creaking wood of the stage, snarling at them.
As Thomas looked back he saw that the actress who had been struck down in the
first attack was on her hands and knees and trying to crawl toward the edge of
the stage. Before he could move to distract the Arlequin, it whirled and saw
her. She screamed and the Arlequin grabbed up a section of one of the painted
columns and hurled it at her.
Suddenly Columbine was on the stage and shoving die other woman out of the
way. The wooden missile hit her in the back and knocked her off the stage,
sending her crashing to the floor in a heap of splintered wood.
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
93
Damn it, Thomas thought. Damn brave madwoman. He looked around as Martin ran
up with the lit torch, a makeshift affair of a chair leg, a torn piece of
someone's underskirt, and lamp oil. Thomas took it and moved forward slowly.
The Arlequin shifted away, wary, ready to charge again.
Thomas's first thought was to lure it away from the wooden stage, knowing the
stone and marble facings in the rest of the room would give them time to put
die fire out. But he suspected the Arlequin s instinct would be to take as
many people with it as possible, and when it was racing around like a
monstrous torch, it would have plenty of opportunity.
In the pile of shattered wood, die Columbine actress moved. She pushed herself
up, shaking her head dizzily as her actor's mask fell away. Thomas was
thinking, She must Have a head as hard as a brick . . . Then she looked up and
saw the Arlequin just as it turned and saw her.
Instead of rushing her, it gave that wailing cry again. Thomas took the moment
of distraction to run forward and hud the torch.
He saw the actress struggling to her knees, her hands a flurry of motion.
Thinking it over later, he thought she had scraped up a handful of splinters,
spat on them, and tossed them at die Arlequin. They flew farther than their
weight allowed, blown by some invisible wind to scatter around the creature's
feet.
The torch struck the brandy-soaked fur on the Ariequin's chest, which caught
fire as if it had been dipped in pitch. The Arlequin wailed and battered at
die air around it, fighting an invisible wall. There was something containing
it, a hardening of the air that the heat of the flames shivered against.
The Arlequin was dissolving into a cloud of thick black smoke.(Its wails had
ceased and it was curling up like a roll of paper kindling. Thomas saw Dubell
arriving through the arched doorway leading from the long hall, and realized
the fight had lasted only a short time.
Actors and guests who had scattered around the room behind columns or
furniture began to emerge from hiding.
94
MARTHA WELLS
The guards were beginning to look around for wounded and dead. Thomas walked
slowly over to where the Columbine actress still sat in a pile of scrap wood.
She was watching the monster bum with a grin of undisguised triumph.
He already knew who she must be, but it still took him what seemed moments to
put together the direct gray eyes and the long straight nose with a forgotten
portrait in an upstairs hall, and with the wildness of the magic she had just
performed.
Kade looked up at him, met his gaze a moment, then winked.
THOMAS SAID, "MAY I congratulate you on a spectacular entrance?"
Looking up at him from the floor, the sorceress nodded. "It was one of my
best."
Dubell was at Thomas's side. The old sorcerer looked at what was left of the
Arlequin, at the destruction in the gallery, and down at Kade. "Was this your
doing?" His voice was incredulous.
For a moment her expression was that of a small boy caught stealing an apple.
"No." As she got to her feet Thomas saw there were wood chips in her hair from
the broken column die Arlequin had thrown at her. She looked defensive. "It
followed me here."
Thomas moved a few paces away from them. The Cister-nans and his own men were
scattered, collecting the wounded and the dead. There were still courtiers
milling around toward the end of the room. Now would be a terrible time for a
pitched battle.
Dubell met Kade's eyes a long moment, then he said thoughtfully, "Did it
really?"
"Well, in a way it did." She began to pull the splinters out of her hair. "But
it joined the troupe before I did, and I think it killed one of the clowns to
get a place. I would have stopped it sooner but I'd touched some iron, and it
took a bit to wear off."
Renier and a group of Albon knights burst in through the archway and started
toward them. The hide and sackcloth
96
MARTHA WELLS
coats they wore over the lace and velvets of court finery made them look like
ancient barbarians arriving to loot a city. Thomas went forward quickly to
stop Renier. "Let Dubeti handle her," he said in a low voice.
Renier signalled his knights to halt. "Who is she?"
"Kade Carrion."
"My God, we've got to . . ."
"No, if he can get us out of this without a bloodbath, we've got to let him
try."
The big knight considered a moment, then nodded tensely. "All right." He
signalled the other knights to move back.
Thomas nodded, thankful that while Renier wasn't a particularly brilliant
statesman, he wasn't a bloodthirsty idiot either.
"Did she cause all this?" Renier asked, looking around at the chaos in the
gallery.
Thomas glanced back at Kade and Galen Dubell. She was watching them to see
what they would do, wary and a little angry. Her brows were darker than the
pale blond of her hair, so the effect was that when she was looking at you,
you knew it. He thought about her leaping to push the other actress out of
danger and said slowly, "I don't think so."
Then Kade's eyes focused past them and her expression changed. Thomas followed
her gaze and swore. Roland stood in the archway the knights had come through.
Thomas said, "Renier ..."
"What?" The knight looked around and gasped, "Damn that boy." He sheathed his
sword and strode toward Roland, deliberately placing himself between the King
and the sorceress.
Thomas looked back toward Kade, aware that the other guards in the room had
held off on his order. He would have to decide what he minded more, dying or
behaving this stupidly.
Galen Dubell was watching Kade thoughtfully. With gentle firmness he said,
"Kade, don't."
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
97
She looked up at the older man, her eyes losing some of their intensity. "I
didn't come here to kill anyone—even him."
Renier, as Preceptor of the Albon Knights and the only man in Ile-Rien allowed
to touch the King without his permission, seized Roland's arm and hustled him
out of sight. Dubell watched as they disappeared, then turned a worried eye on
Kade. "Then why did you come here?"
She smiled. "For an audience with my dear brother, of course."
And that, Thomas thought, is not gothg to Help matters at all.
The gallery smelled of ash and sour wine. Many of the chandeliers and lamps
had gone out, throwing the upper half of the huge chamber into shadow. The
court had been dispersed, and Ravenna, Roland, and Falaise had retired to a
nearby solar with watchful guards. A breeze, created by an open door or window
somewhere up one of the long galleries, swept gently through the huge chamber,
lifting the heat and the stench for a moment.
"How long had he been with the troupe?" Thomas asked Baraselli.
The Aderassi actor-manager moaned and would have sunk to his knees again but
for the two Queen's guards who were struggling to hold him up. The Master of
Revels hovered worriedly nearby; it was on his responsibility the troupe had
passed the final check at the gate.
"No one's done anything to you, and no one will, if you just answer the
question." Thomas kept his voice mild, despite his growing irritation. It was
easier to question recalcitrant anarchists under torture than someone who was
so busy caving in he could hardly stay coherent enough to speak.
"Only a month. Only a month. I didn't know."
Dubell had moved quietly up behind the actor-manager. His lips moved
soundlessly for a moment, then he looked up at Thomas and nodded. Baraselli
was telling the truth.
"Who recommended him?" Thomas nodded to the guards,
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THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
99
who cautiously released their hold of the man and stepped back.
Baraselli swayed on his feet, but stayed upright. "It was his first mask, he
told me. He'd learned it from an old actor he lived near. He did it well, and
he came to us just after Derani died ..."
"Who was Derani?"
"He played the Arlequin until he died of fever."
Dubell asked, "What were the symptoms?"
Baraselli whipped around, staring up at the tall sorcerer in fear, but
something in Dubell's expression and mild demeanor calmed him and he said,
"He... His skin was hot to the touch, and his wife said he couldn't keep
anything down, not even water, and he had blood in his, pardon, piss, and . ..
We paid to have the apothecary in to him, but he just died."
"When was this?" Thomas asked.
"Last month. Well, a month and a fortnight ago."
Thomas looked up at Dubell. "About a month and a fortnight ago Dr. Surete's
assistant Milam fell down a stairway in the North Bastion and broke his neck.
A week after that Surete himself died of pleurisy. It came on suddenly, and by
the time anyone realized how serious it was, he was dead."
Dubell shook his head. He said, "It's the easiest of dark magics to bring
sickness, and the hardest to detect. It's simplicity itself to send a bookish
and uncoordinated young scholar down a staircase. If one has the stomach for
that sort of thing, of course." He nodded at Baraselli. "He's telling the
truth, and I doubt he can reasonably be held responsible for Kade's actions.
What will be done with him?"
Even without the confirmation of Dubell's truth spell, Thomas was inclined to
believe Baraselli. He'd observed enough people under stress to read the
sincerity in those hysterics. He told the Master of Revels, "Give'him his
money and tell him to take the others and go away."
Baraselli sobbed and tried to fall to his knees in thanks. The Master of
Revels gestured sharply to the Cisternans wait-
ing nearby, who intercepted the actor-manager in midgrovel and hauled him
away.
"It's either a hell of a coincidence, or a hell of a plot," Thomas said
quietly to Dubell.
The old sorcerer sighed. "There are no coincidences."
"I would have thought it difficult for a wizard to hex another wizard,
especially someone like Dr. Surete. He was the Court Sorcerer for two
decades."
"If a sorcerer is in fear for his Hie, he might test every object he is about
to touch with a sprinkle of gascoign powder or some other preparation that
reveals the presence of magic, but Surete and Milam were not in fear for their
lives. The spell could have come to them on anything—a forged letter
purporting to be from a friend, an apple sold to them by a street vendor . .
."
As Dubell stood lost in thought, Thomas watched the sorceress. Kade Carrion
was pacing around the remains of the stage which the servants were
dismantling. As she walked around the painted panels scattered on the floor
and the stacks of singed planks, he had two distinct impressions of her. The
first was that she was only a young girl with a tangled mop of hair and a
tattered red dress, not oblivious to the consternation she was causing but not
particularly worried by it either. The other was that here was a creature
ephemeral yet solid and real, who walked with the night and the wild hunt.
Dubell is the onfy one who realty knows her, Thomas thought. And even he isn
't certain what her game is now.
If she hated her brother and the rest of the royal family as much as she
claimed, she wasn't without motive. Their father Fulstan hadn't been much use
as a king: he had neither Ravenna's head for finance and diplomacy nor the
ability to listen intelligently to advisors who did. The fayre queen Moire had
drained him of what vitality and strength of character he possessed, leaving
him bitter and old before his time. He had taken out his anger at Moire's
abrupt departure on anyone in
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MARTHA WELLS
his reach, especially on Moire's daughter. No one directly in his power had
mourned his death.
Urbain Grandier, however, had no motive, at least not one that Thomas knew.
Kade might be in league with the Bisran sorcerer, but finding out what she
knew wasn't going to be easy.
Dubell was looking toward the place where what was left of the Arlequin had
burned down into a heap of some foul-smelling dark powder in the center of the
stage platform. "Be careful not to step in that black powder," he called to
the servants who were warily clearing away the debris. Then the old sorcerer
turned and saw Kade, whose curiosity had already led her ankle-deep into the
black powder. She lifted her head, surreptitiously rubbed a stained bare foot
against her calf and looked the other way. Dubell shook his head irritably.
The Albon knights had by now arrived in force. There were about forty of them
in the gallery now, guarding the arched doorways and the terrace windows,
pacing the musicians' balconies, and watching the sorceress. The rest of their
number were patrolling the palace with most of Thomas's men and the Cistemans.
Renier emerged from the wide oak door inset with panels of stained glass
behind the dais. It was the gallery entrance to the solar where the royal
family had retired to fight things out. He walked up to Thomas and said
softly, "Roland wanted to put her under arrest, but Ravenna has talked him out
of it Apparently she's in favor of giving the sorceress the audience she
wants, and trying to settle it quietly."
Thomas thought, Yes, Renter, tell me all about how the anointed King still
can't win an argument ivtth his mother. He said, "Really."
Renier either did not recognize the sarcasm or ignored it out of habit. "My
guess is diey"!! give her the audience."
"Very likely. I suppose, in the long run, it is better than going to war with
her in the middle of the palace, killing everyone who stumbles into the way."
THE ELEMENT OF Flftt
101
As Galen Dubell turned back to them, Renier asked him, "Could you tell what
that creature was?"
The old sorcerer nodded, gesturing back toward the ruin of the stage. "It
wasn't fay. It was a construction of wood and animal bone, animated by a very
powerful spell, called a golem. I'm not sure, but I imagine it was designed to
resist anything the weight and size of a pistol ball. It's a relatively new
technique which I believe will come in quite handy on the battlefield once
it's perfected. Doesn't do a thing for can-nonballs, though. The combination
of the weight and size . . ." Dubell recollected himself and shook his head.
"But that is neither here nor there."
"How did it get past die wards?" Thomas asked.
Dubell met his eyes frankly. "I've done some work with (hem, nothing that
should weaken them. They shouldn't have let this creature pass through. I
believe something has affected the wards to make the gaps their continual
movement creates larger, to make them appear in locations predictable to
someone. It would take an intimate knowledge of the construction of the wards,
at least as great a knowledge as Dr. Surete had, but it would be possible.
And, perhaps more disturbing, the spell that caused the golem to shape-change
from the appearance of a man to that of the creature we saw here would have to
be actuated by someone close at hand."
Slowly, Thomas said, "The sorcerer was here, in die gallery."
"Or an assistant, who carried in the charm designed to trigger the golem. I
have looked for Grandier's power-signature, but the ether in this room is free
of it." Dubell nodded to himself. "Yes, I believe it was only an assistant who
was here tonight."
"What a chance to take," Renier said. "There was a Parscen witehman who tried
to cause trouble last year. Surete said there was a disturbance in the wards,
and had some of us come with him while he tracked it to the source. We found
the witehman hiding in an empty house in the Philosopher's
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Cross, sitting on the floor and crying like a baby. Surete said he must have
tried to do a sending against someone in the palace, but the wards stopped it
and followed his magic back to him and took his mind away. We knew that he
tried something because he had more witch-poisons and hair amulets on him than
you can imagine, but it didn't help him at all."
Dubell's attention had gone back to Kade; his expression was worried. As well
it might be, Thomas thought. Had the golem been activated by a confederate of
Grandier's or by Kade herself? "Did she tell you why she wanted an audience
with Roland?" Thomas asked.
"No." Dubell was silent a moment. "Her abilities here, in the mortal world,
are not as great as when she is in Fayre, and it is difficult to fatally wound
her with anything other than a weapon of iron, but... It appeared the creature
was attacking her?"
"Yes," Thomas admitted.
"I hope so, for all our sakes."
The door to the solarium opened and one of the stewards emerged, looking
harried and somewhat the worse for wear. He hesitated, then approached Thomas
and Renier. He said, "His Majesty will see the sorceress now."
Thomas said, "Good. Go and tell her."
The steward blanched visibly.
"All right, all right."
As Thomas approached she looked up, a strange creature not at all like the
child he barely remembered, or the fifteen-year-old girl in the portrait. He
said, "His Majesty will see you now."
"Will he?"
"Yes."
"And I thought he'd be so glad to see me he'd have run out into my arms long
before this." There was a bitterness underneath the light irony in her voice.
"You were mistaken."
"I suppose." She shrugged, abandoning repartee with a disconcerting
abruptness.
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
103
Thomas turned and walked back toward the solarium's door without looking to
see if she followed.
After a moment she caught up with him. "This isn't turning out right at all,"
she muttered.
"Oh? Who did you plan for the Arlequin to kill?"
"You don't really believe that. And I don't know who sent tt so you won't find
out from me. Oh, was I supposed to pale and let something slip at that point?
I'm sorry, I was thinking of something else."
Thomas didn't slam the door of the solar open with any more force than
necessary, and bowed her in with elaborate courtesy.
The old solar wasn't used much, and the three huge windows covering the
farthest wall had already been shuttered by painted panels in preparation for
winter. The scene on the panels was a lurid traditional hunting landscape,
subtly at odds with the other paintings on the oak-sheathed walls, the
hangings of brocaded satin and striped silk, and the delicately carved
furniture. Thomas remembered that this room was one of those that had been
redecorated after the death of Roland's father; the painted panels reflected
the old" king's taste, and had probably been left unaltered by mistake. He
thought Ravenna might have chosen the room for that rather than its
convenience to the gallery.
Roland was slumped in his chair in a sulk, Denzil seated beside him. Falaise's
face was still a little reddened under the powder, as if she had been weeping
from anger rather than hysteria. She had chestnut hair and blue eyes, and her
natural prettiness had been transformed by her coiffure and costume into
fashionable beauty. She wore a blue gown trimmed with gold ribbons and seed
pearls, and against the somber colors of the rest of the room she looked like
an orchid thrown into a dirty alley. Ravenna was the only one who appeared
calm. Her hands were busy on her embroidery and she didn't look up at their
arrival.
There was a stiff silence in the room and the dregs of a bitter argument lay
heavy in the air.
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Thomas realized it was his duty to announce Kade, the steward having
apparently seized the opportunity to escape. Sensing that calling her "the
evil fay sorceress" would probably please her no end, he said,"The Princess
Katherine Fon-tainon," then moved to take his place at Ravenna's side.
Kade's fair skin made her helpless against a sudden blush.
Ravenna looked up and said, "How lovely to see you again, dear child."
Kade curtsied in what had to be an intentionally graceless fashion. "I'm sure
it's just as lovely for you as it is for me, stepmother."
"I'm not your stepmother, dear. Your mother did not bother with the travesty
of marriage with your father, and it would hardly have served the purpose if
she had, because he was already my husband at the time. You know this, but it
seems to please you to hear me repeat it."
In a whisper plainly audible to the rest of the room, Denzil said to Roland,
"Cousin, diis is all too dull."
Ravenna snapped, "Roland, send him away. This is private."
Roland glared. "I could ask you to send your paramour away too, mother."
In the ensuing moment of silence, Kade snickered.
Thomas glanced briefly heavenward. Denzil looked at Roland in irritation as
the implication in the unfortunate phrasing of the King's retort sunk in.
Realizing what he'd said and reddening faintly, Roland continued defiantly,
"This is a family matter and he is the only one of my family who is truly fond
of me."
"What a sad thought," Kade added helpfully. "Sad, but true."
Roland stared at her, meeting her eyes for the first time since she had
entered the room. "What do you want here?"
Kade ignored the question. She looked to Ravenna, who had gone back to her
embroidery. After a moment the Dowager Queen said, "And how is your dear
mother, child?" as if her prepared greeting had never been interrupted.
THE ELEMENT Of FIRE
105
Ravenna's expression was as polite as a judge passing sentence; Kade looked
ironic and amused. "She's in Hell," she said.
"Wishful thinking, certainly."
"Oh, no, she really is. We saw her go. She lost a wager."
"My condolences," the Dowager said dryly, as the rest of the room digested
that. Kade had just reminded them all of her strangeness, and Ravenna had
taken the point. "Now tell us why you've come here in this unseemly fashion,
as an actress of all things, bringing an enemy with you and disturbing our
peace."
"What are you more worried about, that I brought you a battle or that I was
with an acting troupe? Never mind. I have quite a few enemies; I can't help it
if they follow me about. As to why I'm here . . ." She paced a few steps, not
looking at them, hands clasped behind her back and the dingy lace of her
petticoats swirling around her feet. "I just wanted to see my family, and my
dear younger brother."
The slight emphasis on the word "younger" made Roland sit up and flush.
Kade looked from Ravenna to Roland, her gray eyes passing over the quietly
watching Falaise.
This isn't turning out right at all, she had said outside, Thomas remembered.
"I want to make an agreement with you," Kade said.
"Was it agreement you wanted when you sent my court those cursed gifts?"
Roland demanded. "How many of us have you tried to kill?"
"Then there's the death of King Fulstan," Denzil added helpfully, before Kade
could answer. "His illness was very sudden, was it not?"
"I see no point in resurrecting either the dead, or the rumors of years past."
The gaze Ravenna turned on Roland's cousin should have transformed him into
stone. He only nodded politely at her. "Kade, what agreement are you . . ."
Unable to contain himself, Roland interrupted, "Why
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would we want to deal with you, sister?" Contempt twisted his voice. "You've
threatened us, ridiculed us ..."
"Threatened? Oh, what a King you are, Roland." Kade clasped her hands
dramatically and said mockingly in falsetto, "Oh, help, my sister is
threatening me!" She looked down at her brother, lip curled in disgust. "If I
wanted to kill you, you would be dead."
Roland was on his feet. "You think so?" he said. "When you cursed die name of
our family . . ."
"You mewling idiot, so did you," Kade shouted, her sarcasm abruptly giving way
to rage.
"You're lying; I never did. It was you who . . ."
"Silence, both of you," Ravenna said, but something in her tone told Thomas
she had rather enjoyed the argument.
Brother and sister stared at each other a long moment. Kade's hands were at
her sides, curling into fists, uncurling.
Damn it, he's too close to her, Thomas thought. The Albon knight nearest
Roland had eased forward, ready to snatch him out of his sister's reach.
Then Roland turned away from her and threw himself down in his chair. Kade
turned her back on him and walked stiffly to the other side of the room, her
hands shaking.
Into the silence Ravenna said, "You haven't said what agreement you want to
make, dear."
In a voice almost a whisper Kade said, "You make me wish I never . . ." She
stopped, shook her head. "Landlaw and courdaw, stepmother. Landlaw favors the
first-blooded child of the female line. That's Roland. But courtlaw favors the
first-blooded child of the male ruler. That's me." Kade stopped to watch them
a moment, their silence, their concentration.
She shrugged. "Roland's little ass is planted firmly on the throne. That gives
him the advantage. And you base your power on landlaw, stepmother. You founded
your regency on the rights it gave you. You keep your guard by its
traditions." She met Thomas's eyes a moment. He returned her gaze
im-perturbably. She went on, "But there are still those who think I should
have been the heir."
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
107
Without looking up from her embroidery, Ravenna said, "Do you want to be
Queen, dear? When you were fifteen you said you didn't. You spat on the throne
and said it was a foul thing and you wouldn't have it as a gift. And yes,
diere are still those who would put you on it, or at least long enough to
secure the succession for a more manageable candidate."
"It's caused you no more trouble than it has me."
"Then what is. your solution, dear?"
"I'll sign an agreement formally giving up my claim on die throne and any
Fontainon family properties. Have your counselors draw it up." She gestured
eloquently at the King. "And I'll even stop 'threatening' Roland."
"And what do you want in return?"
Kade was deliberately silent until Ravenna looked up at her. "The freedom of
my old home," the'sorceress said softly.
"That's impossible," Roland said, his voice low and harsh.
"Oh, it's hardly that," Kade said.
Ravenna asked, "And what has brought this change of heart about?"
"I have my own reasons, and you don't have anything I want enough to make me
tell you what they are."
"But why, dear?"
"Because I want it."
"That isn't much of a reason."
"It's always been enough for you."
Have to give her that one, Thomas thought. Good shot.
Ravenna's hands paused on the fabric and she stared at Kade. "You don't know
enough to judge me, Katherine."
"Don't I? You've always thought yourself fit to judge me. It's only fair."
"You are young, you know nothing, and life is not fair."
"I know enough, and life is what you make it."
There was a pause.
Ravenna said quietly, "If you are to stay here, there are proprieties that
must be observed ..."
"No conditions. I haven't made any." She smiled. "It's only fair."
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109
The whole idea was so unlikely it took Thomas a few moments to realize that
Ravenna was seriously considering it. In a low voice, he said to her, "It
isn't worth it, my lady. It's too dangerous."
"Very likely," Kade agreed, smiling idly and twisting a lock of her pale hair.
Thomas knelt beside Ravenna's chair so he could see her face. "Don't do it."
Ravenna looked at him, then regarded Kade for a long moment. Her opaque blue
eyes betrayed no emotion. She said, "I accept your proposition, dear."
"No," Roland said, his voice unsteady. "I forbid it."
Ravenna turned a basilisk gaze on her son. He trembled, whether from anger or
fear it was difficult to tell, but said, "I won't have her here."
For a long moment the outcome was in doubt. Thomas realized he was holding his
breath. The room was silent in suspense, as if they observed someone poised on
the brink of a chasm. Even Denzil had lost his expression of detached
amusement and watched the struggle in fascination.
Then Roland's nerve broke. He pounded his fist on the chair arm and shouted,
"I don't want her here! Damn you, can't you listen to me?"
It was a retreat. A shadow crossed Denzil's face that might almost have been
disappointment. Ravenna started to speak but Kade interrupted her. "Oh, come
now, Roland." The sorceress smiled. "You have more to worry about than my
presence here."
He looked at her uncertainly. "What do you mean?"
She said, "The palace wards are still in place. I felt them when I came in."
She frowned thoughtfully and laid a hand flat on the marble veneer of the
fireplace. She curled her fingers, drawing something out of the stone that was
gray and wriggled.
It came out with a shower of stone chips, but without leaving a hole in the
mantel. Kade held it between thumb and
forefinger like a boy with a rat, a spidery, boneless thing that struggled
frantically. It was hard for the eyes to fix on it. "This is a frid. It's
harmless. It lives in stone and eats crumbs spilled on the floor. But it
shouldn't be here."
She dropped it. It hit the hardwood floor wkh a splat, hopped once to reach
the hearthstone, and disappeared beneath the pitted gray rock like a duck
diving under water.
"I'd say the wards aren't proof against the fay anymore. You have a problem,
stepmother." Kade bowed to the room in general and was out the door before
anyone could react.
Roland leapt up and moved to stand over Ravenna's chair. "You have overreached
yourself this time, mother," he said. The protest convinced no one. His face
was red with thwarted anger, but he had lost his chance to defy her.
"Have I? What would you have done, Roland?" she asked, as if not terribly
concerned with his answer.
"Arrested her!"
"And if she didn't want to go with the guards? Power is relative, my lord."
Ravenna let heat creep into her voice. "I thought I'd taught you that if
nothing else. Tell me you understand."
She looked up at him, waiting, while Roland stared at her.
Lounging back in his chair, Denzil said, smiling, "Really, cousin, it's
beneath your notice."
Roland looked back at him. After a moment he nodded. "Perhaps you're right."
He turned back to Ravenna, lips twisted with contempt. "Do what you like,
mother; it doesn't concern me."
Then the King turned and stalked toward the door, his page scrambling to open
it for him and his knights smoothly surrounding him.
Denzil stood and bowed to Ravenna with an ironic smile. "Congratulations, my
lady. Very well played."
Ravenna looked up at him consideringly. "How old are you, Denzil?"
"I am twenty-six, my lady."
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"And do you intend to be twenty-seven?"
Denzil's smile widened. "I depend upon it, my lady." He bowed again and
followed Roland's departing retainers.
"What a good idea," Ravenna said to the room at large. "Why doesn't everyone
go?"
- When Ravenna phrased an order as a question it was a good indication that
her temper had reached the boiling point. Falaise started to speak,
reconsidered, and stood up to Jet Gideon conduct her out. Ravenna's guards and
attendants went to wait for her outside.
Thomas had started for the door when Ravenna said, "Stay here, Captain."
Unwillingly he stopped, his back to her, waiting until die others had filed
out before turning around.
Ravenna had shoved her sewing aside and was resting her face in her hands. The
flicker of light from the hearth played about the red highlights in her hair
and metallic threads in the embroidery of her gown. Without moving she said,
"Don't look at me like that."
He folded his arms. "I am not looking at you in any particular way."
"The hell you're not." She lifted her head and rubbed her temples. "If she had
been my daughter I'd have married her off to the God-King of Parscia. Civil
war would have been the least of his worries."
Thomas gave up pretense and let her see how angry he was. He leaned on one of
the flimsy rosewood tables that looked so out of place next to the
blood-splashed hunting scenes that dominated the room and said, "Civil war may
be the least of your worries now that you've let her in here. Before this she
was taking out her revenge in small pieces, which was a damn sight better than
what she could've chosen to do. Now she wants something more."
Ravenna sat back and looked up at him. "She may well get ft, whatever it is,"
she said seriously. "Did you see the way she dealt with me? And I think there
was a moment when Roland
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
111
actually forgot Denzil was in the room. She makes a fine enemy."
"She could be a deadly enemy. She's grown now and she doesn't want a child's
revenge anymore," Thomas told her. Ravenna was single-minded and ruthless in a
way that would have been devastating had it not been for the lack of any
sadism. She had been born to be an absolute ruler as some men were born to
paint or write music. She wanted to bring Kade back into the fold, to direct
the sorceress's powers and talents to her own ends. He didn't think Ravenna
would understand the bitterness of wounds that had never healed.
"A child's revenge," Ravenna said, looking into the fire. "I wish I had a
child's revenge. Fulstan wore away at them, both of them. When I discovered
all he had done . . . And I didn't realize it until he'd made my son a
coward."
Fulstan's treatment of Roland and Kade had been at its worst when Kade was
fourteen and Roland twelve, at the time when Ravenna was away on the borders
during the last Bisran War. Thomas had been a lieutenant then, travelling with
Ravenna and the rest of the Guard. There had been no one at the palace with
the courage to inform the Queen that while she was managing supply lines and
browbeating her generals into cooperation, Fulstan was destroying Ile-Rien's
future through its heir. Thomas had long wondered if Fulstan hadn't known
exactly what he was doing. If he wasn't striking back at Ravenna in the only
way open to him. God knew she had been indifferent to anything else he'd ever
done.
At this time it had also been an open secret that Thomas was Ravenna's lover.
Most of his conversations with the late king had been limited to details of
the execution Fulstan had planned for Thomas the day Ravenna died, or grew
tired of him. He did have a gift for words. Perhaps he would Have been happier
as a poet than a king.
Ravenna was saying, "Had my children been bastards I think all of us would be
the happier for it."
"Very eloquent. Now what are you going to do about it?"
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She stood up and flung her sewing to the floor. "Sixteen years ago when I
approved your appointment into my guard, I knew I was making a mistake," she
shouted.
"Probably," Thomas agreed. "And I suppose that bit of misdirection, while
admirable, though not quite up to your usual standards, is the only answer I'm
going to get."
She stared at him a moment, then shook her head, her expression turning wry.
"If I had an answer, I wouldn't need misdirection." After a moment of thought,
she asked, "Can we trust Galen DubeU?"
And that was that, even if he stood there and argued until he fell down dead
of old age. Thomas rubbed the bridge of his nose. It wasn't the first time
Ravenna had given him a headache. He said, "I think so."    i
"Really?"
"I don't think he knew she was coming here. But he's genuinely fond of the
girl, and there are people who are going to mistake that for collusion. It
would be against your best interests to be one of them."
"Yes, we need him. Braun and his little apprentices are no good for serious
work like this. The sorcerers we sent for from the Granges and Lodun haven't
even reached the city yet. That's suspicious in itself. I'll tell Renier to
send more messengers." She paused, her back to him, her slender form
silhouetted against the light of the fire. "1 want you to watch her, Thomas."
"I gathered that," he said dryly. "I've already arranged for it."
There was a discreet tap on the door, and Ravenna irritably called, "Enter."
It was the steward who had made his escape from the solar earlier. He said
nervously, "My lord High Minister Aviler is requesting an audience, my lady."
"Oh, he is? Well, I'm in the mood for him, as a matter of fact. Tell him he
may enter, and don't think I didn't notice when you disappeared earlier,
Saisan. Let's not make a habit of that, hmm?"
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
113
The steward bowed. "No, my lady."
As the servant withdrew, Thomas said, "Fond as I am of Aviler, I have some
things to attend to."
"Thomas?" she said quietly.
"Yes?" He stopped halfway to the door.
"You're the only man I know who doesn't hate, dislike, or fear me, and it is a
blessed relief simply to speak to you; did you know that?"
Because the High Minister was already coming through the door behind him,
Thomas swept off his hat in his best formal court bow and said, "My lady, it
is my very great pleasure."
On his way back to the Guard House, Thomas took the immense circular stairwell
that led up from what had been the main hall of the Old Palace two centuries
earlier and now linked the wing that held the Grand Gallery with the older
defensive bastions. The gray age-old stone of the banisters and the central
supporting column were carved into flowing ribbons and bands that ended in the
heads of gryphons, lions, and unrecognizable animals from the artisan's
imagination. The lamplit twilight of the stairwell was cool, and echoed
faintly with the humming activity of the rest of the palace.
Thomas wondered what Kade Carrion the fay sorceress was doing now.
The first time Kade had used her power against the court had been on a Saints'
Day ten years ago. It was held on Midsummer Eve because combining the Church's
holy days with the Old Faith's festivals made it easier for the priests to get
a respectable turnout for the services, especially in the country where most
of the population still considered themselves pagan. Outside, the city streets
had been packed with costumed entertainers, travelling merchants, and
celebrating crowds, while in the High Cathedral the bishop was saying the
Saints' Day Mass before the royal court. At the culmination of the service,
pandemonium had erupted. Objects levitated and smashed into walls.
Candlelamps, altar vessels, and stained
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MARTHA WELLS
glass windows shattered. It had been a display of raw uncontrolled sorcerous
power.
Dr. Surete had been Court Sorcerer then, and he had immediately sensed the
cause of the disturbance. It was Kade.
Galen Dubell, who had been at court working with Surete, admitted that for
most of the past two years he had been secretly teaching Kade the rudiments of
sorcery. This in itself was not much of a crime. But Kade was the illegitimate
daughter of the king. She was older than Roland and courtlaw gave her a claim
on the throne. She was also half fay, and elements at court and in the
Ministry had been advising Ravenna that Kade was dangerous almost since the
girl's birth. The next day Ravenna had banished Dubell to Lodun and sent Kade
out of the city to the Monelite Convent, perhaps knowing she would f not long
remain there. Many had wondered at the time why Ravenna had shown the daughter
of her husband's mistress that much mercy, when no one in Ile-Rien except the
disgraced Galen Dubell would have objected to Kade's execution. But they knew
that Ravenna did everything for her own reasons, and asking for an explanation
when none was offered was useless.
In the solar Ravenna had unintentionally said "my children" and Thomas didn't
think she was including the two stillborn girls buried in the High Cathedral's
crypt. Ravenna had wanted Kade to be the canny, beautiful daughter she had
never had, and in some ways she still wanted that. But that was exactly what
that brave, daft, strange-eyed sorceress would never be.
There was a clatter as Martin appeared on the landing above and called,
"Captain?"
"What is it?" Martin had been sent with the other Queen's guards to see that
the palace was secure after the Ariequin's disturbance. Thomas suspected the
expression of relief on the young man's face indicated that he was about to
pass a thorny problem on to someone else.
"Trouble, Sir," Martin said as Thomas reached him. The
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
115
young guard led the way off the landing to a short pillared hall. "We just
found him. It's Dr. Braun."
On one side of the hall an oaken door stood open. Thomas followed Martin into
a small room furnished as a salon which had been used as a waiting room for
diplomatic guests when the Old Hall had been an audience chamber.
Braun lay crumpled on an eastern carpet whose rich color was distorted by his
blood. He lay as if he had been sitting on the stool at the high writing desk
when he had slumped to the side and fallen to the floor.
Two more Queen's guards waited there, Castero and Bas-erat. Both were looking
at the corpse as if trying to decide what to do with it. Thomas went past them
and knelt beside the body. The carpet was soaked with blood and squished
unpleasantly underfoot. Carefully he lifted the young sorcerer's head and saw
that his throat had been cut. The edges of the wound were straight, not
ragged. It had been done smoothly, with a very sharp knife. The body was cold
and beginning to stiffen. "Who found him?" he asked.
"I did," Martin said. "We came past this room earlier on the first quick
search and missed him. You can't see die body from the door since the
secretaire is in the way. When we were working our way back just now doing it
thoroughly I walked all the way in and saw him."
"He's cold, so he must have been here before that, Sir," Baserat added.
"Yes, and he must have been killed here," Thomas agreed. The carpet was
evidence enough of that. Braun had been leaving from the gallery, going back
to die King's Bastion, and must have stepped into the little room to speak to
someone. Someone who had come up behind him at some point during the course of
the conversation and skillfully slit his throat.
"What is this?"
Thomas looked up to see High Minister Aviler standing in the doorway, watching
them suspiciously. It wasn't surprising that the High Minister's audience with
Ravenna had been a
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MARTHA WELLS
short one; in her current mood it would have been succinct, to say the least.
Thomas answered, "At first glance it appears to be a dead man."
"I realize that." Aviler stepped into the room, his long state robes brushing
the floor, keeping a wary eye on the other guards. As he well might, Thomas
thought, if this were really the murder in progress the man obviously half
hoped it was. Martin and the others, who were probably still uncertain whether
they'd neglected their duty and didn't appreciate Aviler's presence as a
witness to it, were no doubt helping this impression by their obvious
attitudes of belligerence and guilt.
The High Minister came to the edge of the blood-soaked carpet and stopped,
frowning, as it became apparent the death was some hours old. "Braun," he said
in surprise, recognizing the young sorcerer. "Who did it?"
"That's a good question." Why? is another good question, Thomas thought,
though he could guess at least part of the answer. Poor bastard. He said it
wasn't important. . .
THE AIR SHELLED like rain. Kade
sat on the ledge of the fourth story of the North Bastion, leaning on a stone
porpoise and watching the sky. The clouds were gray and heavy, though sunlight
broke through in occasional patches. Across the maze of paved courts and
formal gardens below were the high walls and steeply pitched roof of the
Gallery Wing, more modem and airy in its design than the blocky bastion at her
back. It was a cool day, and a damp breeze tore at her hair.
She could feel the wards. They stretched from the bottom of the outer walls to
a point high above the palace, forming an invisible, constantly shifting dome.
Years ago Galen Dubeli had shown her how to use gascoign powder made from
hart's horn and crab's eyes to see the corona of light that marked their
presence, and to use ash or flakes of charcoal to track their movements. Bad
weather tended to push them closer to the earth; perhaps that was why they
seemed to be intruding into her thoughts today.
The frid must have slipped in through one of the naturally occurring gaps
between the individual wards. If it had blundered directly into one, the
harmless, powerless creature would have been eaten in an instant. If the
motion of the wards was slowing, then the frid—and the golem for that
matter—might simply have been lucky enough to slip through. The new sorcerer
Braun might have been as incompetent at tending the wards since Dr. Surete's
death as he had been at defending himself from whoever killed him. Galen
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MARTHA WELLS
Dubell had only been back a day: not much time to make up lost ground with as
complex an etheric structure as the wards.
However it had gotten in, Kade was fairly sure the golem had been sent for
her. She had enemies enough among the courts of Fayre, without even
considering those among the mortal sorcerers. There were many fay who wanted
Moire's^ castles, especially Knockma, and Kade was determined not to give them
up.
Someone moving through the garden below reminded her that she was being
followed, but the passerby did not glance up. Kade had dodged the men who were
watching her, though they probably knew she was somewhere in this bastion. It
didn't matter; all she needed was a few moments' privacy.
Seeing Roland and Ravenna again had stirred a whole nest of unpleasant
memories. He stood there and said I cursed the name of our father, as if
nothing had ever happened. As if I hadn't held him while he prayed to the
Church's God for our father to die, she thought. Roland was only two years
younger than she; he couldn't fail to remember.
Fulstan had always been a frightening presence in their lives, but during
Ravenna's long absences from court during the last years of the Bisran War, he
had been at his worst. Kade's memories of those times were particularly vivid.
The day Fulstan had beaten to death one of Roland's servants, a boy no older
than the ten-year-old Prince. Gods, how can Roland forget that. Those little
bones breaking ... In sheer terror Roland had sent away his other young
servants, and even his pages, sons of high nobility meant to grow up with him
and become his companions and advisors. Fulstan had permitted this, because it
had left Roland alone. Except for me, Kade thought. Looking back she could see
that they should have spoken to someone, that Roland could have sent a letter
to Ravenna ... As the daughter of the king's supernatural and despised leman,
Kade had had fewer options, but neither she nor Roland had been able to
believe that a world existed where help was available.
THE ELEMENT Of FIRE
119
Landlaw expected even a sovereign to be responsible for his behavior, even if
courtlaw did not, but Fulstan had been careful. He had made the Cisternans his
personal guard instead of the Albon Order, thereby ridding himself of the
interfering presence of an Albon Preceptor. He had never done anything to
Roland that would leave an outward sign. He had surrounded himself with
sycophants and cronies, and he had been a terror to die palace women.
For a long time he had been wary of Kade, perhaps half hoping, half fearing
that her mother Moire would return to claim her. He had treated his daughter
with contempt, reviled her, held her up to the court as an object of ridicule,
but he had never touched her. Until that day of her fifteenth summer, when he
had pinned her in a comer of her room and told her that as she grew older her
looks were almost passable . . .
The next day had been Midsummer Eve and the Saints' Day episode in the
cathedral. She had been banished to the convent, and six months later Fulstan
was dead.
Kade cursed softly to herself, coming back out of the past to the cloudy day
and the breeze lifting her fine hair. It's no good to think about it; it's
over. If Roland hates you for leaving him, that's his decision. You were a
prisoner escaping a cell, and you took the first chance that was handy. At
least that was what Galen Dubell had told her, two years ago at Lodun.
From the open window a few paces along the ledge to her left came the sound of
a door squeaking open, then a moment later the muted thump of something heavy
being shifted. That's Galen, Kade thought, easing herself up the wall to stand
on the ledge. The servants never moved anything.
She stepped around the elaborately figured window casement and onto the wooden
sill. Galen Dubell was in a corner of his room, piling stacks of books atop a
stout wooden chest. He finished and straightened his back with a sigh, turned,
and saw her. "Kade."
His expression was disturbingly neutral. She wondered at his lack of reaction.
Even though she had never fallen off
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MARTHA WELLS
anything high enough to hurt herself, he hated to see her walk on ledges. She
said, "I wrote and told you that I was coming back. Didn't you get the
letter?"
"No, I never received it," he said slowly. "I would have tried to dissuade
you."
"You told me I should face my anger and that would help me get rid of it. I
take it this wasn't exactly what you meant." Kade spoke with a sinking heart.
And she had thought her decision to return to the palace to confront her past
was sensible and wise.
"Perhaps I didn't know what I meant." He almost smiled. "Perhaps I've become
too used to dealing with old men who would rather talk than act. But if this
is die way you must do it, then I wish you luck."
"But you dqn't want me to involve you," she said, and thought, How cahnfy that
came out. The wooden window frame was rough against her hand and she realized
she was gripping it very tightly.
He didn't look away, but held her gaze gravely. "That might be for the best."
It was not what she had wanted to hear. She had wanted him to look exasperated
and say, That wasn't what I meant at all, you little fool; now stop feeling
sorry for yourself and come down out of that window.
"Something is going to happen here, Kade," he was saying. "I don't know what
it is yet, but I have to be free to deal with it."
And not be banished again because of me. She said, "I know. It's someone
called Grandier."
"What do you know about him?"
"He tried to kill you."
"He failed."
She shook her head, trying to put the anger away. "The lesser fay won't even
speak his name. They're more afraid of him than they are of me. The ones from
the higher courts say they've never heard of him, but it's pretense. They
wouldn't tell me the truth anyway."
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
121
"He's in the city, perhaps closer than anyone realizes. Dr. Braun was killed
last night. I'm certain Grandier had something to do with it, and that means
he must have someone inside the wall already. I could use your help, but I
dare not take it. Do you understand?"
"Yes, well, I suppose I do."
"And you must give me your word that you won't harm anyone here, no matter
what provocation."
Kade couldn't look at him anymore. Her voice was more bitter than she
intended. "You know I can't promise that." She slipped out of the window and
began to make her way down the ledge to an unused balcony. Behind her, he
called with a trace of his old exasperation, "Be careful, damn it."
The guards spotted her again when she had reached the ground floor and was
coming out of the entrance into the Rose Court. Kade picked up her skirt and
bolted down one of the stone-paved paths between the rosebushes. As she
reached the wall of the court, she heard heavy bodies crashing into the thorny
and not-so-delicate hedges. The wall was rough and pitted and she scaled it
easily. Reaching the top she crouched amid the tangled vines and took a quick
glance around. As she had seen from above, the area between the bastion and
the high walls of the Gallery Wing was a honeycomb of intersecting gardens and
courts, some old and familiar and others that were recent additions. She ran
lightly along the wall, jumped to a narrower intersecting wall, and ran along
its length. She heard a yelp and a crash as the vines on the first wall gave
way on someone. As she spun around to look, her lace underskirt caught on a
lionhead spout on the wall's rain gutter, throwing her off balance and forcing
her to jump down.
She landed heavily in a pile of raked leaves. She was in a long and
irregularly shaped garden, with a clipped lawn and overflowing flower borders,
most of it rambling out of sight behind the wall and sheltering hedges.
Kade got to her feet and strolled toward the mossy foun-
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MARTHA WILLS
tain just around the curve of the wall, prepared to be mildly amused when they
caught up with her.
Stopping beside the fountain where water spouted from pitchers in the hands of
stone nymphs, she wriggled her toes in the cool grass. The garden widened out
from this point on, becoming larger and more grand than she had first
supposed. In the wide area of lawn were yew bushes shaped into a scaled-down
battlement with towers half-circling a large round mosaic of a massive
sundial. It was moments before her eyes focused on the man and the woman
seated on a bench beneath a honeysuckle arbor only a few yards from her; the
play of the fountain had covered their voices. It was Queen Falaise and
Denzil.
Falaise saw Kade at almost the same moment. She stood, jerking her hand free
of Denzil's grasp, and hurried toward her. Kade, who was more used to catching
people unawares than being caught, stood there and stared.
The Queen stopped a few feet from her, said uncertainly, "My lady Katherine .
. . uh, Kade?" She wore a dress of rose and pear) and was clutching a small
book in a white-knuckled grasp. like most aristocratic women would have been,
she was out of breath from the exertion of walking quickly across die garden.
Falaise hadn't been crying, but there was something stricken in her blue eyes
that amounted to the same thing.
Kade felt herself looking stupid. She said, "Yes?" hoping to provoke an
explanation.
A little desperately, Falaise said, "We had an appointment."
Kade realized that the Queen was not seeing her as a sorceress or as her
husband's mad sister, but only as another woman. "An appointment," she
repeated helpfully, nodding.
Denzil reached them and caught Falaise's arm again. The Queen flinched and
dropped her book, which barely missed the fountain. Kade stooped immediately
to rescue it from the damp ground.
Denzil said, "Another appointment, my lady?" His smile
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
123
was confident and amused. A brief glow of sunlight breaking through die cloudy
sky touched his blond hair, the powder blue of has doublet, the gems
ornamenting his sword. He and Falaise made a beautiful couple.
Falaise hesitated. "Yes, I ..."
"I was late," Kade said, brushing dirt off the little book's sheepskin
binding.
"Yes, she was," Falaise agreed instantly. She stepped away from Denzil
stiffly.
He chuckled and bowed slightly to make the point that he was allowing her to
escape. "Then I'll leave you to your appointment."
His arrogance was too obvious for Kade to leave well enough alone. "Do that,"
she said.
Amused and ironic, he met her eyes and bowed. "My lady."
They watched him cross the garden toward the gate behind the hedges. Kade
didn't know Denzil very well. He had been presented to court shortly before
she had left. He had attached himself to Roland shortly thereafter.
There was nothing she hated more than people who didn't take her seriously.
Falaise sat down on the edge of the fountain, heedless of what the moss would
do to her silk damask skirts.
This near to the Queen, Kade was suddenly conscious that the climb on the
bastion's ledge and her fall into the leaves hadn't done her dress any good.
But her grubbiness was bound to aggravate Ravenna, and she resolved to let her
clothing degenerate as far as modesty allowed, "Where are your guards?" she
asked Falaise.
"This is my private garden. When I give audiences here they wait beside the
gate. I bribed my ladies to go down to the grotto."
"Why didn't you call the guards?"
"That wouldn't do any good."
Falaise had the calm of someone who has been miserable for a long time and
expects to go on being miserable. Kade
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MARTHA WELLS
said, "It's difficult for someone to make advances when there are a lot of men
standing around looking at him as if they want to kill him. They're Queen's
guards; even Roland can't order them away when they're protecting you."
The Queen shook her head wearily, the wind playing with her curls and ribbons.
"It isn't that sort of advances."
"It doesn't matter what sort of advances. It always worked for Ravenna's
ladies when . . ." When my father. . . "when they needed it," she finished,
but Falaise didn't notice the lapse.
"He wouldn't let me call them."
"Do it anyway."
"It's easy for you to say." Falaise gestured helplessly, the puffed sleeves of
her gown almost hiding the movement.
Kade watched her a moment, dien sat on the fountain rim beside her. "Not
always."
But Falaise opened the book on her lap and turned the pages distractedly. By
craning her neck Kade could see it was written instead of printed, and by a
hand not as fine as a professional clerk's. Poetry, she guessed, and it would
hardly be from Roland. Falaise slammed the book dosed and said abruptly, "What
do I call you, (Catherine or Kade?"
"Kade."
"Kade. Did you ever turn yourself into a bird?"
"I thought about it, but I decided I wanted to live." It came to her that
Falaise wasn't really much of a coward. Denzil must have browbeaten her
thoroughly. Possibly most men in authority over her had browbeaten her
thoroughly. "Human sorcerers can't shape-change, not if they ever want to turn
back into themselves. Most fay can, but I never had to badly enough to make
the experiment."
"That's a shame. It would be wonderful to just turn into something and fly
away."
They sat in the quiet a moment, with not even birds to interrupt the
fountain's bubbling. Then Kade remembered something and asked her, "What did
you mean when you said Denzil wasn't making that sort of. . ."
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
125
A man came running around one of the yew hedges toward them. He threw himself
at Falaise s feet so enthusiastically Kade had to scramble out of the way to
avoid being tumbled into the fountain.
More graceful than the sorceress, Falaise kept her balance and said in
exasperation, "Aristofan, please . . ."
The young man kneeling at her feet was handsome with russet hair and eager
brown eyes. He was dressed for court in blue and gray and had lost his
feathered hat in his run across the lawn. "It was him, wasn't it? That was why
you didn't want me to come to you today. You must tell me what he wants from
you."
Kade looked down at herself to make sure she hadn't inadvertently faded from
sight.
"No, I can't, I told you." Falaise spoke firmly, but then she stroked his
hair. "Really, it's all right."
"Don't mind me," Kade said. "I'll just stand over here, shall I?"
Aristofan clasped the Queen's hand ardently. "Don't you trust me? I'd do
anything for you."
"Sometimes I almost think you would."
One of the men following Kade appeared at the top of the wall, spotted her,
and waved back to his companions. "Well," Kade said, "I have to leave before
they decide I'm holding you prisoner and roll in a couple of cannon."
"Please." Falaise looked up at her. "You won't say anything?"
"I don't know anything." Kade started away, then stopped and looked back at
the other woman. "If you're going to tell someone, tell Ravenna."
Falaise looked down at Aristofan's head, her expression drawn and troubled.
To avoid Falaise's guards, Kade left the garden by going over the wall behind
the battlement hedge. She was still not quite ready to be followed again, and
she rejoined the path that led away from the Queen's garden only when she was
out of sight of the garden gates. The path wandered past walled
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MARTHA WELLS
herb gardens then abruptly opened out to the paved area below the terraces of
the Gallery Wing. The smooth stone of the Gallery Wing's walls was butter
colored and would glow like gold in the full sunlight. She climbed the steps
and walked along the terrace, looked at the view of the rolling lawn, the
trees, and the artificial temple ruins, and wondered about Galen Dubell.
I'm not going to sit like a lump while he fights this Bisran bastard Grandier
single-handed. Does he honestfy expect me to do that? No, he couldn't, she
decided. It was incredible. If she were going to behave in that ridiculous
fashion to one of the few friends she had, then she might as well have stayed
in the convent and saved years of trouble. Galen isn't an idiot. Grandier
trapped him once; he might do it again. He knows he needs help; he just can't
ask for it.
She stopped, drew a toe meditatively over a pattern in the paving stone. She
was tired of being followed.
Kade closed her eyes and pulled glamour out of the damp air and the dew on the
grass, wove it with the afternoon sunlight filtered through the clouds, and
drew it over herself like a concealing blanket. If anyone saw her she would
appear as another courtier, a servant, whatever they expected to see.
She would help Dubell, and she had an inkling of how to go about it.
"Well, that's been a waste of time," Thomas told Lucas. They had just finished
questioning the last of Dr. Braun's apprentices and servants and had elicited
nothing but a tearful confession from the sixty-year-old chamberlain about a
few pennies' worth of misappropriated household funds.
During the questioning, Lucas had been entertaining himself by flipping a
small boot dagger from hand to hand, and now he sent it into the table with a
thud. "So, who killed the poor bastard? The chamberlain?"
The room was damp and too warm, despite the open window. Thomas stood up from
the table piled with papers and moved restlessly to the room's little balcony,
unbuttoning
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
127
the top of his doublet. From here he could look down onto the hall where
servants wandered, off-duty guards gathered, and the main life of the Queen's
Guard House was concentrated. He leaned against the rough pillar in the comer
of the balcony and said, "He's too short. Braun was sitting at a clerk's
writing desk and the stool was a foot or so taller than an ordinary chair.
Whoever cut the good doctor's throat was at least my height. The way that old
man's back is bent he'd never have been able to reach him."
On the stone-paved floor of the hall below, some of the men had discarded
their doublets to practice swordplay on wooden targets and one another. Guards
usually fought one another every chance they had. Constant work was required
to keep in top form for the real duels, which usually lasted no more than a
few moments, depending on the relative skill of the opponents, and often ended
with a death or a crippling. All used their regular dueling swords rather than
the blunt-tipped weapons often employed for practice, and it was only due to
the skill of the combatants that so little blood was being shed. There were
not as many men off-duty as usual; all the guardposts and duty shifts had been
doubled since last night.
All this morning Thomas had noted a tension on the wind that hadn't been there
yesterday. Everyone knew the danger of dark and deserted places, but the
palace had always been safe ground from any but human opponents. Two Cisteman
guards had been sent back to their families in boxes today, the first
casualties in a new and uncertain war. The rest of the court had also finally
bothered to notice the danger, and today there were complaints, mild hysteria,
and loud questions about why someone wasn't doing something.
"If you're going to be clever about it, we won't be able to arrest anyone,"
Lucas pointed out.
The pillar Thomas leaned against still bore the nine-year-old bullet hole that
had signalled the end of his predecessor's career. He picked at the splintered
area thoughtfully and said, "We're looking for a throat-slitter who takes an
unprepared man from behind but who still scruples at robbery." Braun
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MARTHA WELLS
had been wearing a respectable amount of court jewelry, including a
diamond-studded presentation medal from Lodun and several gemstones given to
him by past wealthy patrons. All had been left on the body. "That eliminates
most of the servants but certainly throws suspicion on every member of the
nobility in the palace. And Grandier."
Lucas leaned his chair back against the yellowed plaster wall behind him.
"Always Grandier. What did Braun have that Grandier would want to kill him
for?"
"Information." And thinking of information, Thomas wished the clerks would
hurry with the translation of the documents chronicling Grandier's trial in
Bisra. They knew so little about the man, and he wanted to take advantage of
every resource, no matter how sparse it might be.
"Ahh. Braun saw something ..."
"Or remembered something. He tried to talk to me last night but we were
interrupted by Denzil."
"Coincidence?"
Thomas glanced back at him. "Which coincidence? Braun wanting to tell me
something or Denzil interrupting at the opportune moment11"
"We're not going to get anywhere if you keep inventing new questions." Lucas
glanced briefly toward the window, which opened onto the narrow alley between
the house and the stone wall of the old armory. "Half the palace is saying
that it was the sorceress."
"Not a bad suggestion, except she was Already in the gallery performing bad
Commedia in front of everyone who matters in the city when I saw Braun alive.
The body was long cold by the time she left." Thomas shook his head. She was
also too short. "Today she lost her guards in the Queen's garden. One of them
reported it an hour ago."
"What was she doing there?"
"Talking to the Queen, apparently."
"Huh. What's going to come of that, do you think?"
"Not much." Thomas smiled. "They can't banish Falaise."
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Lucas was silent a moment, then said, "Your great friend High Minister Aviler
is implying it was a Queen's guard."
"What a helpful suggestion. How in hell did he come up with it?"
Lucas shrugged. "The usual way. There was some loud muttering about Braun,
some of the men blaming him for his incompetence when you were trying to get
Galen Dubell out of Grandier's house. Braun was never half the help old Dr.
Surete was."
"So one of them takes it on himself to remove the irritant? It's unlikely."
But Gideon had said something about that last night. Thomas was struck by an
unpleasant image. Braun, unable to find Thomas in the crowded gallery,
stopping a faceless Queen's guard on a deserted stair. Asking him to take a
message to his captain, stepping into a quiet parlor to use the writing desk .
. . But Thomas had always seen Braun as a pitiable figure, and the young
sorcerer had been coldly eliminated in a way that didn't agree with the theory
of a guard murdering him in sudden anger. Then again, Braun was a sorcerer and
would surely have had some means of defending himself; he would almost have to
be taken from behind . . .
The door creaked as a servant opened it to usher in Ephraim, the ragged
ballad-seller and professional spy.
"Good news?" Thomas asked as the old man grinned and bowed to both of them.
Ephraim pulled off his cloth cap and began to knead it conversationally. "In a
manner of speaking, Sir. It's quite a tale. The Gambin lad's dead, you see."
If he had his throat slit around the same time as Braun did last night, I'm
going to retire, Thomas thought. "What happened?"
"From the beginning it was that a couple of my own boys followed Gambin to see
if he would lead us to the fellow who hired him, and he led them a merry way,
Sir, but he ended up back at the palace quarter and entered Lord Lestrac's
house." Ephraim hesitated. Not from trepidation, but more as if he
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MARTHA WELLS
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
131
were still trying to sort things out in his own mind. "After a bit he came
out, and the boys followed Gambin on a wandering way back to his home ground,
and waited outside his house, as they hadn't any instructions to do otherwise.
Before dawn this morning a young woman arrives, and she goes in and starts to
scream. The boys figured they should go in and see what the matter was, and as
Gambin didn't know either of them diey could say they were passersby. Well,
they didn't have to say much at all, because Gambin was dead, you see, without
a mark on him.
"When I got there I Sent for a lady who lives down in the Philosopher's Cross
and knows a bit about these things, and in her opinion it had the look of a
wicked sending about it, though I never heard of Gambin to trouble with
sorcerers before. She said it was most likely in something he was given, some
token, that was enspelled to murder the lad whenever the master was finished
and didn't want the likes of anyone asking questions. It cost extra for her to
search for the token, and I thought you'd want your own people to do that, so
I locked up the house and came on here."
"You've done your best," Thomas told him. "Tell them to get you a drink, and
the Paymaster has your fee."
Ephraim's bow was unpolished but sincere. "Oh, that's very good of you,
Captain."
When the spy had left, Lucas said, "Well, well. Lord Lestrac is our nameless
letter-forger, and Gambin is silenced the same way you think Dr. Surete and
Milam were. A connection to Grandier?"
"Maybe." The attempt with the letters was the sort of subtle, ineffective
trick Denzil's friends were famous for in their attempts to please him, and of
which the Duke unconcernedly let them suffer the consequences. "It almost
seems as if there are two different men, or factions, at work. Grandier with
his sorcery, and then someone else plaguing us with littie distractions.
Gambin was hired by the second man, and when he was compromised, Grandier
killed him."
"If they're working together. They might not be." Lucas shrugged. "There's no
way to tell."
Thomas bit his lip thoughtfully, considering his options. He said, "I want you
to send men to search Gambin's house and pick up the body; I'll want an
opinion on it from Dubell."
"How lovely for him." Lucas got to his feet. "You know, if I'm not mistaken,
Lestrac is also a friend of Denzil's. I think the good Duke of Alsene
maintains that house for him."
"He does. And it was searched by the King's Watch about two days ago. They
didn't discover anything." Lestrac's house was one of a group of manses for
royal dependents that were built up against the outside of the palace's west
wall. Lestrac was a landless, dissipated young nobleman, useful occasionally
as a tool for Denzil but not much else. He had never been implicated in one of
Denzil's plots deeply enough to send him to the traitors' graves outside the
city, but he assisted Roland's cousin in the spreading of rumors and lies.
After a moment Thomas shook his head. "Even if we did connect a friend of
Denzil's to Grandier, it won't prove anything to Roland. To convince him we'd
have to catch Denzil standing over the royal bed with a drawn sword, and even
then I'm not sure he'd believe it."
"Lestrac was supposed to have dabbled in black magic in his wilder days, and
bargained with demons, like Grandier. The letters might have been his own
idea, and he could have killed Gambin himself," Lucas said.
"I heard he dabbled, but I never heard he dabbled all that successfully.
Finding the token should settle it. Have them be especially careful of
anything valuable on Gambin's body. If I were Grandier, I would have put the
spell on the payment that was given him." Thomas paused. "I'll see Lestrac
myself."
Lucas frowned. "Will you take Dubell with you?"
"He's still a target for Grandier and I'm not sure I want to risk him. He may
be the only protection the palace has."
"So you go to Lestrac's house where Grandier is hiding and
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MARTHA WELLS
THI ELEMENT OF FIRE
133
he kills you because Galen Dubell is safe back here. Does that make sense?"
"It's not a perfect plan, I'll admit. I'll take one of Braun's apprentices.
They aren't completely useless."
"Or take me."
Kade Carrion was sitting in the window, perfectly composed, the ragged hem of
her dress tucked under her feet. How she had gotten there without either one
of them hearing her was incredible; from her attitude she might have been
there for the past hour.
"What are you doing here?" Lucas asked, dropping a hand to his sword.
Her look said she suspected his sanity. "Listening. Next you'll ask me how
much I heard, to which I'll very likely reply 'enough.' Can't we dispense with
all that?"
Lucas looked at his captain and raised an eyebrow inquiringly. Thomas shook
his head minutely, and asked Kade, 'Take you where?"
"To what's-his-name's house where you think Gran-dier is."
Thomas leaned back against the pillar and folded his arms. "Why do you want to
go?"
She rolled her eyes in exasperation. "I'm offering to help."
"And in such a touching and spontaneous way. If I refuse your help?"
She appeared to seriously consider the question. "I might follow anyway. I'm
good at that. Or not. I might do a lot of things; the day is young."
This was ominous. "And I'm expected to trust you?"
Apparently outraged, she sat up straight against the window casement and said,
"I gave my word."
"No, you did not."
"I did."
"When?"
He saw her hesitate, then she gave in and grinned. She said, "So 1 didn't.
Come on, you know you want me to go. I'm lucky."
"Lucky for whom?" Lucas muttered.
. 'This isn't a game," Thomas said, wary. She had her own brand of charm, that
was certain. And Thomas realized that even against his will he was tempted by
that charm. Because she's different, or because she's dangerous? he asked
himself, irritated. Stop being ridiculous and concentrate. "You've said you
want to help, but you haven't told me why. And you haven't been terribly
helpful in the past."
"The past is the past." Kade tilted her head to one side, watching him with
those very direct eyes. "Grandier would have killed Galen Dubell, who is my
oldest friend." She finished lightly, "I can't have that, can I?"
Trusting her was a decided risk, but if Grandier was in that house, or had
been there and left more traps, Kade would be their best hope. And so far he
had come across nothing to suggest that she was the Bisran sorcerer's ally.
And this is certainly one way to find her out if she is. He said, "Very well."
I
THE HOUSES THAT clustered
against the palace's west wall presented blank stone facades to the public,
most of their life and wealth turned inward. The clouds had closed up overhead
and a light rain had started, settling the dust and washing away the habitual
stench of the street, preparing to turn it into a river of mud. Street vendors
who sold ribbons, trinkets, foodstuffs, and amulets to protect against
night-dwelling fay were gathered in damp clumps around the pillars of the
promenade that faced the line of houses. Coaches splashed by, trying to reach
their destinations before the storm started in earnest; few of the wealthier
residents were abroad at this hour, and most had retreated into the rich shops
farther under the sheltering roof of the promenade. The street was mostly
unobserved, for which Thomas was glad. He hated an audience for this sort of
work.
Lestrac's house was four stories topped by a steeply pitched red tile roof,
set between the towering residence of a ship owner and the winter home of a
minor noble.
Rain dripping off his hat, Thomas stepped back to look up at the barred
windows while Castero banged on the door. Another Queen's guard tried the
double carriage doors while the others spread out in front of the house and
attempted to look innocuous. There was no back alley and no other exit. He had
brought twenty men, which was overkill if this was Lestrac's own plot. If
Grandier himself was in there despite the earlier search by the King's Watch,
the entire troop might not be enough.
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
135
There was no answer at the door. Thomas started to tell Castero to break it in
when he glanced down and found Kade Carrion at his elbow. The water that was
beading on his dark cloak was dripping from her hair and her dingy red dress.
She had appeared so suddenly it was possible that she had simply risen out of
the mud. She had been investigating the street on her own, wandering about in
a random fashion and poking around doorways. "There's someone in there," she
said positively.
"There's no answer," Castero called.
Thomas looked down at Kade. "Is it warded?"
She stared at the door, brows drawn down in concentration. "No. It should be."
"Open it," Thomas told Castero.
The guard drew his pistol and used the heavy butt to pound the lock. The wood
around it cracked and Castero used his shoulder. As he struck the door it
swung backward and came off its hinges.
Kade slipped past Thomas almost before the door gave way. As she ducked inside
Castero jumped back and muttered, "Pardon me."
If it's a trap, she's determined to spring & first. Thomas signalled Baserat
and another two guards to stand watch outside and followed her, drawing his
rapier.
Inside was a high-ceilinged area with a stone staircase curving up the wall to
the second-floor entrance. The floor was stone paved, and a black coach with
polished brass fittings stood in front of the carriage doors. Light came in
through high narrow windows in the outside wall. There was stabling beneath
the stairs, and Thomas nodded for one of. his men to investigate it.
Kade was halfway up the steps and Thomas called to her, "Give us a moment,
please." She threw her arms up in exasperation, but stopped, tapping her foot
impatiently.
The guard flushed a couple of frightened grooms out of the stalls where they
had been attempting to hide. From the
13*
MARTHA WELLS
number of horses stabled there, Lestrac was indeed home and entertaining.
Thomas put two more men to watch the servants and to keep any fugitives from
escaping behind them, then headed toward the stairs, the others following him.
Kade was off again as soon as he started up. Behind him, Castero whispered,
"Captain, should we let hft- go first' I mean, she is a woman."
"Presumably she knows that," Thomas told him.
At the top of the steps just before the wooden doors, Kade stopped them with
an outflung arm. After a moment of intense study of the dirty stone of the
landing, she tore a scrap of cloth from her skirt hem, licked it, and stooped
to rub it over some invisible spot on the flagstones. Something came away
bright blue, and Kade flicked the cloth over the edge of the landing.
"A ward, but it wasn't working anymore. It was old," she admitted, and stepped
up to push the door open.
It was the first room of a suite of salons, the dying embers in the hearth
revealing landscape paintings, papered walls, heavy oak cabinets, and brocaded
chairs. Sprawled around on the fine furnishings and all drunk into
unconsciousness were three young men Thomas recognized as sprigs of nobility
and two women whose elaborate and revealing costumes proclaimed them
upper-class bawds. A bottle had broken on the floor and wine had seeped into
the carpet, and from the smell, they had been lacing the stuff with syrup of
poppies. Some of the candles were still lit, their holders half-buried under
bizarre shapes of dripped wax.
"We've interrupted a party," Thomas told Castero, who grinned, and tipped one
of the unconscious young nobles off a couch.
"A dull one," Kade said, looking around with a puzzled expression.
Thomas considered her a moment, suddenly recalling that she was a member of
the royal family and had spent some of her youth in a convent, then decided to
let it go. If he had
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
137
known Lestrac was going to be hosting an orgy, he would have reconsidered
allowing Kade to accompany them into the upstairs rooms, but he was damned if
he was going to say anything about it now.
"A livelier brood in here, Captain," one of the guards called from ahead, and
Thomas followed him into the next room.
There were five of them in a central parlor, and they had leapt up from a card
table, overturning their chairs, fumbling clumsily for swords. They were all
drunk, though not quite to the advanced stage of their companions in the other
room. "What is this?" one of them demanded muzzily. Thomas thought he might be
the second son of the Count of Belennier, though he wasn't certain. He ignored
the question and nodded to the guard who was covering them with a pistol, who
immediately said, "Drop your swords, gentlemen."
While they disarmed, Thomas quietly told Castero, "Leave a few men down here
to watch this lot, and take the others on ahead to search the rest of the
house. Lestrac is the one I want."
"What about me?" Kade whispered, standing at his elbow again.      *
"You go with him," Thomas snapped.
"Why?"
"You're here to spring sorcerous traps, not to stand about and be entertained
by me."
"Oh. My mistake." She didn't sound particularly chastened, but she followed
Castero and the others.
Turning back to the group held at bay, Thomas suddenly recognized what he'd
thought at first to be a completely unfamiliar face. It was the dark-haired
stranger he had seen with Denzil at the disastrous court last night. There was
nothing unusual about him; he had the same pale bedraggled look as the others,
the early lines on his face that came from too much drinking. But there was
something about his eyes . . . Guarding a queen of stubborn and definite
opinions in the crowded courts had made Thomas preternaturally sensitive, and
people
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MARTHA WELLS
who were hiding something usually broadcast it in some way, either in look or
gesture or simply by the way they stood. This man was hiding something.
The object under scrutiny seemed to realize he was being watched, and swayed a
little against the table. Thomas smiled to himself. He's also not as drunk as
he's pretending. "Where's Lestrac?" Thomas asked the group in general.
"He's about somewhere," answered the second son of the Count of Belennier, who
seemed to have elected himself the spokesman. "You'll pay for this, forcing
your way into a gentleman's house . . ."
"I'll discuss that witii the gentleman in question."
"Well, he's about somewhere."
"How long have you been here?"
"Oh, all day." Recalling he was outraged, the young man protested, "And you've
no right to question us, if it's Lestrac you're after."
And he's about somewhere. That would be all he could get om of them until he
actually produced Lestrac, but die chances were they hadn't been here
yesterday when Gam bin had visited the house. At least, if Lestrac had any
sense at all they wouldn't have been.
"Don't let them talk to each other," Thomas told the guard with the pistol,
and moved on after the othere.
They went from one well-appointed room to another and up the central staircase
to the third floor, the guards spreading out to search more thoroughly as Kade
flitted before mem checking for magical traps.
After a short while, it became apparent that die only inhabitants were those
they had already discovered and that Lord Lestrac was nowhere to be found, and
Thomas and Castero met back in a central parlor on the second floor.
"He must be on the run, Captain." The young guard absently kicked a chair.
"Unfortunately." Thomas looked around, one eyebrow lifted in an ironic
appraisal of the empty room. It seemed dear. Lestrac had used Gam bin in a
minor plot against Thomas.
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
139
When it failed to have the expected result, Lestrac had panicked, used magic
to dispose of Gambin, and fled. "How very neat and tidy." The other guests had
been herded into the next salon and were under guard. A few had families
influential enough that they would have to be released, but Thomas hated to do
it before he knew where Lestrac had gone. Each one was a potential accomplice.
Kade wandered into the room from the stairwell. She looked around, apparently
in a state of deep consternation. "It's here. I don't know what, but it's
here. And it's not." She moved around the room, touching things, stooping to
look under the furniture.
Madwoman, Thomas thought. But the longer he was in the house the more
suspicious it seemed to him. There was more here than appeared, or something
out of place, and he wasn't willing to leave until he found what it was.
Kade straightened suddenly. Her examination of the parlor had led her to the
far wall. "How many rooms on this floor?"
Castero stared at her. "Nine."
"Eleven upstairs." Thomas saw what she was getting at, and suddenly realized
what had seemed wrong about the place. It was the position of the stairwell in
relation to the second floor. He went to stand beside the sorceress and ran a
hand across the panelled wall. "Look at the way the top of this meets the
ceiling. It's a false wall. There must be a moving panel or . . ."
Kade said, "No, not a panel." She placed a palm on the center of the wall and
leaned toward it, whispering to it. Thomas stepped back as the shape of a door
slowly formed out of the dark wood, as if a sculptor were molding it out of
clay. Grinning with triumph, Kade stepped back as it solidified.
As she was reaching for the handle, Thomas caught a handful of her tattered
smock and hauled her out of the way. The two men stepped to opposite sides of
the door, Castero winding his pistol. At Thomas's elbow, Kade was silently
bouncing with excitement.
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MARTHA WELLS
Thomas twisted the handle and flung the door open.
It was a banqueting room with a long table and sideboards, lit by a dripping
candelabrum and chandeliers. There was a man seated at the end of the table,
slumped over forward.
Thomas advanced cautiously toward him. There was a half-empty wine bottle on
the table, two more on the floor underneath it.
He used a handful of the man's unkempt blond hair to pull him upright. It was
Lestrac. The lean, dissipated features were slack and sickly red. His eyes
didn't focus, and the pupils were so wide they seemed to cover most of the
white. His breath was quick and panting, as if he were running for his life.
It's poison, Thomas realized. Belladonna or henbane, something that the
Aderassi are always using to put each other out of the way. Holding the young
lord up, he could feel his burning skin. "Who did this to you, Lestrac? Was it
Grandier?"
The dying eyes seemed finally to focus. "No, no, not him ..." Lestrac
shuddered weakly, the effort of speaking almost too much.
"But you know him. Was he here?"
"No, he's ... He told me he'd teach . . . power. I should have known."
"Where is he now?"
"It was Dontane, on Grandier's orders," Lestrac said suddenly, his voice
growing stronger. He made a convulsive movement and caught the front of
Thomas's doublet "Captain Boniface, you've got to get that bastard Dontane."
Lestrac started to slide out of the chair and Thomas caught him and shoved him
back. The nobleman's head lolled and his eyes were wide open and staring,
though he still breathed. Thomas let him go and stepped back. That was it,
Lestrac would stay like this, impossible to wake, until he died in a few
hours. But they've made a mistake, perhaps the first one, Thomas thought.
Someone, perhaps Lestrac himself when he hired Gambin, had acted out of turn,
revealing that Grandier had the
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
141
help of others who could come and go inside the palace. And ifDenzil Isn't
involved somehow ... He told Castero, "Send someone for the men from the gate
watch. We're going to tear this place apart."
As the guard left, Kade did a quick circuit of the room, checking the walls
for more concealed doors. Watching her, Thomas knew that at least to some
extent she was enjoying herself, and that she certainly didn't give a damn for
the fact that Lestrac had all but expired a few moments ago. He didn't know
why that should bother him, since he didn't care either and knew that if even
half of what he suspected was true Lestrac would have been executed anyway.
And to some extent he was also enjoying himself. Perhaps her reaction annoyed
him because it was so much in tune with his own.
Kade had drifted back to the table and now took the wine bottle and emptied
the last of its concents onto the polished surface. She stirred the pool twice
with a finger and stared into it intently.
Unwilling to ask, Thomas stepped up behind her to see what she was doing.
Without looking up, she reached out and grabbed his wrist. Before he could
pull away, he saw a shadow come over the wine pool and something move within
it. It was a man. At first the image was shifting and muddy like a poor
mirror, but abruptly it cleared, revealing the face of the man in the other
room, the man who had been with Denzil at court last night.
Kade said quietly, "I thought so. He was in here, and they fought, or at least
argued. Violent emotions always make the strongest impressions."
She let Thomas go and he stepped back, and the pool became only wine again. He
hadn't realized until then how the sounds of his men searching the next room
and the occasional drunken protests of Lestrac's friends had temporarily faded
as the picture appeared in the pool. "Is he a sorcerer? Did he conceal the
door?"
"Maybe. But that one might have done it, too." She nod-
142
MARTH( WELLS
ded toward Lestrac's still form. "You said he knew some of the art, and it
wasn't a very powerful illusion, though it was tricky."
Thomas nodded to himself. "He brought Dontane in here, Dontane killed him,
then walked out through the unconcealed door on this side. He stayed with die
others to make sure Lestrac didn't come staggering out gasping accusations. He
must have known how long it would take to die from die stuff. Any later and we
would have missed him."
Kade looked thoughtful, then turned for the door, remarking pointedly, "Well,
I'm certainly glad I bothered to come."
After considering Lestrac's slumped body a moment more, he followed her.
Later, Thomas had the guards cany Lestrac out past the group gathered in the
parlor. Leaning on the billiard table, which was extravagantly covered in
green velvet and lit by candleholders mounted on its raised sides, he watched
the nobles react with varied degrees of befuddled shock. Including Dontane,
whose reaction was perfectly in keeping with the rest.
"When do we cany out this lot, Captain?" Castero asked.
"Now. Take them to the Cisteman Guard House for the present" He touched one of
the silver bells fitted above the billiard table's goal. "All except Dontane."
Dontane looked up, but if he was startled he concealed it well. As Castero and
the other guards herded Lestrac's guests out, Thomas waited patiently. When
they were gone, that left Dontane, three watchful guards at the door, and
Kade, who was sitting on top of a sideboard and swinging her feet As Thomas
looked at her and started to speak, she announced, "I've been a help, and
shown quite a bit of restraint, and I think I should be allowed to stay and
watch."
It was harder than Thomas would've thought to conceal his smile. He said,
"Well put."
Watching them with contempt, Dontane said, "I assume there is some reason for
my being singled out." He swayed slightly and steadied himself on a chair.
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
143
"You assume correctly. How long have you known Lord Lestrac?"
"Not long. But I am a friend of the Duke of Alsene."
"That puts you in the minority, then, because no one else here is." Jt would
have been foolish to deny the connection; Dontane must realize he would've
been seen at court last night. And why attend court at all, except to activate
the golem so it could attack a certain sorceress. Thomas folded his arms. "I
know you poisoned Lestrac."
Dontane drew himself up. "That is an insult, and I will challenge you for it."
He stiffened resentfully as one of the guards at the door chuckled.
Ignoring the bravado, Thomas said, "You were in that room with Lestrac. Were
you discussing a spy named Gambin, perhaps?"
"I don't know what you're talking about."
"He's lying," Kade interrupted.
"Yes, thank you, I know," Thomas told her, but he was watching Dontane's
reaction.
"I suppose 1 should be flattered that you find it necessary to have your pet
witch here to deal wirh me," Dontane sneered. But he had lost a little of his
drunken nonchalance. Kade's statement had shaken him.
" 'Pet witch.11 like that," Kade said, apparently addressing the blue faience
vase sitting next to her on the sideboard. "I'm going to put a curse on him."
"If you can't be quiet you'll have to leave, pet," Thomas said.
Kade turned a look of narrow-eyed reproach on him, then regarded Dontane with
so much sly malice it had to be artificial.
Thomas studied him thoughtfully a moment, then asked, "Are you a sorcerer?"
"I am not."
"Then are you a dabbler in magic, like Lestrac?" He hadn't forgotten the young
lord's last words: he said he'd teach power. If one had a taste of power,
enough to hide a door by
144
MARTHA WELLS
illusion, or to witch a useless spy dead, the temptation to learn more at the
hands of a master like Grandier would be overwhelming.
"No, I am not," Dontane said, looking away in disgust.
Had he hesitated, deciding how to answer? "Is he a sorcerer?" Thomas asked
Kade.
She dug a moment in the pocket of her smock, and when she drew her hand out
her fingers were covered with a dark powdery substance. She touched her
forefinger carefully to the comer of each eye, then looked up at Dontane.
He smiled, scornfully. "Well, witch?"
She held his eyes a moment, then said, "I think he knew what I was doing."
Dontane snorted derision and looked away. Watching him carefully, Thomas
asked, "And what was that'"
"Putting gascoign powder in my eyes. If he had been using a spell, or if there
had been a spell on him, I would see it. It doesn't prove he isn't a
sorcerer."
Dontane smiled. "Alchemical powders are hardly a secret."
"Maybe," Thomas agreed. He'd heard of gascoign powder as well, but that
explanation for Kade's actions hadn't immediately leapt to mind. If Dontane
wasn't trained in the craft of sorcery, he had at least been much around those
who were. "Where's Grandier keeping himself these days?"
"Who? I don't know the name." It was said admirably, with just the right
amount of confusion.
Thomas smiled. "Then you must have been under a bushel. Everyone else knows
it" After Dr. Braun's murder, rumor had spread out of control in court circles
and Urbain Grandier's name had been prominent, though without any real detail.
Dontane should know that, but Thomas had been hoping to fluster him into a
lie.
Dontane's expression froze and for a moment he looked dangerous, and not at
all like the drunken puppies that Cas-tero had caned out.
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
145
Dangerous, Thomas thought, but weak, tike Lestrac, Someone's useful tool.
Certain now, he said, "You will be glad to know that I am extending the
hospitality of the palace to you."
"You'll regret this." Dontane had gathered up the remains of his facade, and
spoke with drunken arrogance.
"I'm sure one of us will," Thomas agreed.
It was evening by the time they returned to the palace. The rain had stopped
but the clouds still obscured the stars and the waning moon. Thomas had seen
the prisoners settled in the Cisternan Barracks, with Dontane in one of the
cells specially warded against the use of sorcery. Then he set off through the
corridor within the outer wall toward the King's Bastion. He wanted to find
Lucas and hear what they had found at Gam-bin's house, though he suspected it
wouldn't be much. The answers he needed would have to be pried out of Dontane.
It was pure luck they had managed to catch him at all.
Pure luck, and Kade, who had disappeared again after they passed through the
Prince's Gate, taking her confused motives with her. She couldn't be here
simply to cause trouble. Thomas might have realized Lestrac's hidden room was
there without her help, but he would never have gotten into it in time to
question the dying noble.
He climbed the rough-cut stone staircase that angled up into the King's
Bastion. The tapestry-concealed entrance on the third floor gave onto a long
central mirror-lined gallery, which was unusually crowded and noisy for this
time of night.
Thomas made his way past a group of loudly talking courtiers and saw the cause
of the excitement.
Denzil was dueling with Aristofan, Queen Falaise's poet-companion. They had
stripped to their shirts and were stalking each other up and down the length
of the candlelit room. The young poet was intent but breathing hard, and was
obviously having the more difficult time. Denzil, his blond hair tied back
from his face, was moving with easy grace and
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MARTHA WELLS.
confidence. It was the social event of the night, the women watching from
behind fluttering fans, the men commenting on the performance and quietly
placing wagers.
Thomas joined Lucas, who was watching from the sidelines with the old Count of
Duncanny and a few other bystanders. "How did it start?" Thomas asked his
lieutenant.
Lucas shrugged. "The boy accused Denzil of insulting the Queen in some way and
Denzil challenged him. It's all very mysterious. Neither will say exactly what
the insult was."
Arms folded and eyes critical, the old count said, "I don't think they know."
Most duels were sparked by boredom. Courtiers and city-dwelling nobles with
little to do except drink, gamble, and argue fought over everything from their
wives' honor to the score of card games. This one had a certain impromptu
look; there were no seconds and they were righting in the flickering,
inadequate light of the long gallery.
Face shining with exertion, Aristofan was quick to take advantage of the
openings in Denzil's guard, but his blade never seemed to connect. After a few
moments, Thomas recognized Denzil's technique, which was one he had often used
himself for training inexperienced swordsmen. Denzil was completely
controlling the fight by maintaining a constant distance between himself and
the young poet. Denzil was the taller man, and with his longer reach and
better control, Aristofan hadn't even a chance of wounding him.
The Duke of Alsene was using a special dueling sword with a black metal cup
hilt that matched his main gauche. Thomas noticed Aristofan was using a
businesslike dueling rapier. "Where did he get that sword?" He looked at
Lucas.
Lucas shifted uncomfortably. "You should have seen the one I took away from
him. The boy was going to try to defend himself with a piece of jewelry."
"Getting sentimental in our old age, are we?"
"Won't help," the count said quietly.
Thomas sensed movement near him and looked down to find Kade Carrion at his
elbow again, watching the fight with
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a faint look of contempt. He was beginning to wonder if the woman was
intentionally following him. As if aware her presence had been noted, she
asked, "What's this about?"
Several nearby watchers looked around at the shabby figure of the sorceress in
surprise, having not realized she was there until that moment. Thomas said,
"Possibly the Queen's honor, possibly nothing. Public opinion is divided at
the moment."
She glanced up at him suspiciously, then said, "Oh."
The Duke was continuing to play with Aristofan, turning the duel into a
cat-and-mouse game Thomas was finding repellent.
Kade asked suddenly, "Are the rumors about Denzil and Roland true?"
Thomas automatically glanced around to see if any of Denzil's tale-bearing
friends were within earshot. Roland had a morbid fear of idle talk, and what
the gossips would make of Kade s innocent question would reach his ears in no
time. Her presence had cleared the immediate vicinity of everyone except
himself, Lucas, and the Count of Duncanny, who was a staunch supporter of
Ravenna's faction, and Thomas didn't see any real reason not to answer her
question. "If they are, it isn't because of any affection or desire on
Denzil's part, at least." He had always seen Roland and Denzil's attachment as
a strange sort of parasitic relationship on both sides, and he found himself
searching for a way to explain it. "And I don't think it matters. Denzil's
real control over Roland is the friendship they had when they were boys. If
Roland had other favorites, or even if he managed to notice Falaise's
existence for once, it would mean taking his attention away from Denzil, which
Denzil can't allow. Roland must know how easy it is for a king to attract
admirers; Denzil doesn't want him to discover how easy it would be to use a
rival against him."
The Duke of Alsene was apparently finding the fight as it was boring. He
stepped back, tossing away his main gauche and drawing a second one from his
sash. The hilt on the long dagger was overelaborate and the blade looked oddly
heavy.
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A moment later this was explained as Denzil pressed a hidden catch on the
weapon's hilt and two metal rods popped out of the central blade and snapped
into positions at acute angles to it. Their movement revealed that the center
blade had a serrated edge.
The old count shook his head in disgust and walked away.
Kade asked, "What is that?"
"It's for breaking blades," Thomas explained.
"I thought that's what quillions were for."
"Obviously we were all mistaken."
Aristofan shifted his stance and adjusted his grip on his rapier. The weapon
was obviously heavier than what he was used to, but it still wouldn't hold up
against the main gauche's serrated edge. Aristofan and Denzil circled each
other.
"You're about to lose a blade," Thomas told Lucas.
"I've been doing this twenty years and I never needed anything like that,"
Lucas said, exasperated. "This isn't a duel; it's a murder. That young idiot
ought to give over."
"It would look bad. People would talk." Thomas's voice was heavy with irony.
"He'd be alive to hear them. He's only a poet; why should he care what people
say?"
"Everyone does," Kade said.
Thomas looked down at her and saw the tension in the way she was standing, the
intent look in her gray eyes, and realized what she was about to do. He
decided to let her.
Aristofan attempted a desperate parry and Denzil trapped the boy's sword in
his elaborate main gauche and snapped the blade. The Duke's first slash opened
a long cut on Aristofan's cheek; his second never landed.
Kade slammed into Denzil from the side. He staggered and twisted away from
her, landing heavily. Before she could leap on him, Thomas caught up with her
from behind and pulled her out of the way. Denzil leapt to his feet, threw
down his sword, and started toward her.
Thomas shoved him backward and said, "Temper, my lord. Take them one at a
time."
They were treated to a good view of Denzil with the veneer of civility
stripped away. "How dare that bitch interfere with me?" he shouted.
Aristofan had fallen to the floor and was pressing his arm to his face, trying
to staunch the blood flow. A couple of watching servants ran forward to help
him.
"I'll do more than interfere with you, posturing monkey," Kade sneered at the
infuriated Denzil. "Why don't you take on someone with a chance against you?"
"There's an idea," Thomas remarked pleasantly.
Denzil focused on him and his expression changed. He smiled and gestured back
toward the fallen poet. "Is that the problem, Captain? Am I usurping your
duty?"
They regarded each other for a moment, long enough to realize the entire
chamber had fallen silent. Thomas turned and saw Roland standing in the
doorway at the far end of the room, his attendants grouped around him. After a
moment of angry contemplation, the King strode forward and shouted, "What is
this?"
"What do you think it is?" Kade asked him with withering contempt.
Roland turned a slightly darker shade of red, embarrassment added to anger,
and said, "You will all stop this immediately."
There was some shuffling among the spectators as they tried to look as if they
were obeying. The main figures in the drama simply stood there and stared at
him.
Roland looked at Denzil and started to speak, then abruptly wheeled and
stormed out of the room. Denzil recovered his sword and went after him without
even a glare for anyone else.
As Thomas expected, Lucas and the others had found nothing incriminating ^it
Gambia's house that had any bearing on Ur-bain Grandier. They had brought the
body and its effects back to the palace and Galen Dubell had promised to
examine them.
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Thomas had gone out to the portico that extended off the third floor to take a
shortcut across to the main part of the building when Kade caught up with him.
She asked loudly, "Why did you stop me?"
He turned to face her. The threatened afternoon storm had never produced more
than a light rain, but the evening breeze was damp and strong, shifting the
lamps hanging from the columns and tearing at her hair. He asked, "Why did you
let me?"
He watched her mentally back up to begin again. She demanded, "What did Denzil
mean by 'usurping your duty?"
She could hear it from anyone, and was perfectly capable of badgering him
about it for hours. He said, "Queen Falaise had a lover, a young stupid man
like Aristofan, nearly helpless with a sword. He became too arrogant, she sent
him away, and he insulted her in front of important witnesses. I killed him."
Her eyes narrowed. "You wanted to stop the duel."
"Yes." hi spite of everything, he was surprised. For someone who leapt to
conclusions as often as she did, her leaps were fairly accurate.
She stared at him. "You bastard, if you want to kill Denzil, have the guts to
do it yourself; don't use me for it."
"If you don't want to be used, then don't open yourself to it by behaving
stupidly and leaving other people to pick up the pieces. You can't play the
spoiled witless child all your life."
"Well it's better than what you're playing at, isn't it?"
"I wouldn't know, having never been so lacking in initiative that I had to act
like a raving idiot to get what I wanted."
As Kade was drawing breath to answer, there was a crash beneath their feet as
a glass-paned door was flung violently open on the balcony of the floor below.
Both of them flinched.
"My lord, . . ." Denzil's voice said.
"Don't call me that, not while we're alone." It was Roland.
Thomas remembered that this terrace was directly above
the balcony of one of Roland's private solars. He and Kade regarded each other
in silence. They could hardly object to each other's eavesdropping, Thomas
supposed, having just come to the mutual conclusion that they were both too
despicable to live in polite company anyway.
Denzil asked, "Are you all right?"
"You ask me that?"
The voices below had grown softer, and Thomas took a silent step forward to
the railing to hear more clearly. After a moment Kade quietly joined him.
"What' Were you worried?" Denzil's voice had a laugh in it. "That was barely
worth the effort."
"You take too many chances. But you should have left that boy alone. He's
nothing." Roland was oblivious to the fact that Aristofan was perhaps a year
or two older than himself.
"He insulted me. And you should thank me for ridding you of him. He's your
wife's lover."
"He's nothing. All the married women in the city have lovers. My mother has
lovers. God knows my father had worse habits . . ."
"Don't. If your honor means nothing to you, it means something to me."
And how is Roland's Honor affected by an insult to Denzil, Thomas wondered.
Where was Dr. DubeU to ask the pertinent question?
"Sometimes I think you're the only one."
Denzil did not dispute this. "I'm sorry I upset you. That bitch of a sorceress
. . ."
"Is my sister."
At his side Thomas sensed Kade stiffen.
"And where was she when you needed her?"
"She ran away. I loved her and she left me behind without a second thought."
Kade shivered once, a slight movement with all the intensity of a restrained
convulsion. Thomas found himself unwillingly sympathetic. Roland had been the
Crown Prince; his exiled sister could hardly have taken him with her, as if
they
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were farm children escaping a harsh master. And the choice to stay with him in
the city had been taken from her by Ravenna's command.
Kade drew back as if to leave. Impulsively, Thomas put a hand on top of hers
on the railing and she froze. At that moment an army probably couldn't have
kept .her on that balcony by force, but that gentle touch seemed enough to
hold her there.
"Who stayed with you?" Denzil asked. "You did. I'd have died without someone."
"Then it's a good thing she wasn't all you had." There was silence, then a
creak as one of the men below opened the door.
Thomas released Kade's hand, and she vanished back through the archway.
KADE FOUND HERSELF in need of
company. Falaise was the only person she could think of who might possibly be
willing to put up with her, and Kade was in such a mood that she was willing
to put up with moping, which was probably what Falaise was doing at the
moment. The Queen's apartments were on the fifth level of the King's Bastion,
but when Kade came up the stairs to where she could see the doorway of the
first antechamber, it looked like a disturbed anthill. Gentlewomen and
maidservants were running in and out, and Queen's guards were stalking around
outside the door. That doesn't look promising, Kade thought. She didn't
particularly want to start another sensation, so she crept back down the
stairs and out of sight.
The next stairwell gave onto the cathedral-like entrance of an old gallery,
and she stopped in front of the oaken doors carved with willows and birds of
paradise. This was the hall where the royal portraits were kept, "where the
family was interred," as some long-ago courtier had referred to it.
After a moment Kade went inside.
It was cold with the chill of marble, fine wood laid over stone, and gilded
frames, and felt barren as rooms that have never been lived in feel. The hall
lanterns illuminated ancestors, distant relations, and the notables of this or
other ages, which Kade passed by without more than cursory glances. There was
only one set of portraits here anyone ever came to see. They were the
Greancos, the portraits of the royal family.
Other painters had done royal portraits which were
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MARTHA WELLS
scattered about the palace or presented to favored nobles, but the ones by
Greanco were in another class. Greanco had been a seventh son of a seventh
son, with half his mind in the Otherworld. Having a portrait done by him was
to take a chance at having one's soul revealed. Fortunately for Greanco, this
held a fascination for Ravenna and her family dial had kept him at court
longer than anyone else would have put up with him.
Knowing the effect and having felt it before didn't help; shivers ran up
Kade's back as she stood beneath those canvas eyes. She had to fight the
conviction that there were people watching her who disappeared when she turned
to face them. Anyone with any sensitivity at all felt that way around a
Greanco painting; for Kade's nervous and heightened awareness the sensation
was almost too vivid.
She stopped before Greanco's portraits of the old kings Ravenna's father and
grandfather. Their hard eyes stared down at her, and the force of their
personalities was like a swift current in a river. Both men had been
beleaguered warrior kings, and the primary impressions the portraits gave were
those of guile and strength. Undoubtedly they would have found Ravenna a
proper daughter; her strong features were echoed in theirs. But what would
they think of Roland, Kade wondered. Or herself, for that matter? Probably not
much, she decided. Why Ravenna's father had chosen to settle the ruling right
on Fulstan and not on her was a mystery. Perhaps he had not entirely trusted
her, or perhaps he mistook independence for willfulness. Kade had heard that
Fulstan had always put on a good show for his father-in-law. It hadn't
mattered in the end, and Ravenna had had the kingdom in reality, if not in
name. We all make mistakes, she told the portrait silently, as she moved on.
But some of us have to live with them.
There were solemn representations of other relatives, and courtiers she should
have known, generals or statesmen who had walked these rooms when she was a
child and had since died. But like the children she had played with until her
father found reasons to send their families away, she only dimly
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155
remembered their faces and couldn't quite recall their names.
Then she circled a pillar and found herself facing the portrait of Fulstan in
his prime. Surprisingly Kade could look at it without emotion; Greanco had
painted an empty slate, a weak vessel that had not yet been subjected to the
stresses that would deform it. Greanco had faithfully depicted the handsome
features, the full brown hair, and the wide-set blue eyes but had managed to
give the impression that the beauty was transitory, and not something that
grew out of character and would last through age. The later portrait that
revealed the older, bitter man was said to hang in Ravenna's bedchamber, there
only because the Dowager had reportedly said that she couldn't think of a
better place for him than nailed up there on, the wall, watching.
Kade remembered dial the night of the Ariequin's attack, Denzil had brought up
die subject of her father's suspiciously quick illness and death, and she'd
felt an odd mingling of triumph and guilt. She had been almost certain for
years that she had caused Fulstan's death with that same unskilled power that
had smashed the cathedral's windows, that she had wished him dead all the way
from the Monelke Convent. But she was a little afraid of those thoughts, too.
She wanted to think her sorcery had some control, that it wasn't as wild as
her fay magic. But study was the only cure for lack of control, and she should
be studying in the quiet peace of Knockma instead of stirring up trouble here.
The next was a portrait of Roland as a child. The better-known and inferior
portrait by Avisjon hung in a more prominent location downstairs. Despite the
trappings of royal tunic and mantle, the scepter and the Hand of Justice,
Greanco had captured Roland's frightened eyes all too well.
She wandered down the line a little and unexpectedly encountered her own
portrait.
/ should have known, she thought. Ravenna wouldn't have let Roland burn the
rags Greanco used to wipe his brushes, let alone one of his paintings.
When it had been done so long ago, she had been upset
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MARTHA WILLS
that her awkwardness and anxiety had been so well revealed. Now she saw what
had really been there. It was pain.
So that's what it was like, she thought. It seems I might have forgotten.
Kade now understood why Ravenna had had the portrait put away after it was
complete. It was also a reproach. How it had found its way up here she
couldn't imagine.
She stepped back to where she could see both her own and Roland's portraits
and thought, Did I run away? At the time it had seemed a glorious escape. What
would have happened if I'd stayed? Nothing or everything. She couldn't
remember being angry at Roland when she left for the convent. She felt like a
contributor to that expression on Roland's young face which Greanco had
captured so well, and she didn't like the feeling. I should leave, tonight,
now. This isn't turning out the way I imagined and I'm Just in the way. Now
that they 've met me again they probably won't even be afraid of me anymore.
Kade remembered that hot Midsummer Eve's day when the power had come flowing
out of her as if she were a bottle shattered from pressure within. She hadn't
had any grudge against the cathedral itself; in fact, she rather regretted the
destruction of those stained glass windows, but the power had been out of her
control. She had done simple magics under Galen Dubell's tutelage, but that
had been the first time the ability had risen in her with such strength, the
first time she could focus it at will. It had been marvelous. But it was the
first and only time. She would not reach that peak so easily again. The only
road to that kind of power was the one of hard study, and she had dedicated
the years since to mastering her abilities, though it had never been easy. And
perhaps she had let the more painstaking magics of sorcery take second place
to the easy power of fayre.
She turned to go, but she had missed the paintings on the other side of the
gallery and now one caught her eye. Greanco's work was typically hard to
ignore but this one was
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particularly striking. It was an informal portrait of a younger Ravenna with
an elite group of her Queen's Guard and the officers. She sat in the center,
dressed in a mantua of black velvet and flame silk, a rose of diamonds on her
breast. Thomas leaned on the chair at her side and slightly behind her, with
the rest of the guards grouped around, all handsome and all with a pronounced
air of danger.
Kade didn't remember seeing it before. It must have been done after she had
left, to commemorate the recently victorious Bisran War, when Ravenna had
brought the years of fighting to an end. It was odd that it was not somewhere
downstairs, but Kade supposed that it had been" scandalous for an independent
queen with a useless husband to have her portrait done with a group of young
men, but then that was Ravenna down to the bone, and Greanco had conveyed
that, too. During that war, Ravenna had travelled extensively around the
disputed borders with her guard and one or two maidservants. But knowing
Ravenna, she had probably chaperoned the maidservants more than they had
chaperoned her. A few bishops had spoken out against her, but the rest of the
country thought the Church poked into other people's morals too much as it
was; landlaw barely took notice of adultery, and less than a hundred years ago
queens had traditionally taken lovers among their personal bodyguard.
It was the tacit rules of landlaw that allowed Ravenna to keep command of the
Queen's Guard when she should have passed it on to Falaise as the younger
woman was crowned. Under landlaw, a personal bodyguard could not be inherited
or given away without the liege's permission, and if there was something
Ravenna was good at, it was manipulating laws and circumstances to her own
ends.
I should learn to do that, Kade thought. But fayre had few laws, or at least
few that made sense, like the court, the denizens of the Kingdoms of Fay
fought, plotted, and stabbed one another in the back to excess, but they were
soulless creatures and their passions were short-lived and shallow. The
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MARTHA WELLS
outcomes of their games didn't really matter to them, and there was nothing
like the solid trust that was reflected in this portrait . . .
You are getting sentimental, you idiot.
She turned and caught her breath as she saw the next portrait. It was one of
Thomas Boniface, also in informal dress. Even for a Greanco it was dark and
elusive. Though Thomas was more than ten years the elder, he and Denzil had
much the same presence in person: arrogant and sensual and well aware of their
own worth, both wolves in lapdogs' clothing. The portrait suggested that in
the Captain's case the arrogance might be tempered by irony.
Tradition dictated that the Captain of the Queen's Guard as well as the
Preceptor of the Albonate Knights renounce all familial connections so their
whole loyalty would be to the crown. Nepotism and interfering relations could
be permitted with other nobles who served in the palace, but these positions
were seen as too important. Renier had been Duke of something, Kade
remembered, when he handed the whole thing over to a younger brother and took
his post for Roland. Thomas had been Viscount Boniface.
Both court offices came with a huge amount of wealth and some land, but gave
up the right to leave that wealth to any heir other than the next man
appointed to the position. If die Albonate Preceptors lived to retire they
were usually created a duke and awarded estates and income. It was assumed the
same thing would be done for the Captains of the Queen's Guard, but in recent
history all of them had died at duty.
Kade realized abruptly that Thomas Boniface probably expected the same to
happen to him. If he outlived Ravenna his position at court would not be a
good one. Roland and Denzil were both against him, and Falaise seemed helpless
to protect anyone including herself. That was what the portrait conveyed, Kade
knew suddenly. It was the face of a man who took service with the crown
accepting the possibility of eventual betrayal and a violent death, but not
one who enjoyed
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159
having to kill people whose main crime seemed to be stupidity.
Kade turned away and started resolutely for the stairs, telling herself, /
don't know why I care; I don't even like him anymore anyway.
Then the nagging restlessness that had plagued her coalesced into dread, and
she stopped in the doorway. Her heart was fluttering. She took a deep breath,
her hand pressed to her chest, and tried to think what it could be.
Something's gone wrong; something's happening. She forced herself to move
forward, to start down the stairs. I've got to get to Galen.
"What kind of a man is Grandier?" Thomas asked.
Galen Dubell paused, kneeling on the floor beside the wall niche, to give the
question serious consideration. "He is driven," he said finally, looking up at
Thomas seriously. "And in pain. The worst sort of opponent to face."
They were in one of the deep cellars of the Old Palace, and the rough stone
walls glistened faintly in the flickering light of the candlelamp. Stone
pillars as wide as draft carts stretched up into darkness to meet the arched
ceiling somewhere overhead. The dirty, straw-dusted floor was littered with
broken or empty barrels, boxes, and odd pieces of ironwork. Battered and
forgotten siege engines, which had been lowered through traps in the ceiling
sometime in the dim past, looked like the metal skeletons of beached sea
monsters in the half-light. The three Queen's guards Thomas had assigned to
watch Dubell when the old man's work took him into deserted corners of the
palace were wandering at the edges of the light, fighting both boredom and
nerves and trying to look unaffected.
In an effort to discover what was wrong with the wards, Dubell was examining
'the warding stones buried in various locations around the palace. He was also
planning on moving the keystone. He could remove it with Thomas and the guards
present, but he would have to convey it to its new resting place alone. Thomas
wasn't happy about Dubell moving
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about the undercellars of the palace unguarded, but the keystone was kept safe
by being hidden away among the hundreds of other warding stones. Dubell was
the only one who would know its exact location.
After carefully examining the dull-colored, egg-shaped warding stone, Dubell
had replaced it in its wall niche and sealed it up with clay from a bucket
carried by an unwilling servant boy he had drafted for the task.
"Driven by what'" Thomas asked.
"By his convictions." Dubell climbed to his feet awkwardly and they started
toward the pillars in the center of the cavernous room, the boy trailing
behind.
The cellar was damp, but the air was neither too hot nor too cold, and not at
all stale, as if the airshafts within the thick walls of the Old Palace
overhead might have openings somewhere in the cellar's ceiling.
' Thomas had followed Dubell down here to ask him what he had found out about
Gambin's death, but the sorcerer hadn't been able to discover what the spy had
been killed with or how it had been done. Now he needed to head back to the
Cisteman Guard House where the prisoners were being held, to begin questioning
Dontane, but Dubell was his best source on Grandier and he wanted to find out
what he could. Thomas said, "I don't understand why his convictions would lead
him against us. This isn't Bisra. If a sorcerer or a witch steals or kills his
neighbor, he is hanged just like anyone else, but not for practicing magic."
"That, of course, is the difficult point. Why is he here at all? In Lodun we
believe he has never been across our borders before, even though his father
was from Ile-Rien. He has certainly never been accused of a crime, justly or
unjustly, by our crown. Which leads me unfortunately to believe that his
grudge against this land or this city is ideological, in which case there is
little that can be done to deter him."
Thomas shook his head. "I can't agree with that. There's a member of the city
Philosophers' Academy who has invented some kind of clockwork that can add
figures when he turns
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the knobs on the outside. The Inquisitors General in Bisra heard about it and
have declared him a devil's servant, and if he ever crosses their border
they'll kill him. If Grandier considers himself such a scholar, why isn't he
still over the border giving the BJsran crown hell?"
"It would certainly seem more sensible of him, unless," Dubell paused as the
idea occurred to him, "he has been offered money by someone to persecute us."
"That's been considered." In Bisra, mobs surrounded the churches where the
Inquisition held court, accusing each other of witchcraft and seeing demons
under every bush. If it came out that the Bisran crown had employed a man who
had escaped the death sentence for black magic, there would be riots it would
take them weeks to put down. Thomas kicked a pillar thoughtfully. He'd have to
consider ways to let the appropriate rumors slip across the border. "Grandier
might do it, if they offered him something he wanted badly enough."
"I don't know. If I were him, I think my quarrel against them would run too
deeply."
"There are several possibilities as to who could have hired him." He had no
wish to discuss the possibilities who were nearer at hand than Bisra; not with
Galen Dubell, at any rate. "And you have never heard of this man Dontane?"
"Not in connection with Urbain Grandier. Not at all, in fact. The poison that
the poor fellow Lestrac was given tends to cause hallucinations and delusions
before the sleep that soon turns to death. He might have accused the man
falsely."
Thomas didn't think it had been a delusion. Lestrac had been too certain, too
angry in his betrayal. "Kade seemed sure that he was the one in the room with
Lestrac. She made his likeness form in a pool of wine."
"That is not entirely a tried-and-true method. Kade is," Dubell hesitated,
"quite brilliant in a peculiar way. But she also tends to let her imagination
get the best of her."
Thomas, who thought of Dubell as brilliant in a peculiar way also, didn't
comment.
The old sorcerer stopped at one of the huge pillars and
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THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
163
pointed to a square section near the base that had been carved out and
refilled with clay. "This is where the keystone is buried. I've already
prepared the new location for it, and it will only take me a short time to
convey it there. Not long enough to cause any degeneration in the wards."
Thomas knelt to look at the clay seal more closely. "This is recent. Have you
looked at it before?"
"No." Dubell stooped anxiously, and started to pry out the clay. "Perhaps Dr.
Surete ... God, if it's been this all along ..."
The explosion was like a cannon going off directly over their heads. The stone
pillars trembled with the shock of it, releasing a rain of dust and rock chips
from above. Thomas stood, then staggered as the floor slipped suddenly under
his feet. Deafened by the noise, he waited for the thousands of tons of stone
to come crashing down on top of them.
The walls shuddered back into stillness.
For a moment Thomas and the other guards stared at each other. "What ..."
whispered Baserat.
Dubell had rocked back on his heels with the concussion but he kept digging
away at the day.seal. It broke under the pressure and he reached back into the
niche. "It's empty," he said, and began to curse Grandier.
Thomas hauled the old sorcerer to his feet. "Come on," he said and led them at
a run toward the stairs. It might have been the city armories, he thought. The
two long stone buildings housed stores of gunpowder and stood on the opposite
side of die inner wall from the Gallery Wing. But even if both had gone up at
once . . . No, there was no accidental cause for an explosion like that; the
palace was under attack, from outside or from within. He tried to remember who
had been on duty in the building overhead, and where Ravenna was likely to be
at this time.
They reached the staircase at the far end of the shadowy darkness. Thomas took
the lamp from the guard who had had the presence of mind to bring it and held
it up. The narrow stairs spiralled upward, unblocked as far as the light
reached.
Thomas said, "Load your pistols."
Dubell took the lamp and moved to peer uneasily up into the stairway as the
guards loaded their weapons with the swiftness of long practice. By the time
Thomas closed the cover over the priming pan of his second wheellock and
tucked it back into his sash, he'd calmed himself enough to think clearly. If
the few of them were going to do any good, there could be no mistakes.
He started up the stairs, the others following behind him. The four-story
climb might have stretched to infinity.
They had reached the second flight when there was a yell from behind and
Thomas turned back. Treville was slumped on the stairs clutching his side. The
figure standing over him was nightmarish; it looked like a man, but its skin
was gray and foul, its dothes in brown tatters, and its hair a torn greasy
mop. It seemed as though they froze there, staring at the apparition, for
moments, but it must have been only half a heartbeat because the creature
never had another chance to move. On the stairs below, Baserat struck upward
at the same time that Martin fell on it from above and almost succeeded in
impaling himself on the other guard's sword.
Dubell flattened himself back against the wall so Thomas could get past. The
two guards were standing back from the creature now, looking down in shock.
Thomas had to put a hand on Martin's shoulder and move him out of the way
before he could see it.
Its narrow features twisted in death, it looked like a man who had been held
prisoner in a dark place for a very long time and starved. The place in its
chest where the point of Baserat's rapier had emerged was bloody but also
burned, as if the metal blade had been red-hot
Dubell had edged down past them and was helping Treville to sit up. Thomas
picked up the weapon the creature had used. It was a bronze short sword, with
a narrow blade and wickedly sharp edges. Not much protection against a steel
weapon, but it did its job well enough on human flesh.
"It was up above us, perched there, Captain," Baserat said.
"What is it?" Thomas asked Dubell.
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"Fay, but I don't recognize what sort." He finished staunching Treville's
wound and looked up at them. "With the keystone removed from the matrix for
more than a few hours, the wards would begin drifting away from the outer
walls of the newer sections of the palace. The creatures must have been
waiting for a large enough opening. If this is an attack in force ..."
Thomas felt everyone's eyes on him. He looked down at Treville and said, "Can
you walk?"
"Out of here I could run." The man grinned weakly.
"Good." Thomas looked at the others. "Let's go, gentlemen."
Dubell helped Treville to his feet, then reached back to collar the servant
boy and pull him farther up the stairs. "Here, boy, carry the lamp, and don't
fall behind."
The boy took the lamp in a shaking hand and whispered, "Yes, Sir."
The air in the stairwell was growing warnier. It might mean the entrance above
them was blocked, or the building overhead had caught fire, or collapsed
entirely. It might have been Katie. It might have been her plan all along,
Thomas was thinking. He had no idea why that thought made him so angry. She
had never promised him anything.
The final turn brought Thomas to face the wooden doorway at the top of the
stairs, which still stood open as they had left it earlier. The darkened
corridor was blocked by the collapse of its wood and plaster ceiling. Dim
lamplight shone down from the resulting gap in the passage above.
Thomas climbed the debris and took a cautious look through the opening. It was
a passageway, its floor and one wall wood while the rest was the original
stone. The source of the light was hidden around a corner farther up the way.
He thought about the layout of the Old Palace and decided they were near the
lower kitchens and storerooms. There were many ways leading out into the rest
of the structure from here; some would have to be unblocked.
"All right," he said to the others, "this is our way."
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
165
It took some moments to get Treville up into the passage, his wound making
their efforts to help difficult and painful for him. Just as Thomas gave
Dubell a hand up, Baserat signalled them hastily for silence.
The guard had gone a few steps farther up the passage to listen. "Hear that?"
he whispered.
In another moment they all did. There were people farther down the passageway.
For a moment the knowledge that they were not the only survivors of some
immense disaster was reassuring, then the faint sound turned into a tumult as
shouts and a woman's scream echoed down to them.
"Save your pistols," Thomas told them. The unspoken thought was on all their
faces. Because we don't know what we'll find upstairs . . .
They went down the passage and burst through an archway into a large
low-ceilinged storeroom. A group of men and women dressed as servants was
trapped in a corner, fighting off more of the sickly creatures with torches
and clubs and whatever else they had been able to find. The fay rushed their
new attackers as they entered the room. The first leapt at them waving its
sword over its head and was disembowelled by Thomas's rapier. A bronze sword
swung at him from the side and he swept it away and punctured the owner's
chest.
One of the fay kicked over a lamp, sending the room into near darkness.
Obviously the creatures can see in the dark, Thomas thought, parrying another
thrust from one of the fay. Ptty we can't.
Dubell shouted something and clapped his hands. Immediately a small bright
ball of pure light appeared over his head and hovered there, flooding the room
with a stark white illumination.
From behind, something grabbed Thomas's arm and swung him around. The strength
was astonishing for a creature so emaciated. He slammed the rapier's heavy
hilt into its face and it fell away from him with a shriek.
As he turned, Thomas saw that three more fay had come at them from the door to
the passageway. Hell, they must have
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MARTHA WELLS
been following us up the stairs. One had attacked the wounded Treville from
behind, and he was now sprawled bleeding on the floor. Martin leapt over his
wounded friend to knock the creature away from him; as it staggered back he
drove his rapier through it.
Nearby another fay was grappling with Dubell, trying to plunge its sword
toward his face, but the old sorcerer was holding it off. Dubell managed to
shift his weight and shove the creature up against the wall. Thomas stepped up
behind the sorcerer, said "Pardon me, Doctor," and finished off the creature.
All the other fay in the room were dowry The spell light above DubelTs head
died as the servants relit their lamps, and the strange unwavering white light
was replaced by the familiar flickering yellow.
"Captain," someone gasped at his side, and Thomas turned and saw Berham. The
servant had armed himself with a crude but effective iron club. "Captain,
there's fighting in the hall by the round stair. We could hear the shots.
That's where we was making for."
"Good." As an afterthought, Thomas asked, "Do you know what's happened?"
"No, Sir, I couldn't say that." Bertram's story was like their own. He had
been visiting nearby when the explosion had occurred. As a veteran of the last
war, his instincts had taken over and he had gathered survivors, armed both
men and women with what was available, and set off to join the organized
resistance.
Martin came up to them as Berham finished and said, "Dr. Dubell said TrevUle's
gone, Sir. The bastards go for the wounded like wolves."
"Aye," the servant said softly, looking back toward the bodies of his
companions who had not survived the ambush. "I noticed that."
"Take his sword and give it to Dr. Dubell. Let Berham use the pistols. We'll
come back for the bodies when we've
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
167
secured the palace," Thomas told him, and thought, I sound like a bloody idiot
of an optimist.
But it was what the other two men wanted to hear. As they moved to comply,
Thomas went to where the sorcerer was still kneeling beside Treville. Dubell
looked up at Thomas and said, "I'm sorry."
"It wasn't your fault."
"I don't like this. It's another damned war."
Another damned war, Thomas thought. But the Bisran army fought us for two
decades and they never got as close as this.
As they returned to the others, Baserat was leaning over the fay that Thomas
had disembowelled and poking the entrails experimentally with the tip of his
sword. "See, it looks human to me."
"You're right. I wish I had my glasses." Dubell peered down at the creature,
then said, "As I thought."
"What is it?" Thomas asked him.
"The Unseelie Court, or the Host, as they are more commonly called. On their
nightly rampages they seize human captives whom they will use to attack their
fellows." He paused as Martin came up and handed him TrevUle's rapier. The
sorcerer looked at the weapon as if he wasn't sure what it was, then said,
"Yes, of course."
"What makes men turn into that?" Thomas nudged the corpse with the toe of his
boot.
"Prolonged exposure to the influence of the Host. Their captives become like
them. Iron becomes poison to them. They gain some powers of the fay, but they
lose their souls in the process."
The room had grown silent to listen to him. The servants were watching him
with white bruised faces and apprehensive eyes.
Something bumped his elbow and Thomas looked down to see the servant boy who
had somehow managed to survive all this peering interestedly down at the fay's
corpse.
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"Berham," Thomas said. "Keep this one with your lot." "Yes, Sir," the older
servant said, and gestured sharply to the boy. "Come away from there, boy,
before you get in the way."
There would be for too many people wandering about without Berhams to organize
them. Unarmed retainers and servants, children who could not fend for or
protect themselves, women who would not think to pick up a weapon. "We have to
get moving," Thomas muttered.
Kade was on the stairs in the King's Bastion when the explosion shook the Old
Palace. She held onto the balustrade as the walls trembled in sympathy with
the adjoining building. A stiff breeze poured up the stairwell; the stink it
carried made her wince. The shaking stopped and the beams supporting the
stairs gave an uneasy creak before deciding to hold. Kade started down again,
stumbling occasionally because her legs were trembling for some reason. The
inexplicable wind had ceased with the reverberations of the explosion, but it
had left the air smelling of mud, stale water, and death.
It can't be the wards, Kade told herself uneasily.
She found the bottom of the stairway blocked by a panic-stricken crowd of
palacefolk and servants and she had to go back up a flight to work her way
around by back passages. She could smell smoke now, from fires that had caught
when candles and lamps had been knocked over.
When she reached the long gallery that connected the bastion to the Old
Palace, it was badly lit and in chaos.
Albon knights were milling around the doors and Renier was shouting orders.
Over the noise, someone was yelling, "If you don't send them to help us fight
the fire, they won't have anywhere to retreat!"
Kade ducked into the crowd, slipping past a mailed arm before it could stop
her. She emerged onto the wide balcony of the great spiral staircase that led
down into the main hall of the Old Palace.
It was a pitched battle.
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
169
The main hall was on two levels and the wide sweep of steps leading down to
the lower portion of it was where the battle line had been drawn. Furniture,
boxes, and other debris had been piled up at the top as cover for the
defenders. Queen's guards and a few Albon knights and Cistemans were manning
the barricades along with dishevelled courtiers, retainers, and servants who
had either taken up weapons or were crouching back behind the defenders and
reloading pistols. The lower half of the hall was walled away by a palpable
unnatural darkness. Missiles flew out of that darkness, bronze-tipped bolts of
a deadly effectiveness demonstrated by the number of corpses sprawled on the
floor.
Kade started down the staircase, one hand on its wide banister. The zoomorphs
carved on the stair's central column leered out of the shadows as they were
briefly illuminated by torches, adding to the nightmare quality of the scene.
Refugees struggled past her, palacefolk and wounded guards.
As she moved closer, she began to see past the curtain of shadow in a way the
others defending the barricade below could not. There was movement in that
darkness, mangled faces, shifting forms, distorted or partly human. The wards
must be gone, at least over the Old Palace and the Gallery Wing; that's how
this mess got in, Kade thought, and forced herself to keep moving down the
stairs toward that chaotic darkness stretched across the hall. But what drove
them here? It was the Unseelie Court, the rulers of the dark fay and the other
creatures who fed on blood and terror, who rode the night in the form of the
Host, preying on humans and destroying every living thing in their path. They
travelled the sky on dark windy nights accompanied, the church priests
claimed, by the souls of the dead and wreaking havoc wherever they went.
At the bottom Kade started toward the barricade, dodging running forms,
ignoring startled glances of recognition. As she reached the hastily erected
wall of broken furniture and tried to peer through it, she heard, "If it isn't
the Queen of Air and Darkness."
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The voice was sibilant and soft and came to her quite clearly over the noise.
She looked down slowly and saw the face through a gap in the barricade. It was
Evadne, one of the princes of the Unseelie Court. His narrow features might
have been called handsome by someone less picky about character, even if his
skin was powder blue. But though his expression was that of a wistful fay
child, his eyes were gloating and entirely adult. Kade said, "Your eyesight is
as bad as your sense of humor." She had never truly accepted her mother's
title, which Evadne must know.
He grinned up at her, revealing pointed teeth. "Why don't you join us, my
sister? What has the Seelie Court ever given you that you should risk your
life to side with them and battle us?"
Kade ignored the growing knot of coldness in her stomach and laughed at him.
The Seelie Court was the highest court of the Otherworld. Titania and Oberon
ruled it, but spent little time in governing the fay who swore allegiance to
them, and occupied most of their days in fetes, rades, contests, or other
unreal pastimes of Fayre. The fay loosely attached to the Seelie Court loved
daylight and music but were often dangerous to humans, either through acts of
mischief or simple lack of concern over human frailties.
The Queen of Air and Darkness was not truly a member of either court, and Kade
did not like to think about what would happen to the balances of power in the
Otherworld, which she only vaguely understood herself, if this were to change.
Evadne must be very confident to risk making that offer. She said, "The Seelie
Court has given me nothing, which is far better than the trouble you've given
me. What makes you think I'd throw my fortune in with either of you?"
His features drew into a pinched sneer. "The Host grows in power by the
moment. The mortals' pitiful protections are scattered and you can't stop us.
I'll destroy you myself."
"Promises, promises. Who's your master? Is it Urbain Gran-dier?"
The eyes hardened. "We have no master."
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
171
"I'll tell him you said that when I meet him."
Evadne stepped back, fading away into a darkness even Kade's sight couldn't
penetrate. "I expect," he whispered, "that you will ..."
Kade dropped to the floor and used the hem of her dress to wipe a clear spot.
Evadne had given her an idea. Those were powerful wards; they couldn 't simpfy
dissolve. They must be about somewhere. If she could find one . . .
"Hey, come away from there." She looked up to see a man in a Cisternan
officer's colors, who started back when he recognized her.
Kade said, "I need chalk, wax, and some burnt coal." At his expression she
shouted furiously, "Do you want help or not?"
An unblocked corridor leading out from the storerooms led Thomas and the
others into the main hall.
Wounded guards and refugees were climbing the huge spiral stair up into the
King's Bastion and a thick white pall of smoke from the pistols and muskets
hung in the air. Out of the confusion, Thomas spotted the Cisternan Commander
Vivan. He stepped forward and caught the other man's arm. "What did we lose?"
Vivan ran a hand through his dark hair and didn't seem to notice when it came
away bloody. He said, "They're in the Gallery Wing, and probably all of the
east side."
"What about the King's Bastion?"
"Secure. Everything inside the inner wall is secure, They didn't come through
there."
"The wards," said Galen Dubell, who was suddenly standing beside them. "They
have drifted away from the newer structures of the palace, but the foundations
in the older sections act as keystones themselves and are holding the wards in
place there."
Thomas nodded. "Good, it'll give us breathing room." What he wanted to do most
was slam Vivan up against a wall and demand to know where Ravenna and Falaise
were, but there was no time, and no sense in it. He knew Lucas and
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Gideon were on duty and for now he would just have to trust that they had
gotten both Queens to safety. He said to the Commander, "You're trying to push
them back so you can close the siege doors at the top of the stairs?"
"Yes, If we fall back now, they'll push forward and we'll all go, but the
sorceress said . . ."
"Who?"
"The sorceress said if we gave her some time she could keep them back long
enough to let us retreat."
"Where is she?"
"At the barricade. Thomas! They're throwing elf-shot."
That explained the ominously still forms that bore no visible wounds. "All
right."
Thomas spotted Kade's tattered form crouching near the center of the barricade
between two Cisternan guards firing muskets and began to make his way over to
her.
She had drawn some kind of design on the floor and was dripping wax from a
lighted candle onto it. She was muttering continuously at it and Thomas
thought she was saying a spell until he was close enough and realized she was
cursing.
He crouched beside her and said, "How much longer?"
She tossed her head to get the hair out of her face and said, "Hours, days,
weeks, how should I know?"
A bronze crossbow bolt came through the barricade and clattered off the stone
floor between them. They both hunched their shoulders instinctively and Kade
said, "Close," in a conversational tone. She tossed her hair back again.
Thomas reached over and tucked her hair into the back of her smock for her.
She muttered, "Thank you," without looking at him, a slow flush spreading up
her cheeks.
He said, "How much longer?"
"Not long. I'm almost done. Listen, what I'm doing is calling a ward." She
stopped as the barricade shuddered under another onslaught. "Impatient
bastards."
"Calling a ward?" he prompted.
"Yes. Its name is Ableon-Indis and it's supposed to be over
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173
the St. Anne's Gate but it's lying across the top of the King's Bastion now. I
don't know why."
"Someone's taken the keystone."
"Damn. That would be the reason, then. The newer wards float away from their
places without the keystone in the etheric structure, but the King's Bastion
has the strongest warding spells in the old parts of the palace. It's drawing
the drifting wards over to it." Her expression was grim. "Anyway, when I
finish this the ward should fall toward us here. If I'm lucky it will come to
ground right here along the barricade. When we leave, the Host will surge
forward, run into it, and get an unpleasant surprise. But Ableon-Indis will
start moving upward again almost immediately. What I'm doing here isnt as
strong as the warding spells still drawing it to the King's Bastion."
"So we'll have a few moments at best"
"Yes."
"It'll be enough."
She looked up quickly and grinned.
Berham made it over to them and knelt beside the barricade. "Albons are
holding the doors in the bastion, Sir," he reported.
"Which officers are up there?"
"Just Sir Renier that I could see, Sir. They said if I came in they wouldn't
let me go back because the idea was to get everyone out, you see."
"All right." Thomas looked around and saw Martin nearby. He waved him over and
said, "Find Commander Vivan and spread word that when I give the order to fall
back everyone's to stop firing immediately and head for the stairs. We'll have
our retreat covered but not for long." As the guard hurried off he told
Berham, "You tell the reloaders to make sure they get the wounded out of here
before we have to move."
"Yes, Captain," Berham said. "By God, this might work."
As Berham made his way back to the reloaders, Thomas saw a disturbance on the
other side of the hall. Soot was pouring out of the great hearth in a dusty
cloud.
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Thomas got up and started toward it. There was something coming down the
chimney.
Closer, he could see that the head emerging from under the stone mantel was
like a horse's in size and shape. But its eyes were glazed over and white and
it looked as though its coat had been removed with a dull knife. It had teeth
like a lion. Thomas drew his pistol, but before he could wind the mainspring,
the creature plunged out of the fireplace and fell on a group of men who had
been reloading muskets. It swung its great horse's head from side to side, its
teeth tearing as the men scrambled to get away.
Reaching it Thomas drew his rapier and slashed at its side. As it turned
toward him with a scream of rage, he drove the point through its neck. It
teetered dien fell toward him, dragging him down as it slumped onto the floor.
A second one was emerging from the fireplace. Thomas dropped the rapier and
wound the pistol's spring, then braced it on his forearm and fired.
The ball hit the creature in its broad chest along with three other shots
fired from different areas of the hall and a fourth ball that all but
shattered the mantel of the hearth. The creature dropped like a stone.
Galen Dubell appeared at Thomas's side, pointed at the fireplace, and
gestured. The creature's body caught fire as if it had been dipped in pitch
and die flames shot up the chimney. "That should hold them for awhile," Dubell
said.
Thomas stood and went to put a foot on the fay-horse's neck to work his rapier
free. He asked, "Can you help Kade?"
"No, anything I could do might only counteract the effect she is attempting to
create and then we would be dead." He smiled grimly. "But I can harry the
enemy and perhaps give her more time."
As die sorcerer strode off Thomas looked after him and thought, Disasters
agree with you.
As others ran up to carry the wounded, more fay charged the barricade and
Thomas joined the defenders.
Nightmare images flung diemselves out of the darkness
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
175
and were driven back by pistol balls or pikes wielded over the barricade.
There were hideous animal-shapes with distorted bodies and wicked intelligent
eyes, creatures with oddly human faces and bodies that were marked with
startling deformities, and other things that vanished so quickly the mind
discounted what the eyes saw. Their shrieking and keening mixed with the
blasts of muskets and pistols was deafening.
Thomas had lost track of time when Vivan grabbed his arm and said, "She's
ready."
Thomas looked around. The wounded and the refugees had vanished up the
stairway and Commander Vivan had already sent the reloaders after them. Thomas
said, "Pass the word: when I give the order, stop firing and fall back into
the bastion." He stepped back where he could see Kade and waited for the word
to pass down the line.
When the guards at each end signalled ready, Thomas looked at Kade. She
nodded, and he yelled, "Fall back."
Discipline held remarkably, even among the Albon knights, who didn't think
themselves obliged to listen to anyone.
The shrieking din from their attackers rose in a crescendo. Thomas moved with
the others to the foot of the stairs and looked back for Kade, not seeing her
among the crowd.
She was still crouched beside the barricade, and Thomas saw what she had been
waiting for. The Host surged up toward the barricade and met a wall of hostile
air. Some dissolved into myriad colors that shrieked toward the ceiling and
away like fleeing ghosts. Some popped like soap bubbles and disappeared while
others fell backward, marked by horrible wounds.
Kade smiled tightly to herself, leapt to her feet, and ran.
Thomas waited for her to reach the stairway before starting up. She was a
little ahead of him halfway up the second tier when she was thrown back
against the banister as if something had struck her.
The Host started to pour over the barricade. Thomas
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MARTHA WELIS
reached Kade and picked her up. She was unconscious but still breathing and
weighed practically nothing.
The third tier passed in a blur with the fay on the stairs below. Then the
Albon knights were closing the siege doors behind him, foot-thick oak panels
sheathed with iron. They slammed them to and shoved the heavy locking-bolts
home. The foyer was crowded with wounded guards and refugees, and the light
was dim and smoky.
Kade let him know she was awake and wanted to be put down with a sharp elbow
in his ribs. He set her on her feet and she staggered slightly. "What happened
to you?" he asked.
"I don't know. Ow." She felt die side of her head gingerly. "Where's Galen?"
The old sorcerer was already on the other side of the gallery, helping with
the wounded. As Kade turned away to go to him Thomas said, "Wait."
She paused, wary, and he asked, "Did you know this was going to happen?"
"No." Her voice was scornful. "That is the Unseelie Court, the Dark Host, the
enemy of light I wouldn't have anything to do with them. They were the ones
who tricked my mother into accepting a wager she couldn't possibly win. I
wasn't much fond of her, but no one deserves... And they would just as soon do
the same to me."
He had to be sure. "You didn't mention you knew how to manipulate the wards."
"I wouldn't have been able to call that ward down if the keystone had still
been in its place. Removing it destroyed the etheric structure that held the
wards in their courses." She winced and touched her head again, then continued
more calmly. "Galen taught me how to track wards in a puddle of ash, and the
way I called Ableon-Indis to me was only a variation on the spells used to
temporarily hold a ward in one place, which every apprentice knows. Ask him if
you don't believe me."
There was a muffled thump from the other side of the siege doors, then an
echoing roar, as some thwarted creature
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177
expressed its displeasure. If Kade had not bothered to aid the defenders, they
would have been on the other side of those doors now. Thomas thought, She
didn't have to do it, and it certainty wouldn't serve her purpose if she meant
us any harm. He said, "It won't be necessary to ask him."
Kade hesitated, as if she was just as inexperienced at accepting trust as he
was at giving it, then she turned without a word and slipped into the crowd.
Render pushed past the other Albons clustering near the siege doors to reach
Thomas and said, "The doors are holding."
Thomas asked, "What started it'" It had occurred to him that he still didn't
know exactly what had exploded or where, except that it was somewhere in the
Old Palace or the Gallery Wing.
The big knight looked like he had been run over by a wagon. The final touch
was a perfect black eye. He said, "I only know we've lost half the Cisternan
Guard and anyone who was posted past the main hall of the Old Palace.
Including one of your lieutenants. I saw him going that way just before it
happened."
Gideon would be with Falaise in the King's Bastion. "Lucas Castil?"
"Yes, that's him."
"God damn." Thomas leaned back against the wall and used the full sleeve of
his shirt to wipe the sweat off his forehead. He could still smell the
fay-horse's acrid blood. "Where's Ravenna?"
"She's here in the bastion; I've seen her. Roland was in the Gallery Wing when
it happened. We got him out barely in time." Renier hesitated, then said, "I
have to talk to you in private."
Thomas looked up at him. With Kade on the other side of the gallery, there was
no one to eavesdrop except for their own men, who were standing or lying about
in various positions of pain or exhaustion, but Renter's expression was deadly
serious.
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As they moved off a little, Thomas asked, "How did you
get that eye?"
"The King was a trifle upset at certain developments,"
Renier answered with a noticeable lack of expression. "Well, he's a great
comfort to all of us." "Thomas, I'm not sure about this but . . ." Renier
hesitated such a long moment Thomas had to take
a better hold on his patience. "Go on," he said in a level tone. "A knight
stationed on the Prince's Gate Tower reported to
me a short while ago. He said they could see fires and fighting
in the streets. It's not just the palace quarter; it's the city."
RENIER SPREAD THE gilt-edged
map on the table and indicated a spot with one calloused finger. "The
Cisternan Barracks were overwhelmed in the first few moments." He cast a
worried glance at Commander Vivan, who was slumped in a chair by the fire.
"They came through St. Anne's Gate, then?" Thomas asked.
"No. Mind, the reports we have come from grooms and stableboys who were able
to seal off the Mews to keep the creatures out of the Old Courts, but they
said the attack seemed to come from the inner gate into the palace, not the
outer gate. As to how that was managed . . ." He shook his head.
They were in the Queen's Guard House, in one of the small rooms adjacent to
the practice hall. The walls were hung with leadier and parchment maps and the
door was open to the hum of talk from the hall. They knew the human, or
once-human, members of the Host had been used as cannon fodder in the initial
attack, and that the fay had come after, but Thomas felt they still did not
have an accurate picture of how the invasion had taken place. He said, "We
still don't know what that explosion was."
"It wasn't the city armories. You can see them from the top of die inner wall.
But that's what everyone thought. The off-duty Queen's guards were heading
that way to repel what they thought was an attack through St. Anne's Gate when
they
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were stopped at the Old Halt. My men were right behind them."
Thomas saw Gideon drawing breath to make a comment, and cleared his throat.
Their eyes met and the younger man subsided with disgruntled reluctance. Most
of the guards felt that the main body of the Albon Knights should have
followed them down into the Old Hall, instead of staying in the relative
safety at the top of the stairs. Thomas was willing to concede that someone
had to hold the siege doors; whether the task had required almost the entire
Albon troop was another matter. But it had been an act of disorganization
rather than cowardice, and he wanted to keep the trouble among the two troops
to a minimum. Looking back to Renier, Thomas said, "In the cellars it sounded
as if the explosion was almost directly overhead; it must have been somewhere
in th£ Gallery Wing."
"But there's nothing there to explode, not with that sort of force, not unless
they brought it with them," the knight protested.
"Maybe they did." Vivan's voice startled them.
Only an accident of history had placed the Queen's Guard House in the area
protected by the ancient wards of the inner walls. They had lost far too many
men as it was, but the Cisternan Guard, and their families living within the
barracks and adjacent to it, had been decimated.
After a moment Renier said, "We should hear from the commanders of the city
levies by morning."
Thomas shook his head. There were over six thousand city volunteers, half
musketeers and half pikemen, organized into regiments based on dieir
neighborhoods. Both the crown and die Ministry had the right to call them out,
but in the chaos of this night that would be impossible. "The city levies
won't be able to form; they'll be too busy defending their own homes and it
will be suicide to go out into the streets tonight."
Renier regarded die map a long moment. "The Host has never attacked in force
before. It has harried travellers, solitary farmsteads, but never . . . Well,
the gate garrisons will be
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
181
trapped inside until daylight at least. The Host can't attack when the sun's
out."
Thomas had been told by Kade that the main body of the Host was composed of
powerful, quarrelsome spirits from the Unseelie Court, who could agree on
nothing but revelry and fighting the Seelie Court, their opposites in Fayre.
In their wake would be fay predators: hags, bogles, spriggans, things that
haunted lonely places or preyed on travellers. Thomas said, "They can't attack
in the kind of organized force they used on us in the Old Palace, but there's
a mob of dark fay following them like scavengers after an army. They aren't
organized, but they can stand the daylight and they will attack at any
opportunity."
Renier pursed his lips in disapproval. "You heard that from Kade Carrion, I
assume. I'd prefer another source for that intelligence."
Thomas controlled an inexplicable surge of irritation, and without too much
acid in his voice asked, "Who else did you have in mind to question?"
Frowning, Renier shook his head. "Still... There's no help for it, I suppose.
Does she know if Grandier is aiding them?"
"No, but he must be involved somehow." Thomas considered a moment. "The Host
was depending on surprise, and they had help. Someone knew to go down into
that cellar and take the keystone, and whoever it was is probably still here
with us." Dontane might have known who that traitor was, but he must have died
with the other prisoners and the guards in the Cisteman Guard House.
Renier looked up. "Perhaps the man who killed Dr. Braun got the location of
the keystone out of him before he died."
"Braun was killed instantly; he wasn't tortured for information."
"If we could get the keystone back . . ."
"It could be hidden anywhere." Thomas shook his head. "We can't count on
that."
"Well, we can't beat our heads about it now." The knight leaned over the map.
"The corridors in the outer walls have
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183
been sealed. The rooftops and the open areas of the Old Courts are protected
by the wards, and the iron-shod siege doors are keeping them from coming
through the King's Bastion to us. The only thing we can do now is wait them
out."
If Renier wanted to "wait it out" with a traitor in their camp it was his
business. Thomas had. no reason to argue the point while he still had a few
more preparations to make.
Lord General Villon and the siege engine cavalry were posted at the Granges, a
royal fortress about fifty-five miles to the south. It was the mobile force
closest to the city, except for DenziTs small private garrison still in
residence at Bel Garde. The fay might be able to take the city, but they
couldn't hold it. They couldn't close the iron-hinged gates, use the cannon
mounted on the walls, or the stockpiles of arms. Villon had proven troops and
a populace that would rise to aid him as soon as they saw his flags.
As Renier rolled up his map and went back out into die hall Thomas caught
Gideon's arm and said softly, "If anyone's going to offer to hold Renier's
sword while he falls on it, it's going to be me; is that clear, Sir?"
Gideon smiled reluctantly. "Yes, Sir, it's clear."
The others gone, Thomas hesitated a moment over Vivan, but he had no idea of
what to say to him.
He walked out through the hall, where things were beginning to calm down as
the night wore on without attack. The refugees in the house were mainly palace
servants and retainers who didn't mind bedding down on a clear space of floor
as long as there was a roof overhead and plenty of iron lying about. They were
stretched out on blankets along the walls or huddled in groups telling each
other their horror stories from the last few hours. Their children played on
the second-floor balconies with nerveless unconcern, but no one apparently
felt secure enough to put out any of the lanterns, despite the number of
people trying to sleep. The only real disturbance was an old woman kneeling in
the far corner praying at the top of her lungs, while a nervous young girl
anxiously pleaded with her to stop.
Queen's guards and the few remaining Cisternans were prowling the house like
caged cats, checking their weapons over and over again and alert for anything.
The refugees of higher class were crowded in the Albon Tower and the Gate
Bastion, with the King's Bastion being kept as a buffer area between the fay
in the Old Palace and the fortified court. Thomas had preferred this
arrangement, knowing that if he had to have a large group of civilians under
his protection in a battle, it was better to have ones who were trained to
take orders without question. Ravenna and Falaise and their entourages were
safely ensconced on an upper floor.
In the entrance hall he found Phaistus, standing before the partly open doors
and looking tentatively up at the cloudy night sky. "What are you doing?"
Thomas asked him.
Phaistus jumped, then shifted the heavy coil of rope tucked under his arm.
"Berham wanted this in the tower, Captain."
His reluctance was understandable. On the open roads of the country, the Host
traditionally attacked from above, swooping down on men like hawks on mice.
Except that hawks were unquestionably kinder in dispatching their mice quickly
than the Host would be with human captives. The wards still clinging to this
side of the palace were supposed to protect them while outside, but the wards
had failed before.
"Well, come on then." Thomas hauled him out into the open court.
The night air was chill, the court lit only by light seeping through cracks in
shutters and closed doors. The Albon Tower high above them was only a dim
shape in the darkness, clouds streaming swiftly across the moon. Phaistus
hurried along in Thomas's shadow, casting worried glances at the sky.
The first level of the tower had become an infirmary, and the sick familiar
odor of cauterization hit Thomas as soon as he went in.
The wounded lay on pallets along the walls of the high-ceilinged hall. There
were women and children among them, far too many. They had been hacked up by
the bronze blades
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MARTHA WELLS
of the human servants of the Host, burned in the sporadic fires that had
broken out from overturned lamps, or bitten and clawed by the fay. There were
no victims of elf-shot. If someone was hit by one of those tiny
harmless-looking stones he fell down and never moved or spoke again, no better
than breathing dead, and was lucky if starvation or thirst killed him before
the stone found his heart. Anyone struck by elf-shot had been left behind, or
smothered by Dr. Lambe or one of the other apothecaries.
Fires had been lit in the two great hearths, and dozens of lamps and candles
added their stains to the smoke-blackened rafters. The furniture had been
pushed aside to make way for more pallets, and Thomas had to climb over a
couple of tables to reach the other end of the room. It brought back
less-than-pleasant memories of the Bisran War, of border villages overrun and
taken before the inhabitants could scatter into the forest, and of the
aftermath of battle.
Dr. Lambe stood near the long draw table where bags of instruments and jars of
medicinal herbs were laid out. He looked exhausted and considerably the worse
for wear. He looked up at Thomas's approach and said, "Captain, when can we
leave?"
"As soon as it's daylight. The Host won't be able to form then."
"And how sure are we of that?"
"1 have it on fairly good authority. What might be wandering the streets is
another matter, but they aren't after just anyone."
Lambe glanced upward. The King was on one of the upper floors, guarded
heavily. "You're right about that."
The palace was a trap, and diey couldn't afford to be caught in it. Ravenna
and Roland would have to be gotten to safety. Whether Ravenna likes it or not,
Thomas thought. His first choice was to get them out of the city and to Villon
at the Granges—and they would have to be together. Roland would be swept under
by the chaos and lose his throne to the first opportunist with a troop.
Ravenna could ride the storm.
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
185
Galen Dubell crossed the room toward them. Like Dr. Lambe, the hem and sleeves
of his robe were stained with dried blood. "What sort of protections are we
employing for the evacuation?" he asked.
Before Thomas could answer, an Albon knight stepped up to them and said, "His
Majesty requires an audience, Captain Boniface."
Thomas looked at him, but the knight's face betrayed nothing. After a moment
he said, "Very well," and turned to Dubell. "Doctor, could you send a message
to my lady Ravenna and let her know I'll be unable to attend her for a short
time?"
Dubell looked from Dr. Lambe's stricken expression to the other Albon knights
who had suddenly appeared in the room, and said, "Yes, of course."
Thomas followed the knight to the bottom of the narrow stairwell that led up
into the tower, where there were two more Albons waiting for them. He took in
their appearance without comment and they started up the stair.
It was a long way up to the fifth level of the tower, the many lamps that
illuminated tfie stone steps making the air smoky and close. There were
knights standing guard at each level.
On the landing there were two more Albons guarding the wide oaken door. The
knight who had come after him smiled and said, "His Majesty has requested that
you disarm before coming in to him."
Thomas met his eyes. As a member of the Queen's Guard and an appointed officer
he had the right to go armed in the royal presence, and he also knew what any
sort of protest to that effect would mean to Roland, and what would happen if
they searched him inside and found a concealed weapon.
In silence he handed over both pistols, his main gauche^ boot dagger, and
unbuckled the rapier from his baldric.
One of the knights opened the door and they went inside.
The room was far too warm and too crowded. The gold threads in the red
tapestries caught the candlelight and cast it
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MARTHA WELLS
back. There were more Albon knights, all showing signs of the past battle.
Some of Roland's younger courtiers were playing cards at a table in a comer,
and somewhere out of sight a musician played a soprano recorder. Renier wasn't
present. Roland was seated in a tapestry-draped armchair, Denzil at his side.
As Thomas bowed, Roland said, "Kneel, Sir."
Even though he was hearing the latch of a trap snap shut, it was second nature
to make it look like an easy gesture.
Denzil smiled lazily and said something inaudible to Roland that made the
young King giggle and redden with embarrassment at the same time. Thomas
realized Roland was not drunk yet, but he was definitely well on the way, and
he would have bet anything it was Denzil's doing.
Roland fiddled with a torn piece of lace on his cuff, his eyes large and dark.
"What is my mother doing now?"
"She's resting, Your Majesty." Thomas kept his expression even and his voice
level. The room had quieted, and the courtiers were watching with a fascinated
intensity that combined sly amusement at someone else's misfortune and fear
for their own necks.
"And my Queen? My cousin has said she refuses to attend me here."
Thomas wondered if Falaise knew she had refused to attend Roland. Probably
not. "She isn't well, Your Majesty, and your mother required her to stay in
her rooms." This was a lie, but he wasn't going to throw the young Queen to
the wolves to save his own skin. If the matter doesn't become academic in the
next few moments.
Roland said, "Oh." Even at this time, he realized Falaise was not likely to
ignore a direct order from Ravenna. But Denzil nudged him with an elbow,
causing the knight standing guard behind their chairs to tighten his grip on
his sword-hilt, and Roland said, "And my sister?"
"She's in the Guard House, Your Majesty."
Denzil idly twisted one of his rings. His hands were trembling slightly,
probably from excitement. He said, "She was
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
187
seen smearing blood on the lintels and comerposts of the Guard House. Now why
was she doing that, we wonder?"
How the hell should I know? "I don't know, Your Majesty." He directed his
answer to Roland, just to see Denzil's expression tighten with anger. It was
hardly likely to be anything detrimental: even Kade wouldn't put a curse on a
house and then settle down in it for the night. And she obviously hadn't made
a secret of what she had done. It sounded more like a feast-day practice one
of the foreign cults in the city performed.
Roland absently rubbed the carved arm of the chair, thinking over his next
move. Denzil leaned toward him familiarly, watching Thomas out of the corner
of his eye, and whispered something. Roland giggled and looked guilty.
Thomas allowed himself to look just slightly bored. Denzil's attempts to prey
on his nerves were having more effect on the Albon who was standing behind him
and could hear what he was saying.
Finally Roland said, "Perhaps you told her to do it."
"Why would I do that, Your Majesty?" Thomas had always known that if he had to
die to please a royal ego, he wanted it to be as scandalous, messy, and
politically inconvenient for as many persons as possible. Disappearing into
the depths of the Albon Tower was not a scenario he preferred.
Roland didn't answer immediately. He bit his lower lip and looked at his
cousin.
Denzil stood and strolled around the room, behind Thomas and out of his sight.
The Duke said, "We don't know what part she had in this attack."
Thomas kept his eyes on Roland. "She was almost killed in the retreat from the
main hall." Defending her this way could be dangerous for both of them, but he
wasn't sure what Denzil was after.
Roland looked surprised. "She was?"
Standing too near him Denzil brushed Thomas's hair aside to reveal the pearl
drop in his right ear. "That's a gift from die Dowager Queenf isn't it?"
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MARTHA WELLS
The door opened and a knight bowed his way in. "Pardon, Your Majesty."
Denzil stepped away from Thomas. Roland shifted in his chair nervously. "What
is it?"
"The Queen ... The Dowager Queen has sent a messenger requesting Captain
Boniface's immediate presence."
All eyes in the room went to Roland as most of those present realized the
implications of this. Thomas thought, Don't provoke her, boy, not now. Ravenna
was exhausted and angry and sitting on top of the best-organized force left in
the palace with an armory at her back. But if Roland pushed her into a civil
war just because he could, then he didn't deserve to be King, let alone to
live.
Roland stared at the knight. Denzil started to speak but abruptly Roland waved
him to silence and said, "Fine, then, go on. I'm tired."
Thomas stood, bowed, and left the room. He collected his weapons in complete
silence from the knights on the landing, then went down the stairs and saw
Martin pacing restlessly near the outside door.
Reaching him Thomas said, "Tell her you saw me outside and I'll be there in a
few moments."
Martin said, "Yes, Sir," and headed back across the court at a run. Thomas
went the other way, along the tower's wall, until he came to a place in deep
shadow but with a good view of the door.
He pulled his cloak around him and stood with folded arms, watching the
cloud-strewn sky. The cool wind lifted the hair off the back of his neck, and
he thought for a few moments about treason and murder.
But he had learned more from Denzil than the Duke had from him. He thought He
had me. He mas sure of it. He had tried to provoke Thomas to fight. He wanted
Ravenna and Roland at each other's throats; he wanted the palace in chaos.
Denzil was confident. He had expected the attack.
He took the keystone, or he ordered it done. Never mind how he knew where it
was; I'll work that out later. He may
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
189
have kitted Braun himself. And I don't have a shred of proof against him.
There was only one thing Denzil could want in return for treason of such a
magnitude.
The young Duke of Alsene had so much already from Roland. Would he abandon a
secure existence on a chancy bid for the throne, based on such infirm ground
as the help of a foreign sorcerer? But is Denzil's existence secure? Thomas
asked himself. Or more importantly, does he think his existence is secure?
Roland was still Ravenna's son, and Fulstan's. He could have Denzil killed on
a whim, at any time. And he was still a young man; he could become as
changeable in later life as his father had.
As a patch of moonlight illuminated the court, a swift smooth shadow crossed
it. Something large enough to be flying above the wards yet throw a man-sized
shadow on the pearl gray paving stones.
Thomas leaned back against the wall, his dark clothing blending into the rough
stonework. A reminder from the Host.
As it passed out of sight and the clouds crept back over the moon, the Albon
knight he had suspected was following him stepped quietly out into the court
from the door of the tower.
Thomas waited until the man gave up and disappeared back inside, then started
back to die Guard House.
Denzil was in league with Grandier, and regardless of the consequences, he was
going to have to die.
In the Guard House, Kade was sitting on die floor near the stairs dial led up
to the second floor of die hall. She turned over another card from the deck
she had found, winced, swept the scattered cards together, and reshuffled
them. Something was happening in the Albon Tower, something interesting, and
no one would tell her about it. Who can I pry it out of, she wondered, looking
speculatively around the quiet hall and laying out the cards again.
No one seemed to find her presence objectionable. The refugees had brought her
everything from amulets to prayer
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MARTHA WELLS
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
191
books to bless for luck, and she had collected several apples, an egg, a few
ribbons, and a battered daisy as propitiatory gifts. The guards were all
nobles and so less superstitious, but treated her as a sort of mascot, which
was better behavior than she had had from anyone connected with the crown in a
long time. They knew who had been on the wrong side of the bastion's siege
doors with thqn, and were acting accordingly.
Falaise had sent her a pair of boots. The woman who had brought them had said
they were a boy-page's boots, made for a masque last month and brought along
accidentally in the trunk the Queen's ladies had hastily packed before leaving
the King's Bastion, but the Queen had "thought they would suit best." She
meant they looked big enough, Kade thought. Falaise and her ladies had small
perfect feet, not ugly long-toed things better suited for walking on tree
branches. But the boots were soft, blue-stamped leather with gold stitching,
and she liked them immensely.
She nibbed the bruised lump on her head thoughtfully. That is, no one objected
to her presence openly. She still didn't know what she had been hit by in the
retreat to the King's Bastion. An object that small of wood or stone would
have certainly startled her, but not knocked her reeling and half-conscious
against the banister. No, the object had been cold iron, and no fay had cast
it at her.
And Thomas Boniface had carried her up the stairs.
That had triggered a memory, a tactile child's memory. She had been six or
seven, playing on the warm dusty stones of a palace court with servants'
children, and suddenly found herself among a forest of sharp hooves and tall
equine legs, horses snorting and dancing around her. For a moment she had
found it wonderful. But just as fear had time to set in, a strong arm had
caught her around the waist and lifted her out of danger with a muttered "And
what do you think you're doing." She had been deposited on the side of the
court out of harm's way, and left with a memory of a deep voice and a
masculine scent combined with the musky sweat of horses.
Her father had heard about it somehow. He heard about
everything somehow. He had called her a whore. When she'd told Galen about it,
he had slammed things around his small study and muttered to himself for an
hour, but he was not quite worldly enough to realize what was bothering her
and explain it away. It wasn't until two weeks later when a scrubwoman had
explained to her what a whore was that she understood she couldn't possibly be
one. A whore, she thought, old stale anger rising again. At that age and about
as alluring as an awkward puppy. It's a wonder that I'm not mad as a
wool-dyer. It was a wonder she wasn't as helplessly at sea in the world as
Roland was.
"Excuse me, my lady?"
She looked up to see a nervous dark-haired gentlewoman on the stairs above,
looking down at her hesitantly. Kade thought her one of Falaise's ladies, but
she wasn't the one who had come before. Then the woman said, "My lady, the
lady Ravenna would like to speak to you in her chamber."
"Oh," Kade said. She collected the cards and stood up.
She followed the woman up the lamplit stairs to the third floor. The rooms
Ravenna and Falaise had taken were in a single suite. There was a group of
Queen's guards and two Cisternans standing in the anteroom having a
low-voiced, intense, and agitated conversation Kade was sure would have been
quite interesting, but the gentlewoman opened die inner door to Ravenna's
chamber for her, curtseyed, and fled.
Ravenna sat alone near the shuttered window, head turned to look down at the
empty hearth. A few carved chests stood open, and richly embroidered robes and
rugs were tumbled about and piled in the chairs. Kade fought a surge of
anxiety that suddenly welled up in her gut; she was not a child anymore.
"I wanted to know your intentions." Ravenna turned to look at her, finally.
"Why you are still here."
Kade looked down and noticed her feet again. She said, "Why shouldn't I be
here?"
" 'Why shouldn't I be,' " Ravenna mocked. "Your wit astonishes me. Of course,
everything I've built with my life and
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THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
193
my blood is tumbling down around my ears; why shouldn't you stay and watch?"
"if you already know then why are you asking?" Kade said it quietly, and
looked up to deliberately meet Ravenna's eyes. That was good. I did that well.
"Oh, never mind." It was Ravenna who looked away. "I suppose if you actually
had some sort of motive, you would give me an answer."
Kade sighed, then realized the old Queen's sharp eyes were on her again and
felt a chill that didn't come from the air. Ravenna had set a trap for that
telltale expression of relief. "Well," Ravenna said slowly. "Do you still want
the throne?"
"No! I just said that; I didn't mean it." I should have known that would come
back to haunt me. "Can't you just leave me out of your idiot power struggles?"
But it was easy to talk about the throne. Ravenna couldn't understand how
little it meant to her.
"No, I cannot. I'm old, and frightened. I get angry when I'm frightened and
your brother does not know when to stop pressing me. Or rather, he lets Denzil
tell him that it is all some sort of game, and that his mother will forgive
him anything, because she wants him on the throne. Well, I'm having second
thoughts about that."
"Don't bother having first thoughts about me, because I won't do it."
Ravenna's hard eyes came back to her again, cynical and doubting. Kade said,
"I'm serious. It's hard enough being a queen in Fayre, but this is ... real."
"I wish Roland knew that. I tried to teach him to rule, but he doesn't
understand. Our people aren't serf-slaves, like Bis-ran peasants. They'll riot
in the cities and rebel over the vine-growers' excise in the country. The
balances of power that must be maintained among the nobles of this city alone
. . ." She tapped her fingers on the chair arm and shook her head. "I push
Roland, to test him, to make him strong, but he backs away. Then he lets
Denzil goad him into pushing me too far."
Kade looked at her curiously. Even in the soft candlelight Ravenna was all
glinting sharp edges, her sharp profile, her
jewels, her eyes. She wondered if her brother understood that someday his
mother would be gone, and there would be nothing to cushion him from the
battleground of the court. "If not Roland, and not me, then who?"
Ravenna seemed to ignore the question. She said, "I planned it so carefully. I
let the Ministry gain power. The nobles," she invested the word with
considerable contempt, "clung to each other in salons all over the city,
alternately whining and shouting about it, but they couldn't stop me. I
reduced the walls of their private strongholds, took away their private
armies, so if die flower of nobility wanted to rebel against Roland they'd
have a damned hard time doing it. And Aviler has some concept of how a state
should function; he would have been able to keep Roland from making too bloody
a fool of himself. I made an enemy of Aviler, even though his father was one
of my closest friends, because if I had ever shown him favor Roland would
never have listened to him. Of course, Roland never listened to him anyway.
And now we don't know where Aviler is, or if he's alive." She stopped and
looked away. "If not you, then no one."
Kade anchored her eyes on the floor. She is already speaking of Roland in the
past tense.
After a long moment of silence Ravenna said, "I'm rather an all-or-nothing
sort of person when it comes to violence. Roland doesn't understand that."
There was a returning quality of strength and calculation in her tone that
made Kade look up at her.
The old Queen was watching her carefully again. "Thomas is rather an
all-or-nothing sort of person when it comes to loyalty. I don't think anyone
at court understands that, excepting myself and the Guardsmen. You could come
to understand it."
Kade stared at her, feeling completely transparent under that gaze. A slow
flush of heat reddened her cheeks.
Ravenna said, "Are you sure you won't reconsider my offer? The benefits are
considerable."
She said, "Listen, you dried-up old bitch . . ."
194
MARTHA WELLS
Ravenna smiled.
Kade took a deep breath to give her enough air to get the words out. "If you
want my help in pulling your fat out of the fire, then you can damn well keep
your offers and your speculations to yourself, because I don't want to hear
diem and I won't, do you understand?"
"Quite well, thank you, dear." Ravenna nodded pleasantly.
Kade stalked out the door and slammed it behind her.
The anteroom was empty. Why do I stay here? Kade raged at herself. / meant to
cut off all these old ties, say what I wanted to say, and forget about all of
it. To get some peace at last. But I've done nothing but get into stupid
arguments with Roland and make Ravenna think she can put me under her thumb
again. How dare she even impty . . . Imply what?
She paced a tight circle in the anteroom, remembering Ravenna's smile at her
angry response. Did I just make a mistake?
The door to the hall opened and Thomas walked in. Kade jumped guiltily.
"Did you put blood on the lintels and the cornerposts of this house?" he asked
her, keeping his voice low.
She held her hand out, to show him the fresh cut across the white skin of her
palm, and thought, He has such dark eyes, like velvet. She was starting to
blush again, for no accountable reason. To distract herself, she asked, "What
happened while you were gone?"
He regarded her for a moment. "What is it for?"
God, can no one answer a direct question? She folded her arms and looked at
the floor. "To keep fay out. To let diem know I'm in here, and that I'm not
receiving visitors."
"Will it work?"
She shook her head. "Not that well. The ones it will keep out wouldn't be that
difficult to deal with anyway. But it's something."
"Why did you choose here, and not one of the other buildings?"
Not wanting to answer, she began to tap one foot in grow-
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
195
ing irritation. He waited. Finally she looked up and said, "I like it here.
There, are you happy?"
He said, "Delighted," and went into Ravenna's room.
Well, I handled that brittiantfy, Kade thought. A soft noise made her glance
back and she saw Falaise standing in the doorway to her room. She was wearing
a pale blue, heavily embroidered mantua and her hair hung like a chestnut
curtain. She looked like a startled fawn. "What is it?" Kade asked her,
temporarily distracted from her own problems.
Falaise made a noi$e like a strangled gasp and vanished back into her room.
Kade followed her. Inside was the tumbled splendor of a parlor attached to a
small bedchamber, three ladies-in-waiting looking up at them in surprise.
Falaise stopped in the middle of the room and shrieked, "Out! I want to be
alone." It wasn't the full-throated bellow Ravenna was capable of but it
worked well enough. As the gentlewomen scurried for the door, Kade stayed
where she was, correctly surmising that the order had not been directed at
her.
As soon as the door closed behind the last woman, Falaise seized a wine glass
from the table and dashed its contents onto the polished floorboards. As Kade
stared at her, the Queen shoved a chair away from the wall that adjoined the
Dowager Queen's quarters and crawled under a table, placing the glass to the
wall and her ear on the glass.
"What are you doing?" Kade asked.
"There's a weak board here. I can hear through to Ravenna's room."
"Brilliant!" Kade climbed onto the table and pressed her ear to the wall, but
couldn't hear anything but muffled voices. "What are they saying?"
"Shhh."
Short of dragging Falaise out from under the table by the ankles and taking
her place, which would cause them to miss some of the conversation, there was
nothing to do but wait. Kade paced, tangled her fingers in her hair, and tried
to contain herself.
196
MARTHA WELLS
Finally, as doors slammed out in the anteroom, Falaise crawled out from under
the table and sat back on the floor with a sigh.
Kade bounced with excitement. "Well?"
Falaise scrubbed wine out of her ear with the sleeve of her mantua. "It was a
terrific fight."
"About what'"
"He has a plan for leaving the palace because we're going to be attacked by
the fay again. He said they're just waiting, they have a traitor inside
helping them, and that when they can come through cracks in the walls, we
can't hope to keep them out forever."
"He's right."
Falaise sat back on the floor, hugging her knees, looking up at her
quizzically. "Are the wards working?" The question was anxious, but not
panicky.
Kade decided to tell her the truth. "They're working up above us. But most of
them aren't touching the ground anymore. It's only the siege doors and the
gates keeping the Host out."
"I see." The Queen bit her lip.
"But what did they fight about?"
"We're going to be leaving in the morning. But Ravenna doesn't like some part
of the plan, and it made her very angry. She yelled and threw things, and said
she didn't intend to die alone."
"Really?"
"Yes, and he told her she was too mean to die at all, alone or in company, and
if she thought he was fool enough to fall for these mock hysterics then she
should think again and she was going anyway if he had to tie her to a horse."
Falaise shook her head, an irritated kitten. "Something happened in die Albon
Tower, something to do with Roland and Denzil. But she already seemed to know
what it was, and they didn't discuss any details."
"Hell, dial's not much." Maybe I can find out more down-
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
197
stairs. As Kade reached for the door Falaise said, "If you find out anything
else, will you come and tell me?"
"All right."
"Thank you."
Leaving the room, Kade wondered if Falaise had heard her own conversation with
Ravenna, and if it mattered. It might. She is full of surprises.
Thomas crossed the hall and went into the map room. The fire burned low behind
the grate and Vivan was gone; he was unsure if that was a good sign or not. He
stood for a moment contemplating a faded parchment map of the city on the
table. He needed to go back up to Ravenna, but he didn't trust his temper
quite yet.
He knew she'd agree to his plan. She wouldn't let emotion get in die way of
necessity for too long, and it was only his part in it tiiat disturbed her.
And whatever she did, he didn't intend to give in to her diis time.
"Captain! Captain, look!" someone shouted from outside the room. Stepping
toward die door, he saw Gideon surrounded by a noisy group of guards and
conducting another man across die hall in an apparendy friendly headlock.
Thomas started forward as Gideon released his captive widi an affectionate
shake, and felt an idiot grin spreading over his face as he saw who it was.
Lucas and a younger guard named Gerard whom they had also given up for dead
staggered into die room under die enthusiastic greetings of dieir comrades.
Lucas grinned back at him. "What are you gaping at?"
"Why aren't you dead?" Thomas caught die older man in an embrace. "And where
die hell have you been?"
Lucas dropped onto a bench at the table. "I've been banging on a bloody gate,
trying to get die idiot on die odier side to let us in. Before dial we were
crawling dirough die streets on our bellies. Look, God bless that man for a
saint!"
198
MARTHA WELLS
Anticipating the request, Phaistus was bringing in an armful of wine bottles
and tankards.
As the wine was passed around, Lucas said, "It's a wonderful story; do you
want to hear the version where I climbed the St. Anne's Gate in a hail of
heathen arrows with my sword in my teeth and a fainting Gerard slung over one
shoulder?"
"You lying bastard!" Gerard objected, slamming down the tankard that someone
had just handed him and spraying everyone around him with the contents.
"We got out the Postern Gate, actually," Lucas admitted more soberly. "It's a
ruin, no sign of anyone. We couldn't come along the outside wall; there's a
lot of somethings-or-others congregated along it that we didn't want too close
a look at. We had to go several streets over to get around and back to the
Prince's Gate. There's a very large hole in the park side of the Gallery Wing.
I couldn't get very close but it looked as though something erupted out of the
floor in the Grand Gallery."
Thomas knew Lucas well enough to recognize the fear in his eyes. That fear was
masked by bluff, as it was in most men, and the louder the bluff the greater
the fear. It was very loud in that room right now. "Out of the floor?" he
asked. "Are you sure?"
"Yes. Don't ask me what it was; I've no idea. If we hadn't been in the portico
and halfway outside already when it happened, we'd be dead." Lucas turned his
tankard around thoughtfully. "As it was we lost Arians, Brandon, and Lesard."
He looked up. "That I know of."
"Twenty-six altogether, not counting you two."
"Oh."
"What's it like in the city?" Gideon asked softly.
"It was hard to tell. We saw some houses broken into and burned out, but
others locked up tight. No one's out on the streets anymore that we could see.
There was ten or so palace-folk that crept out after us, but they decided to
chance it in the city. We thought we'd try to make it back here so we could
die with our friends like gentlemen." He looked around at everyone. "So? How
have you been keeping busy?"
THOMAS AWOKE KNOWING what
it felt like to be a corpse—stiff and cold. The fire had burnt down to coals,
and seemed to be emitting nothing but a dim red glow. Any heat produced was
lost in the frigid air. He eased out of the chair and started pulling wood out
of the stacked pile beside the hearth. His hands were numb.
The kindling he dumped on the coals caught and he started to add the logs.
After a timeless wait the heavier wood started to burn and he began to feel
alive, and only two or three times his age.
Sitting on the floor in front of die fire and still shivering, he heard the
timber frame of the house creak protestingly against the onslaught of a harsh
wind. It was an oddly sudden cold spell for this time of year.
They should be due for two to three more mondis of fall rain before winter set
in. It never got this cold until after midwinter.
He climbed to his feet and found his cloak on the floor across the room and
bundled up in it, then went out into the hall. Only two lanterns were lit
there now, and it was as cold as a saint's bed. An old house with this many
restless bodies crowded into it could never be entirely silent, but all the
sounds—footsteps of patrolling guards creaking the boards on an upper story,
the fitful stirring of sleepers on the hall floor, a child's frustrated
crying—were oddly muted. Shadowy forms wrapped in blankets stumbled around the
dark cavern of the hai's huge fireplace, building up a fire in the
200
MARTHA WELLS
hearth that had been scraped clean and unused since last winter. Once they got
the blaze going, warmth from the chimney would help heat the upper floors,
though not nearly enough for comfort.
Thomas started upstairs, buttoning up the sleeves of his doublet.
There was a small window looking out into the court from the second-floor
landing. Ice was starting to form on it already. Clouds still streamed across
the sky, allowing the shrinking moon to briefly illuminate the court one
moment, leaving it in pitch darkness the next. He could hear the wind howling,
and the front wall protesting faintly in response.
He didn't hear Kade's footsteps but was somehow unsurprised when he noticed
her standing beside him.
She said, "Grandier had to work on this for days."
He looked down at her but there wasn't quite enough light to see her
expression. She looked like a fanciful drawing of a gypsy with her hair flying
in all directions and a torn piece of petticoat dragging the ground. She wore
a blanket over her shoulders and the night muted the red of her dress, making
her look very human and solid. He asked, "How did he do it?"
"A shift in the wind one day, gather clouds from over the sea the next. Very
slow work, and very subtle. Oh, it might have made it a little cooler than it
should have been, or there was less rain or more rain. But who would notice?"
The slender moon peeping through a gap in the swift-moving darkness above
revealed clouds like monoliths, black, streaming giants crossing the sky.
"Can you do anything?"
"The spells to do this were set and done months ago, when the forces were
favorable. Now the planets aren't in the right houses for influencing the
weather, and they won't begin to favor atmospheric magic for another month at
least. His timing of its arrival is excellent, and there's no saying how long
it will last. Galen might know of something to try, but I don't. I'm only the
Queen of Air and Darkness by inheritance, and I don't have a degree in
philosophy from Lodun."
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
201
They stood there quiet for a time. The wind's fury made the timber and stone
wall of the house seem flimsy, as if they were separated from a vicious animal
by only a thin layer of decorative fence. Thomas found himself watching Kade.
He was no longer certain what to think about her, and that disturbed him far
more than it should, considering everything else there was to worry about. /
always try to understand my enemies, he thought, but it's time to admit that
the one thing she is not is an enemy. Finally, he asked, "What does it mean to
be the Queen of Air and Darkness?"
Her brow furrowed, she said, "I don't have a kingdom, except for the castles
my modier kept. Some of them are in . little pockets of the Otherworld, some
are in this world, but protected by spells. But in a way . . . From knowing
Titania, Oberon, the other rulers of Fayre, I have the sense diat what I am
somehow defines what they are. I might exist to balance them, the way they
exist to balance the Unseelie Court. But it isn't good and evil, either. I'm
not particularly evil most of the time, and they aren't particularly good
hardly any of the time, at least not by human standards." She shivered, and
the moonlight brought silver to her hair. "The Unseelie Court doesn't approve
of balance, and they're always scheming to upset things. My mother Moire
accepted a wager from them, that she could steal all the grain from Oberon's
stables without missing a single seed. She got past the fay guarding the
stables by changing herself into a beautiful white mare, and she made all the
grain vanish—except for one flax seed. The Unseelie Court had suborned a
flower sprite that lived in the stable, and it hid one flax seed in the bell
of a flower, so Moire couldn't ftnd it. So she lost the wager, and they sent
her to Hell. They seemed to think I should be grateful for it. She wasn't a
nice person and we didn't exactly live in a state of joy together, but she was
my mother." After a moment she seemed to shake off the recollection and pulled
her blanket more closely around her. "The weather will be worse tomorrow.
Grandier wouldn't have spared us the snow."
Thomas hadn't missed the hurried change of subject. He
202
MARTHA WELLS
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
203
wondered why she had told him so much. He asked, "Spared us?"
Kade looked up at him.
"When did it become 'us'?"
She turned from the window and started to walk away, but stopped after a few
steps. "Do you remember me?" she asked.
Because of the intimacy of standing here in the shadows wfirching death come
out of the north, or just that he was becoming used to her way of speaking, he
knew what she meant. He said, "Not the way you looked, not really. Not very
well."
"I remember you."
He didn't reply. The silence stretched, and Kade faded back into the shadows.
Thomas turned away from die window and went down the stairs and back to the
map room. The weather was one more thing to worry about, one more factor to
take into account. At least a freeze would put off the possibility of a plague
brewing up among the unburied dead in the east quarter of the palace, and the
rest of the city.
As he neared the open door of the map room, he saw an outline of a long cloak
or robe silhouetted by the edge of die firelight. Someone was there, and
Thomas stopped in the doorway, feeling an inexplicable chill that had nothing
to do with the cold.
But a flare-up from the fire showed him it was only Galen Dubell warming his
hands near the hearth, his stooped shoulders shivering faindy underneath his
heavy robe.
Stepping into the room, Thomas said, "You're awake early, Doctor."
The sorcerer looked up and smiled. "It's a trifle cold for my old bones." He
shook his head. "I'll begin work on counter-measures against this weather as
soon as it's light. You realize it is not natural."
"Kade told me." Thomas lit the candlelamps with a twig from the fire, and
began to go through the maps stacked on the table, looking for the one of the
city walls and the solid
paths through the water meadows. Under the maps, he found the pile of
translated Bisran court documents instead. They had been sent over the night
of the attack, and he had never had the chance to look at them.
Dubell took die armchair near the hearth that Commander Vivan had occupied
some hours ago. "I must admit, Kade is not the same girl I once tutored," he
said.
Thomas sat down on the bench and began idly paging through the trial
documents. He said, "I would hope not." The list of questions and answers was
much the same as the monk's account had been. Grandier had refused to name
accomplices, which must have cost him a great deal. Thomas also thought die
Inquisition showed an unhealthy degree of interest in sexual relations with
demons.
After a long silence Dubell said, "I find myself wondering at her motives."
Thomas looked up. The sorcerer's expression was vaguely troubled. "I don't
diink it's as complicated as it seems. She has unfinished business with Roland
and Ravenna." Thomas had been younger than Kade was now when he had had the
devastating and final confrontation with his father, when he had left to
pursue the commission of Captain that would allow him to legally and
permanently disown his entire family. The urge to try to settle old arguments
and angers had been strong, and his attempts along those lines had turned out
just as badly as Kade's seemed destined to.
"Perhaps you're right." But Dubell didn't seem convinced.
Thomas turned over the last page of the trial transcript and glanced over the
next closely written document. A note at the top described it as a Bisran
priest's description of Grandier's confession during his questioning.
Thomas skipped through most of a page of unconvincing preamble as to why this
disclosure wasn't violating the sanctity of confession. The rest of it read:
... and he confessed to me quite freely. He had not dealt with the darkness,
or at least the Evil One as we recog-
204    MARTHA WELIS
nize it. He had been approached by the aspects of the Fay, who had offered him
powers beyond the reach of mortal sorcery in exchange for mortal souls, which
they must annually tithe to Hell to preserve their soulless immortality. He
had refused these offers, but our ill treatment (I but repeat his words) had
caused him to reconsider. They had offered him swift travel and flight, but
what he would bargain for was the terrible ability to alter his physical form,
that no wizard of human blood had been able to accomplish. This would cause
great pain to him, and once done he would never be able to resume his own
shape, nor any other shape that he would assume and abandon, and it required
that he could not assume a shape in an image worn by a living man, he must
destroy its original before he could assume it ...
. . . before he could assume it. Thomas found himself wiping his hands off on
his trouser legs. It had the ring of truth about it as nothing else in the
Bisran documents had. It was far too realistic for a Bisran priest, who had
been trained to find evil influence in every lung fever and to hate magic like
a mortal enemy, to fabricate. This is true; this is what he told them after
they drove him mad with torture and accusations. And if you were Grandier,
which shape would you choose... He looked up at Galen Dubell.
The sorcerer was sitting absolutely still and watching him with an expression
of thoughtful speculation. He was no longer shivering from the cold. "What are
you reading, Captain, that has apparently been so revealing?"
"Nothing in particular. A dispatch from Portier." His rapier stood against the
wall near the hearth perhaps four steps away. He started to stand.
"I don't think so."
The gentle contradiction held no anger, but Thomas stopped. He had betrayed
himself somehow, but Dubell had always shown a talent for guessing at others'
thoughts. / can't Jet him kill me now. If he burns these papers and walks out
of
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
205
here no one witt ever know until it's far too late. It may already be too
late.
The old sorcerer said, "Perhaps the time for the masquerade is over anyway.
But I think I've been found out."
"It's a priest's report of Grandier's . . . of your confession during your
trial." Thomas slid the document across the table toward him, but the sorcerer
didn't take the bait and reach for it. Thomas kept expecting the mask to drop
but it didn't. It was still DubelTs face, Dubell's eyes. Dubell's look of
regret.
"Indeed," Urbain Grandier said softly. "I didn't expect to have anyone take it
seriously. Not in Bisra, at least. They all believed I was hand in glove with
the Prince of Hell, you know. As to how the incriminating document followed me
here, I suppose I can credit the Church's league of brotherly spies."
The fire popped loudly in the silence. Thomas felt the extreme danger that lay
in carrying on this conversation but was unable to stop. Knowing and believing
were two different things. If a weapon had been in reach, there was a good
chance he would have hesitated with it, and that would have been fatal. And he
looked up at me over TreviUe's dead body and said, "I'm sorry." He said, "Did
you do it when you kidnapped him from Lodun?"
Grandier looked mildly surprised. "Oh, no. It was long before that. I
kidnapped myself, you see."
It would have had to be that way. Dr. Surete's death, and Milam's. It was
simplicity itself, he told us, if one had the stomach for it. Grandier watched
him with a dead man's eyes. Thomas said, "Why haven't you let the Host in yet?
That's part of your bargain, isn't it' Your payment to them."
"The Unseelie Court did me a great service," the old man agreed. "I owe them
much. The first shape I took was that of the man who served as the secular
judge at that farce the Inquisition deemed my trial. He was so cold, so
forbidding even to his own family that aping his manner presented no
challenge. He was powerful, and I took my revenge as I liked. I lived as him
for nearly half a year, before I tired of it. Then
206
MARTHA WELLS
it was a young servant in his house, for I needed to move about without
drawing attention to myself . . ." Grandier gestured the memory away, his
expression wry in the firelight. "But my plans do not always coincide with
those of my associates, a feet of life they fail to understand."
A log shifted in the fire and as Grandier reflexively glanced toward it Thomas
rolled backward off the bench, grabbed his sword from where it stood against
the wall, and whipped off the scabbard. Grandier leapt out of the chair, his
hand moving as if he were gathering something out of the air and tossing it.
Thomas saw the sorcerer's quick motion and scrambled sideways, coming to his
feet as a blue blaze of light struck the wall where he had been. It splashed
on the bricks, sizzling and smoking like acid. Thomas threw himself at
Grandier with a suicidal lack of caution that the sorcerer could not
anticipate. But Grandier dodged backward with surprising agility and the tip
of the rapier only slashed a yard-long hole in the hanging fold of his sleeve.
They both saw Kade standing in the doorway at the same time.
Thomas's first thought was that faced with the situation the only reasonable
conclusion she could come to was that he was attacking Galen Dubell. But it
was Grandier she was staring at.
She looked at Grandier with a kind of growing incredulous fury, a combination
of wounded pride at being fooled and all-too-human betrayal. The sorcerer
looked back at her, and his eyes held all of Dubell's intelligence and wit and
the gentle humor he employed on those who pleased him, and he said, "No, it
wasn't your fault."
The fury flared and ignited and she took a step toward him. But Grandier's
hand came out of his robes and he tossed something at her, but it wasn't a
deadly flash of sorcerous light. It was a handful of iron filings.
Iron wouldn't harm Kade as much as it did other fay, but it would interfere
with her ability to do magic. Even as Thomas started forward Kade leapt back
to avoid the
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
207
filings and Grandier pushed past her and out the door. As he crossed the
threshold, the candles and the fire were extinguished with a hiss as if all
had been doused with water, plunging the room into shadow.
Thomas banged into the heavy table that had somehow moved into his way, shoved
it aside, and ran out into the hall.
Grandier was halfway to the outside door, Kade running after him. The few
lamps dial were lit extinguished as the sorcerer passed them. Thomas shouted
for the guards in the hall to follow him, but in the confusion and darkness he
couldn't tell if any heard.
Thomas caught up with Kade in the entry hall and together diey slammed out the
door and into the frozen mud and cold of the court. The clouds had opened up
again and the moonlight was stark white, the wind a tearing force, and
Grandier was nowhere to be seen.
Kade spun around, trying to look in every direction at once, and Thomas did a
quick circuit of the court, but found nothing.
"Damn it, where is he?" he muttered. Grandier, loose in the confusion of the
palace . . .
As he reached Kade's side again, she looked up and said, "Oh, no."
Thomas followed her gaze. A shadow had appeared and now grew on the moon's
narrow face, becoming larger and larger. It was a blot of greater darkness
dropping toward them out of the night.
She said, "He's opened the wards."
Without having to discuss it they both went for the nearest shelter, the lee
side of the wellhouse. They were too far from the Guard House, from the
entrance of any building. The winged fay plunged toward the ground, then
seemed to hover above the courtyard, as insubstantial as a shadow.
The wellhouse's door was on the far side, Thomas knew. They could edge around
to it if they were lucky, if the fay beast was half-blind.
Thomas started to slide along the wall and Kade grabbed
208
MARTHA WELLS
his arm and whispered, "Don't move." He hesitated, thinking, Does she know
what she's doing? Then he noticed the quality of the Ught change as the moon's
sparkle on the ground around them became almost palpable, and remembered
Kade's ability to eavesdrop without being seen, and that one of her fay powers
was supposed to be illusion.
The-creature that touched ground lightly in the courtyard was a living shadow,
the moonlight seeming to bend away from it. In the jumble of dark shapes that
composed it, Thomas could see only the pointed delicate razor-outline of a
claw held at an unlikely angle and a snaketike motion.
Kade was whispering, "Moonlight, shadow, moonlight, shadow . . ."
Thomas thought, Thank God we're downwind. Then he saw Grandier, walking toward
the bizarre thing the sorcerer had summoned. A moment later the creature was
aloft, soaring upward at an incredible speed.
Kade slid down the wall to sit in the mud.
The illusion around them dissipated into tiny sparkling droplets of light that
fell to the ground like beads of dew and disappeared. Fayre glamour, Thomas
realized. He looked down at Kade and said, "Very good," and gave her a hand
up.
Kade swayed a bit as she stood, not bothering to brush the mud and dirt off
her dress. She shook her head frustratedly and ran a hand through her hair.
"He let the wards move back into place, after he was past them. Why did he do
that?"
Thomas assumed it was a rhetorical question. At least, he had no idea how to
answer. The door to the Guard House swung open and torchlight poured into the
court. There were shouts from the direction of the Albon Tower. The timing was
too good. He wondered if Grandier had cast another spell besides the one to
extinguish the candles, a spell to create confusion and keep everyone else
inside.
Then Kade demanded, "What did he do with Galen?"
She was looking up at him, those clear gray eyes angry and beginning to be
afraid. Not having read the priest's document,
THE ELEMENT Of FIRE
209
she would not have understood that part of the conversation. He said, "Galen's
dead."
"Mother, this seems like cowardice," Roland said. He stood huddled in a heavy
fur cloak, attended by Renier and two servants, all dressed for hard riding in
frigid weather. The other knights charged with guarding him paced about
warily, a short distance away. It was barely dawn, and the sky was a solid
gray roof, low and threatening. A half hour ago the wind had died and the snow
had begun to fall.
Ravenna pulled her hood up over her tightly braided hair and adjusted her
gloves. "No, dear, it seems like survival." She turned to Elaine, who stood
quietly at her elbow. "Wrap your scarf more carefully, child; this cold could
ruin your skin."
Thomas folded his arms and tried not to show his frustration; it was just like
Roland to balk at the eleventh hour. Staying in the palace, at Grandier's
mercy, was impossible.
They stood in the court below the Albon Tower, an island of relative calm amid
the bustle of preparations for the evacuation. Under his cloak Renier wore a
gold-embossed gorget and back- and breastplates as many of the Albon knights
did, though Thomas and most of the other guards preferred the heavy leather
buff coats which offered almost as much protection as the awkward armor pieces
and allowed more freedom of movement. In the dim morning light servants ran
past, coaches and wagons were being loaded, horses saddled or harnessed, all
in apprehensive haste. Nothing had been said about last night's confrontation
in the Albon Tower, and nothing would be said, unless Roland was an utter
fool. Which is not entirety out of the realm of possibility, Thomas thought.
"I'm not deserting my court," the King muttered stubbornly.
"Roland," Ravenna said with a sigh. "You are the court, the crown, and the
throne. This place has only symbolic value; you can rule just as well from
Portier or the Granges. But only if you're alive."
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The King looked away, a little mollified. "I dislike having them say we ran,
that's all." He hesitated a long moment, and Thomas silently contemplated the
gray sky and braced himself to let Ravenna handle the next objection. But
Roland said, "Is it really true about Dr. Dubell?"
Panic and rumor had spread through the crowded halls, and Thomas had spent
most of the night trying to quell it. Ravenna's eyes went hard and she said,
"Yes, it is true." The news had not sat easily with her; she had hated the
thought that she could be deceived along with everyone else.
Roland bit his lip, not meeting her eyes, then nodded. "I see." He turned
abruptly and went back toward the tower, the snow crunching under his boots,
his servants and knights trailing him. Renier shook his head and followed.
Ravenna smiled ruefully. "A pretty speech I gave about symbolic value, don't
you think? One might imagine I believed it." She eyed Thomas with mild
annoyance. "I'm still angry with you. I didn't enjoy being coerced into this,
but you've got your way, and I suppose that's the height of male ambition."
"That's amusing coming from you," Thomas said without rancor. They had been
through this all last night, when he had finally persuaded her to accept his
plan for the retreat.
"Perhaps." She watched him a moment, a flicker of something other than cool
control in her eyes. "For all your faults, I trust you'll come out of this
alive." She started across the court without waiting for a reply.
Though he needed to be elsewhere now, Thomas found himself pausing to watch
her. Occasionally he was surprised anew by the idea that someone so frail
could also be so strong.
"Captain."
He looked up. Denzil stood only a few steps away, dressed in heavy brocades
and a fur-trimmed cloak, snow collecting in his hair. Ravenna and Roland's
presence in this section of the court had for the moment cleared it, and the
servants loading wagons near the Guard House were making enough noise to cover
their voices. Though, undoubtedly, eyes watched them from most of the
surrounding windows. Thomas said, "Are
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211
you sure you don't want to save this performance until you have a better
audience?"
The Duke acknowledged that with a smile, but said, "At times your impatience
with Roland is ill concealed. From your manner one would be tempted to think
you despise your King."
"I don't despise him, I pity him. He actually loves you."
"Of course he does." Denzil's smile widened, and for the first time Thomas
felt he was being allowed to see the man's real face, the truth behind the
sham he put on for Roland, for the court. The petulance, the pretense of
shallow vanity, were gone, replaced by intelligence and an amused contempt for
those the mask had fooled. "And it was well done, wasn't it'"
"It furthers your purpose."
"Whatever that is." Denzil paced a few steps. "I can say anything 1 want to
him, do anything I want to him, cause him to do whatever I want"—he looked up,
his blue eyes mocking—"I can tell you about it with perfect impunity. And I
have made him love me for it."
Thomas looked away, seeing and not seeing the many wounded being helped into a
wagon near the door of the tower. He felt stupidly, irrationally angry for
Roland's sake. Why? You'd think I'd know better than to give a damn about the
feelings of a boy-king who spits on me. He was as block-headed as Renier, who
actually believed in his oath of knighthood. But he said, "And what a conquest
it was. A boy whose father taught him to take abuse. Undoubtedly he believes
he deserves you."
"Perhaps he does. Weakness is its own reward."
Denzil was just as crippled as Roland, but in his own way, with his hate
turned outward instead of festering within. But Denzil's intelligent enough to
see it. Probabty he does see it. And probabfy revels in it. Thomas said
slowly, "You are a piece of work."
"Yes, but it's my own work," Denzil answered easily, sounding pleased. "And
IVe gotten nearly everything IVe ever wanted."
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MARTHA WELLS
And now you're getting a reaction from me, something else you 've always
wanted. Thomas put a little bored doubt in his voice and said, "Have you?"
"Nearly everything. I wanted you, once, before I realized how much it would
have harmed my cause with Roland."
Still watching the wagons, and inwardly a little amused, Thomas said dryly,
"How flattering."
"My pride demanded it, because I could sense how you hated me."
A flurry of wind tore through the court, scattering snow around their boots.
Thomas searched for the words that would deal the deepest wound, and after a
moment he said, "I know. I found your motives transparent." He looked back at
Denzil, and was rewarded by the ill-concealed anger in those cold blue eyes.
"Words," the Duke said softly. "Ravenna is growing old, Thomas. Take care that
when she falls, you don't fall with her."
"You take care. When I fall, I'm taking you with me," Thomas said, and walked
away.
The Prince's Gate yard, the buffer area between the smaller inner gate and the
towering bulk of the outer gate, was dosed in by a wall and the south side of
the Gate Bastion. Queen's guards and Albon knights manned the walls, last
night's tensions forgotten among this morning's fears.
Thomas's horse danced sideways in the churned mud and snow, glad to be out of
the stables, and he reined her in. Fifty of the Queen's guards, with Vivan and
most of the surviving Cisternans, sat their horses with him, waiting for the
lookouts on the walls to give the clear signal. Snowflakes caught like crystal
in their hat brims, hair, and the fur of their cloaks. Renier waved from the
top of the wall, then the main gate swung open and they rode out.
Many of the wealthy houses along the row had been caught by surprise. The
doors and windows had been smashed through, revealing dark empty openings,
snow
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
213
blowing freely in. They would prove perfect daytime lurking places for the
fay. A few houses across the way were still tightly shuttered and bore no
outward sign of invasion, but nothing stirred as they rode out into the
street.
There were a few bodies half-buried in die snow. Their horses, battlefield
trained to ignore such things, would have walked right over the first had
Thomas not guided them around. The Unseelie Court could not appear while the
sun was visible, even when it was dimmed by the gray snow clouds. They would
not be faced with the power that had driven them out of the Old Palace unless
the clouds grew considerably darker, blocking out most of the light. But the
dark fay that followed the Host were not so handicapped. There would be things
that flew, that travelled beneath the snow, that would leap down at them from
the rooftops and the broken windows of the houses around them. So Kade Carrion
had told them.
Thomas wondered where Kade was, if she was watching or if she was back in
Fayre. After Grandier's escape they had gone into the kitchens attached to the
Guard House to talk. The servants had fired the ovens and it was almost warm.
It was not deserted either; men and women were packing supplies for the
journey. Along the side where the stores were kept, among barrels of apples,
flour, and barley and shelves stacked with rounds of yellow and white cheeses
covered with wax, they had stopped. Kade sat on an apple barrel, fixed her
eyes on the rubies in his cloak pin, and said, "How do you know he's dead?"
He had brought the copy of Grandter's confession, and handed it to her.
She read it through twice, her eyes bleak. He said quietly, "He wanted us to
be completely dependent on one sorcerer, and he chose Galen Dubell. He killed
Dr. Surete and Milam after Surete had convinced Ravenna to let Dubell return.
He told me how himself, after the golem attacked you in the Grand Gallery. He
said it would have been simplicity itself to give either the Court Sorcerer or
his assistant
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MARTHA WELLS
an enspelled object, especially if it seemed to come from a friend. So they
died, like Dubell himself, his servants at Lodun, that clown in your acting
troupe, a spy called Gambin, and Lord Lestrac, who knew too much of their plan
and was prone to dangerous mistakes. Maybe there were others. We'll probably
never know.
"I thought Denzil was Grandier's agent in the palace. That he'd taken the
keystone. But Denzil didn't know where it was kept—only Dr. Braun and Dubell
knew that. The night Braun was killed he must have thought of something or
found something that he believed important, and he was afraid to tell me with
Denzil so nearby. He was on his way back to the King's Bastion. Dubell was
coming along the same way toward die gallery. They met, and Braun must have
decided to tell Dubell what he'd meant to tell me. They went into that salon
and . -. . Braun idolized the man and had no reason to be suspicious. He would
never have thought twice about turning his back on him. Neither would I, for
that matter, and I don't do that lightly. Grandier played his part very well."
Kade turned the paper over, and studied die blank back of it.
Thomas said, "You told him you were going to get into the palace with an
acting troupe, didn't you?"
She nodded. "He said he never received the letter."
"But he did. You were right when you said the golem was after you. All
Grandier had to do was find out which troupe was likely to get the invitation
to court and plant the golem among them. You were the one who knew Galen
Dubell the best; you were die one most likely to expose an imposter.
"I think it was Denzil who brought him here. Lestrac and Dontane were the
contacts between them, so Denzil wouldn't know that Grandier had taken
Dubell's place. That way Grandier could talk Roland out of leaving Bel Garde
its walls, and we'd think of Dubell as his own man and no friend to Denzil.
Denzil's antagonism would be real, and no one would suspect the link between
them. It was die only way for him. Grandier was scarred and crippled by
torture, and it would've been
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215
impossible to go unnoticed with his own appearance. He used this to move
around undetected in Bisra and have his revenge on the priests in the
Inquisition, to cause the plague and the crop failure."
For the first time Kade met his eyes. "Why did he let the wards close again?
He could have held them apart and let the Host down on us. He could have done
that at any time."
"I don't know. I don't know why the man does anything," Thomas confessed. He
remembered the burning house in the River Quarter, and how the magical fire
had considerately avoided spreading to the other buildings on the crowded
street. He had noted it at the time, the equal portions of viciousness and
restraint, and he understood it no more now than he had then. "Why he would
help Denzil of all people... I don't think it was malice against Galen Dubell.
It was just that he was perfect for Grandier's purposes. He was trusted,
well-known, but he'd been a recluse for ten years. He was living alone at
Lodun, without family . . ."
She interrupted, "He stopped taking students last year. He said he was working
on a treatise on . . ." She stopped, and buried her face in her hands.
He stepped dose and pulled her hands away from her face. She wasn't crying. He
might have expected grief and rage, but this wounded silence was pain itself.
"I'm going to need your help."
Kade seemed to realize he was holding her hands and pulled free. Standing up,
she moved away a few steps. Not turning to look at him she said, "I'm leaving.
That's what I was going to tell Galen when I heard you call him Grandier."
"Why?"
She looked back at him. This time there were tears streaking her face, but her
expression was that familiar one of exas-'peration. "There is nothing for me
here, especially now."
But he had still told her what the plan was, how he had intended for Dubell to
cover the escape to Bel Garde, the closest defensible position that could be
reached before nightfall. She had listened without comment. Before leaving
he'd
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said, "There's a difference between running away from your fears and walking
away from your past. For your own sake, make sure you know which is which."
And that was a damn pompous thing to say to her, he thought now.
The first of the line of six wagons carrying the wounded who had survived the
night left the shelter of the gate and trundled down the frozen mud of the
street. They were guarded by about half the surviving Cistemans and a large
party of servants and retainers—men, women, and children. Thomas would rather
have kept the Cisternans together, but he knew they would obey his orders
whereas there was no guarantee of that with Albon knights. Vivan and the other
few remaining Cistemans would come with his group.
It was a relief to be outside, to be moving. Inside the walls, it seemed
everything was held together by threads which were beginning to unravel.
Thomas looked back at his men grouped around the gate. Baserat was checking
the set of his pistols in the holsters on the saddlebow. Thomas also had two
long wheellock pistols in saddle holsters and was wearing a rapier with a wide
cavalry blade. A dueling rapier was slung over his shoulder.
One large armed party, mounted with only one wagon for supplies, left the gate
and headed down the street in the opposite direction. It was the Count of
Duncanny, who had chosen to lead away his family, retainers, and some of the
other nobility who could not be counted on to keep up in a hard ride. They had
some Albons with them, and Thomas could only guess what their chances might
be.
The count did not turn around as they rode away, but he lifted one hand to
them in farewell.
Thomas noted the similarity to a funeral procession.
The men on the palace wall had vanished. He hoped the fay, and Grandier,
didn't guess the significance of that for another few moments at least.
The last wagon passed out of the shadow of the Prince's
Gate and Thomas nodded a signal to one of the guards waiting there.
Thomas spurred his horse and they were off. The crash of two coaches
barrelling through the gate signalled the eruption of the quiet street into
pandemonium.
Surrounding the coaches were Lucas and about twenty Queen's guards, the other
Cisternans, and a few volunteer Albon knights. Behind them rode the rest of
the Queen's Guard and the Albon troop.
Grandier would anticipate their escape. He knew they would have to move now,
before the snow choked the streets. Thomas hoped he hadn't anticipated any
further.
The promenades and tall houses of the palace quarter flashed by. Out of the
corner of his eye, Thomas saw a horse stumble and go down. He couldn't tell
who its rider was.
The attack came. A large dark-winged creature struck the top of the first
coach, leaping away immediately as its claws encountered the iron nails
embedded in the roof. But the coach swayed under the weight and fell sideways,
two of its wheels crushed beneath it. The driver tumbled free and the horses
screamed, staggering and fighting their harness. The second coach shuddered to
a halt beyond it as more fay leapt off rooftops and sprang up out of the mud
and snow in the street.
Thomas wheeled his horse, leading the escort group of Queen's guards and
Cisternans to surround the two coaches. They fetched up against the dressed
stone wall of a fortified town house.
Thomas looked back toward the second company. If Renier didn't follow his
instructions . . . No, the Albon troop and the rest of his men had split off
with the wagons as the fay had attacked the coaches, heading up the Avenue of
Flowers, riding pell-mell for the gate out of the city. But even as he saw
diem go, an illusion of a confused roiling mass of horsemen settled in their
place.
She's here, she's (tone it. A moment later he saw Kade leap
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off the back of the coach that Berham had driven and disappear into the
illusion she had created. He had intended for Dubell to cover the retreat of
the second troop with illusion, the plan he had fortunately not had time to
reveal to the old sorcerer. Kade could do it with fayre glamour, which neither
the fay nor Grandier would be immune to, but until this moment he had not
thought she would.
The coaches had been empty but for their drivers. Ravenna, Roland, and Falaise
were on horseback in the midst of the Albon troop, the wagons carrying the
supplies and the wounded, and the rest of the Queen's Guard. Ravenna had
ridden under conditions almost as desperate during the war, it was one of the
few things Roland did well on his own, and Gideon was under orders to keep
Falaise on her mount if he had to tie her there. If Grandier was watching,
Thomas knew his own presence with the coaches would add verisimilitude to the
deception.
Then the fay were on them and there was no more time for worry about the
others. Thomas emptied both pistols at the flying creature that had struck the
first coach as it stooped on them again, then used the heavy cavalry rapier to
slash down at the fay that clustered about his horse. A gunpowder blast
erupted somewhere nearby, with the shriek of wounded men and horses—the barrel
of a too hastily loaded wheellock exploding.
The horses were trained to kick in battle and their iron-shod hooves kept the
fay back at first. Then Thomas saw Baserat go down and an instant later
something struck the side of his own horse, knocking it sprawling. He managed
to fall clear and the horse tore itself free, staggered up, and bolted. As
Thomas struggled to get to his feet, a fay leapt on him from behind and
slammed him to the ground. He twisted and shoved an elbow back into it,
expecting a bronze blade in his vitals, then the hilt of the rapier that was
still slung across his back touched the thing's head. He heard the creature's
flesh sizzle and it yelped as it leapt away.
Thomas stood and cleared a path through the creatures
with his rapier and put his back to the wall of the house. Blood was slicking
his swordhilt—his own possibly, though he couldn't remember being wounded. He
saw the second coach collapse and the misshapen dark fay swarming over it, and
grimly anticipated their disappointment at its empty interior. He wished Kade
had not come with them after all. He hoped she was controlling the illusion
from a distance, or had gotten herself away by now.
Above the screams and shouts of men, horses, and fay, he heard the crash of a
door slamming open from farther down the side of the house. He thought to work
his way down there in case someone had found a way inside where they could
retreat, but one of the humanlike servants of the Host came at him, swinging
its sword wildly. He stepped forward and neatly speared its throat with the
rapier's point, then something struck him in the leg just above his right
knee. For a moment he felt nothing more than the slight pain of a bee sting.
Then the ground was rushing up at him, then nothing.
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
221

As KADE TRIED to reach the partial shelter of the wall of the house, a clawed
hand caught her hair and the back of her cloak, hauling her around. It was a
bogle, a short squat ugly thing with muddy gray skin and harsh yellow eyes,
and it was grinning at her. She pulled a handful of glamour out of the cold
air and flung it into its eyes, giving it an all too temporary blindness, and
it fled shrieking away from her. Damn things, she thought, dodging one of the
coaches and its plunging horses. Why anyone allows them to exist is beyond me.
If she ever got back to Fayre she would consider dedicating the rest of her
life to removing its inhabitants from the face of the earth.
Kade fetched up against the wall of the house, just as the carriage doors
slammed open and men poured out. Private troops . . . No, there were sprigs of
white and red tucked into some of their hatbands, the colors of city service.
A trained band.
She could feel the iron mixed into the mortar of the wall behind her as a
distant heat. The proximity of so much iron made her wary, but she hadn't felt
any real emotion she could identify since early this morning. She had not been
able to leave, whether it was the idea of returning to Knockma and being alone
with her own thoughts that was difficult to face or something as solid and
insubstantial as die lump that had been in her throat for hours and seemed to
be keeping her from any decisive action.
The fay began to disperse as the men came to the aid of the now smaller group
formed into a defensive knot between the two wrecked coaches and the house. It
was probably what had saved many of them. The flighted fay large enough to
carry off humans had not been able to reach them. A thick haze of white smoke
from pistols and muskets hung over the street now, but she could see that the
glamour that formed her illusion was beginning to dissipate. The reflective
quality of ice and snow had produced glamour in abundance. A trick on
Grandier, that his foul weather produced material for her illusions.
Kade slipped inside the door with the others as the house troops withdrew. In
the large, stone-floored room within were half a dozen coaches, stabling for
many horses, and the confusion of wounded and dying men.
She made her way across the chamber. Nearly to the bottom of the stair into
the main house, she saw a dead man on the floor in Cisternan colors. She
recognized him as their commander, Vivan, who had helped her in the palace
hall battle. She hesitated, but there was nothing to be done, and in another
moment the crowd pushed her on.
She couldn't see any of the Queen's guards, or Thomas, anywhere. With nothing
else to do, she decided to look for them.
She made her way up the stairs and into the maze of rooms on the second floor.
From outside, faced with only the one uncompromising gray wall, she hadn't
realized the house was so large. The beautifully appointed rooms were crowded
with refugees from the surrounding neighborhood, mostly shopkeepers or members
of the more wealthy classes whose homes hadn't withstood the attacks. They
were making an awful noise, yelling, screaming, complaining, children crying,
though as far as Kade could tell the house had never been penetrated by fay.
Surely they were only stirred up by the battle outside. Surely they hadn't
been like this since last night.
She fought her way through crowded rooms until she saw
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a young servant bustling through, carrying an armload of rolled linen
bandages. She caught his arm. "Whose house is this?"
He didn't even look at her oddly. It probably wasnt the most witless question
he had answered today. "Lord Aviler's house, the High Minister."
She let him go. She remembered Aviler barely from the night of the Commedia,
but mostly from the conversation between Thomas and Lucas she had eavesdropped
on. His position in all this was obscure, at best. And why do I care?
She found another stairway and went up. The third floor would hold audience
chambers and more private entertaining rooms and salons. It was unguarded,
since custom and fear of irritating their patrons kept any of the refugees
from venturing up there.
It was mercifully quiet. Then she heard voices raised in argument, and in a
sudden silence one familiar voice. It cant be . . . She followed the sound to
a carved double door that let her into the more open area of a large state
dining room with a long polished table and candelabra hung with colored glass
drops. A group of battered Queen's guards and the lieutenant Gideon faced
DenzU and a group of Albon knights while tall, sallow Lord Aviler looked on.
But seated nearby was Falaise.
Kade stood still a moment, trying to disbelieve her eyes. The Queen was
sitting in an armchair, her head down and her hands knotted in her lap. She
looked like a prisoner.
Kade started down the room toward them before they saw her. Denzil noticed her
first, and Gideon stopped shouting to follow his gaze. She thought, If Denzil
smiles at me there will be trouble. But the Duke's expression of angry
contempt didn't change.
Kade focused on Falaise. "What are you doing here?"
The Queen looked up at her. She was dressed for hard riding, in a man's
breeches under a plain hunting habit, with a cloak wrapped around her
partially concealing the unseemly breeches. "We were attacked, and I was
separated from my
guards. Lord DenzU found me and brought me here." Falaise's voice held
suppressed hysteria, and her eyes were locked on Kade's with desperate
intensity.
"He abducted her and brought her here," Gideon corrected Falaise, watching
Aviler. "She would be safely out the gates by now if..."
"If you had been competent to get her out the gates Denzil interrupted.
"Sorceress," Aviler said, his voice, used to addressing the loud and
argumentative city assemblies, overriding theirs.
Kade looked at him. His expression was watchful and carefully wary. A part of
her not concerned with death and the present had time to observe: I must look
more than half mad.
He said, "Lord Denzil told me you had left the city."
She said, "Ask him why he didn't take her after Roland and the others. Ask him
why he didn't take advantage of the escape we bought for them." And when did
it become "we," she asked herself.
Aviler's eyes flickered from Kade to Denzil. "He has already explained
himself."
Gideon said, "You're in this with him, aren't you?" One of the other guards
put a cautioning hand on his shoulder.
Denzil said, "We were separated from the main troop, and the Queen had to be
gotten to safety." His expression reflected angry concern, and Kade thought,
He's acting. He's doing it very well, but He's'acting. Does Aviler know
that?She couldn't tell. Aviler seemed to be mainly worried over what she was
going to do. I'm not the danger here, you idiot.
To Falaise she said, "Do you want to be here?"
As the Queen started to answer, Denzil interrupted smoothly. "Of course she
doesn't. She would rather be with her king."
Aviler spared an unreadable glance for him, but kept his attention on Kade. He
said, "The Queen must choose for herself whom she wishes to accompany. I
offered to let her go with her guards, but ..."
"My lady, please," Gideon begged Falaise, going to his
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225
knees beside her chair. "For your honor and your safety, you know we'll
protect you."
Kade looked down at the Queen. "Or come with me."
Falaise's frightened eyes went to Denzil. She was afraid to accept help from
another woman, Kade realized. With that thought came a cold fury, but it was a
fury wrapped in cotton wool, like the rest of her reality. Falaise turned back
to her and shook her head helplessly, and Kade walked out of the room.
She went out into the maze of salons, seeing servants and a few battered
soldiers, but no one she recognized. She could have asked for directions, she
supposed, but she was not in die mood for questions. Then she saw Berham
disappearing into one of the doorways carrying an armload of firewood and
hurried to catch up with him.
It was the antechamber to a suite. Inside there were Queen's guards she
recognized and two men in Cisteman colors. Several were wounded, and all
looked up at her in surprise. Berham stopped as he saw her. He said, "Oh, I'm
glad to see you. We thought you'd gone off."
"Where's Thomas?" The words were out before she quite realized it, and it
crossed her mind that this was the first time she had called him anything but
"you bastard."
Berham eyed her a moment, then he opened the next door and stepped back to let
her go in.
She stopped in the doorway.
It was a bedchamber, cold and musty despite a new fire in the hearth. Thomas
lay unconscious on the bed, still wearing the doublet and bloodstained buff
coat from the battle. It took her moments to recognize him. She had never
thought to see him so still, so white. A thin elderly man in a velvet doctor's
cope sat next to him on the bed. Lucas was standing over him. He was hatless,
and looked as if he'd been caught too near a pistol blast; his face and the
side of his doublet were flecked with powder burns. Martin was standing at the
foot of the bed, leaning on the bedpost, and the sleeves of his white shirt
were blood soaked. The young servant Phaistus was backed into a comer, trying
to stay out of the way.
Kade took a step into the room, Berham brushing past behind her.
She asked, "What is it?" Her voice was unsteady and she hated herself for it.
The doctor glanced back at her, but said nothing.
Lucas said, "Answer her."
The lieutenant's tone was even and reasonable but the doctor looked up at him
and blanched. He said hastily, "I can't find a wound serious enough to cause
this. It has to be elf-shot There's nothing to be done."
Sensation returned and hit Kade with the force of a hammer. She stumbled and
steadied herself against the wall. "Get him out of here," she said.
Martin consulted Lucas with a quick glance. He saw something in the other
man's expression that constituted agreement, and caught the doctor by the
thick collar of his cope and slung him toward the door.
The doctor had a highly developed sense of self-preservation. He scrambled to
his feet and darted out without a threat or protest.
Kade went forward and sat down on the bed. She touched Thomas's face. His skin
was hot but his sweat was freezing. Distractedly she noticed that the striped
wool of the bedclothes was faded, but the plumes topping the canopy were still
pure white and the headboard had a design of twining laurel leaves. It spoke
well for Aviler. She knew Denzil would have been too petty to provide his
enemy a decent place in which to die.
She found die elf-shot by finding the hole it had burnt through his trouser
leg. Elf-shot never appeared to leave a mark, and the tiny fragment was lodged
just under the skin of his lower thigh. It must have glanced off the heavy
leather of his boot top and entered his flesh at an angle. It was why he was
still alive. The stone had not had time to work its way farther into his body
on its eventual track toward his heart.
She said, "I need a silver kniie. It doesn't have to be pure, but it should
have as little base metal as possible."
226
MARTHA WELLS
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
227
Martin said, "That's an alchemy tool. Where would . . . ?"
"Or a piece of family plate," Lucas interrupted. "Berham."
"No sooner said." Berham dropped the wood and hurried for the door. He was
limping, Kade noticed. It's not too bad; he's walking. Worry about Him later.
"Have you done this before?" Lucas asked her.
He didn't ask her if she thought she could do it, and she was so grateful she
answered honestly. "No, but I've seen it done." Or at least attempted. Other
doctors or sorcerer-healers had tried to cut out a fragment of elf-shot on the
rare occasions when it was close enough to the surface of the skin to find,
but most made the mistake of using iron rather than silver. And elf-shot
didn't lose its power once it was embedded in a human body; if a sorcerer did
manage to remove it he was just as likely to have it seek his own heart
instead. The fay who cast the shot sometimes removed it for reasons of their
own, but those instances were few and far between.
Victims of elf-shot were usually killed to keep them from suffering further,
if they didn't die immediately. It was a perfect opportunity for Denzil, or
High Minister Aviler. And Thomas Boniface was a disliked favorite whose patron
and troop were out of the city by now, if they lived. The doctor might talk.
Maybe we should have touted him. It was too late for that now. And why do I
care?
Because from the moment you set foot in the palace, he did not treat you as a
child, a fool, or worse, a court lady. He treated you as exactly what you are,
whatever that is, and he knew what Galen's death did to you.
She paced the room with rabid impatience until Berham returned. He shut the
door hastily behind him and brought a small delicate paring knife out of his
doublet. "Will this do?"
Kade took it from him and felt the nearly pure silver resonate inside her.
"Perfect," she said. "Now all of you get the hell out of the way."
If she had spared enough notice, she would have been surprised to see that
they did just that.
She passed the knife through a candle quickly, and that
would have to do. It was a little too dull but he would be in no position to
notice.
She sat down on the bed and gently probed for the fragment. It wasn't there
anymore. It had worked its way deeper already. She cursed, fighting a foolish
surge of panic, and thought, Gods, why can't anything ever be easy? She knew
where it had to be. It hadn't had time to move more than an inch or so down
into the muscle. So do it. She saw her hand was trembling, and she was glad
Thomas was deeply unconscious because he would otherwise have surely said
some-» thing infuriating at this point. Now, she thought, and carefully
inserted the knife.
A little blood welled up, and after a long heartbeat she felt the knife
vibrate as the.elf-shot adhered to it. My God, it worked. Gently she withdrew
the blade. As soon as the tiny fragment was free she closed her fist around it
to keep it from flying at someone, stood, and started toward the fireplace.
Then she felt it pushing at the skin of her palm.
She froze, staring at her dosed hands. If she let it go, God knew who it would
head for. But I'm fay, she thought against the rising dread. It can't hurt me.
There's no such thing as half human, Galen Dubell had told her once long ago,
and she had typically disregarded his words. One drop of red blood is enough.
She whispered a fey charm of warding danger, and felt the elf-shot press at
her hand, pushing through the skin. Fighting panic, she hoped the planet of
influence was close enough and shouted the Lodun : formula for the destruction
of dangerous objects.
The sorcery worked where the fay magic had not. She felt the fragment catch
fire and hastily scraped it off her hands onto the hearthstone. It burned
bright blue for an instant, then disappeared.
She sank down and sat on the floor. All those years that
elf-shot could have put her out of their misery and the Unsee-
£      lie Court had never thought to make the experiment, to test to
|     see if she had the same immunity to it as the other fay did.
Idiots, she thought. Her palm hurt like hell.
228
MARTHA WELLS
THi ELEMENT OF FIRE
229
She turned back to the bed and saw Thomas move his head on the pillow.
Feverishly, but he had moved.
She had forgotten anyone else was still in the room, and was startled to find
Lucas standing next to her. He took her hand and turned it over. "God damn,"
he muttered when he saw the bum. "Hey, Ber ..."
Berham appeared with a handful of snow scraped from a window ledge and slapped
it into her palm.
She snatched her hand away then realized the cold had cut the intensity of the
pain nearly in half. She watched Thomas while Berham fussily bandaged the
burn, and was rewarded by seeing him move twice more.
Much later she sat on a stool by the fire and looked at the deep red mark on
her hand. It didn't seem inclined to blister, so she supposed it couldn't be
too bad. Unlike pure fay magic, the craft of mortal sorcery was a messy
business and she was used to hurting herself occasionally. Messy, but more
certain, she thought.
She had helped the other wounded as best she could, but without the philtres
and salves that were so necessary to healing-sorcery, or the ingredients with
which to mix them, there was not much she could do. She could have made a
healing stone, but that only worked for disease, not torn flesh. A
well-stocked apothecary box would have saved lives tonight. The charms to give
strength and to hold the soul to the body had little efficacy without the
herbal preparations that soothed the wounds. The effort had left her cold and
dreadfully tired, and she would have traded all her fay ancestry for half of
Galen Dubell's skill at healing-sorcery. And she knew that if she had devoted
all her attention to study, she would have had that skill by now.
Kade was worried about the wound in Thomas's leg. The spell she had used to
knit the flesh together had seemed to work, but the wound was deep and there
was no telling how the elf-shot had affected it. By the firelight, his hair
and beard were inky black against his fever-pale skin. She resisted the
urge to get up and walk over to the bed again. You thought the world ended
when you found out Galen was dead, but when you heard that fool of a doctor
say elf-shot. . .
She took a deep breath and faced herself. It was idiocy to deny it. How could
she not know? But looking back, she could not see when it had happened. She
was not sure how her childhood passion figured into it, or when her carefully
preserved distant appreciation of him had been intensified by intimacy. She
was even less certain when the thought / want this man for a friend had become
/ want this man.
Simply because she had never felt it before didn't mean she couldn't recognize
it, even though it wasn't very much like the poets and books had described it.
Some had implied that the depth of the emotion would hurt; they had not said
it would be tike the blunt end of a poleax in the pit of the stomach.
She had wondered if being fay would make her unable to love; it had certainly
made her unable to feel even the slightest fondness for any of her relations.
She had thought she loved Roland once, but then decided that if she really
had, she would not have been able to leave him. She had thought herself as
cold as her mother Moire and the rest of the fay, who put on a great show of
grand passion but who, underneath their shallow surfaces, had hearts as empty
as broken wine barrels. To find that she was capable of love, that it was
happening now and under less than ideal circumstances, was more than a shock.
It was horrific. And worse, like every other bubbleheaded court lady, she had
fallen in love with the Captain of the Queen's Guard. When she was a child at
court, someone had proclaimed undying passion for him every other week. Trying
to guess who he was going to show interest in and who he was going to brush
off had been a game with Ravenna's gentlewomen. Kade felt herself a fool, and
she had seen too much bloodshed and horror in the last few days to seek the
comfort of childishly wishing herself dead.
She would have to think about what to do sometime./ws* not right now, she told
herself. Just not right now.
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MARTHA WELLS
Thomas turned his head toward the light. It resolved into a glowing orange
fire in an unfamiliar hearth. The room was dark, except for one candle that he
could see as a dim glow through die curtain at die foot of the bed. He felt
die sweat-drenched heat of a receding fever, and everything ached. Except the
wound in his thigh that felt like a hot coal had been buried beneath the skin.
He sat up on one elbow and parted the bloody and burned (Burned? he wondered)
fabric to examine what looked like an especially clean sword thrust, closed
over with a new pink scab, a sign of sorcerous healing.
Then he saw Kade sitting on a footstool by the fire, where she had blended
into die light and its reflection on the polished stone hearth, a creature of
amber, rose, and old gold. One could never tire of looking at her, he decided.
There was always something new to see, an effect made even more interesting
because she produced it unintentionally and entirely without artifice. They
stared at one another for a time, until Kade blinked and shook herself.
"Where are we?" he asked her.
"Lord Aviler's town house. You've been near dead most of the day, because you
were hit by elf-shot."
It took a moment for the words to sink in. He said, "I couldn't have been."
"Very well, argue about it as if you weren't unconscious when it happened."
Thomas looked at the wound again. "Did you cut it out?"
"Yes."
"It couldn't have been easy."
"I have had a hard day," she admitted with dignity, lifting a handful of
sweat-soaked hair away from her forehead.
He saw the bandage wrapped around her hand and asked, "What happened there?"
"Nothing." After a moment of hesitation she said, "Denzil's here, with
Falaise."
He closed his eyes. "No."
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
231
"Yes. He got her away from Gideon and the others when they were attacked. They
followed him here, but she's too terrified of Denzil to take dieir help and
Aviler stands about like a great idiot saying die Queen must decide who
escorts her."
Thomas fell back on die bed and contemplated the underside of die tester for a
moment. "You realize diat a short while ago I was as good as dead and this was
all someone else's problem."
"You're welcome. I think I know why Denzil's here."
He sat up again, taking a deep breath to steady himself as dizziness
threatened for a moment. "I'd appreciate it if you'd tell me."
"Aviler. If he's in this plot with Denzil and Grandier, dial's one thing, but
if he's not... he isn't just going to stand diere and watch."
The High Minister. A man who would support Roland despite personal
differences, knowing he could increase the political power of the Ministry and
it would never occur to the young King to stop him. A man with no patience for
royal favorites. A man with nothing but suspicion for royal favorites. "You're
right." With the help of the bedpost, Thomas hauled himself up and stood
carefully, wincing at die tight pain of the wound. Limping around on it wasn't
going to do it any good but he hardly had a choice.
Kade was fiddling with her hair again. She said, "Falaise knows somediing."
He looked down at her. She was obviously reluctant. "Why do you think so?"
"She's afraid of Denzil."
"She should be." He limped to the foot of the bed and found his dueling rapier
and main gauche. He drew die sword to check the blade and saw it was nicked
and dented but still unbent.
"I know that," Kade said widi asperity. "But she doesn't know that, not unless
she knows more than she should."
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233
Thomas hesitated, thinking it through. "How much do you think she knows?"
"She won't tell me. She doesn't think I can protect her. But 1 think she'll
tell you."
"She may have tried to already, and I thought she was after something else. I
should have listened to her but the woman never gave any sign she could think
before." If they somehow escaped the current situation, that might save her
neck. He could say Falaise had confided to him early suspicions of Denzil but
had been unable to give him anything definite. That would keep Roland or some
ambitious courtier from charging her with treason along with the Duke. If they
got out of this. Damned optimist. Then he realized the full implication of
what Kade had said and looked down at her in surprise. "Doesn't think you
could protect her? That's ridiculous. You're not a supporter of Ravenna,
Roland, or Denzil; you're the only one who could protect her with impunity."
Kade considered that. "Maybe she just can't trust anyone anymore."
Slipping his baldric over his head Thomas thought, That's an idea we could all
have sympathy with.
The door opened and Lucas entered, then stopped abruptly as he saw his
captain. "You're alive," he said, smiting. "And I thought I was about to be
promoted."
"Careful, I might take you up on that."
"Oh, I'd have to decline under these circumstances."
"Typical of you. How many are we?"
"Eighteen. Not as bad as I thought it would be for a moment there, but bad.
Commander Vivan's dead, and Bas-erat . . ."
As he listed the familiar names Thomas shook his head. He would have to deal
with it later. Worse that he didn't know if their sacrifice had accomplished
anything, if Ravenna and Roland had been able to get out of the city. Lucas
finished with, ". . . and hard as it is to believe, Denzil's here with . . ."
"I know. I'm about to go and give him the good news about my premature
survival. Do you know where Falaise is?"
"Yes, Martin found where they're keeping her. Gideon and some of the others
are hanging about outside her rooms, making sure no one makes off with her."
The Queen was ensconced in a suite in the opposite wing. Bloody and ragged,
Thomas and Kade drew considerable attention passing through the house. Thomas
limped, and resisted the urge to steady himself on the walls. They finally
arrived at a suite guarded by five weary, battered men with the badges of city
service, who were in turn being watched by Gideon and six other Queen's
guards.
Gideon was pacing, and when Thomas and the others entered the anteroom where
the guards were gathered, he looked like he was in agony. Stiffly he began,
"Sir, I ..."
Thomas said, "Shut up," and walked past him into the next room.
The city guards watched with great interest and made no attempt to stop him,
but inside were several of Denzil's contingent of Albon Knights, given to him
by Roland and sworn to his personal service. Thomas said, "Gentlemen, really."
The knights were well aware that denying a Queen's Guard lieutenant the right
to see the Queen was irregular enough, but denying it to the Queen's Guard
Captain was practically equivalent to abduction. One of the older knights
looked uneasy. "We have our orders . . . ," he began.
Falaise threw open the door from within and stood there, her eyes wide. She
was still dressed for riding and her hair was coming down. She said, "Captain,
thank God you're all right."
"I think your orders have just been countermanded." Thomas smiled.
Falaise tapped the knight who was blocking the door on the shoulder and said
in an irritated tone, "Get out of the way."
Thomas thought that if Kade were ever foolish enough to get herself into a
similar situation, she would have probably punched the man in the kidney. The
knights reluctantly moved aside.
Then from the anteroom Denzil pushed his way in through
234
MARTHA WELLS
the city guards, Lord Aviler behind him. The High Minister looked mildly
surprised to see them. Denzil stopped when he saw Thomas, and his eyes
narrowed dangerously.
Yes, Thomas thought, how awful that it all doesn t go your way. He said, "I
was looking for the Queen. It seems the King has temporarily misplaced her."
He wondered if Denzil would challenge him now.
The air in the room was brittle enough to break.
"She is under my protection," Denzil said.
"Yes, I've heard all about that, but it isn't necessary anymore."
"I have men here . . ."
"You have twenty armed men sworn to your service, my lord," Aviler
interrupted. "And you, Captain, have about an equal number of Guardsmen in any
condition to fight. I have a hundred city troops in service to the Ministry,
and I suggest we leave them all to their duty of keeping this house secure."
"A very diplomatic suggestion," Thomas said.
Abruptly Falaise said, "I... thank you for your help, Lord Denzil, but I do
not. . . require it any longer."
Denzil stared down at her a long moment. "As you wish, Madame." He turned away
and left the anteroom. Aviler bowed sardonically and followed him.
Thomas followed Falaise into the room and closed the door behind him. It was a
perfect setting for her, with light sarsenet hangings and mirror-glass set in
the panelling. There was no maid in evidence. He wondered briefly if Falaise
had sent her female attendants away, or if she had even been offered any. Was
Denzil on his tvay here just now because he heard I was, or because he knew
Falaise was alone? And was that why Aviler was trailing after him? He leaned
on the back of a tapestry-covered armchair and said, "My lady, I think there
are some things we need to discuss."
"Yes." Falaise sat down on the daybed and looked up at him anxiously. "About
Denzil."
Kade had vanished somewhere along the way, though Thomas suspected she was
nearby and within earshot. He was
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
235
not worried about that. She already suspected most of what Falaise was about
to tell him. "How much do you know about the Duke of Alsene's plans?"
"Nothing, not really. He ..." Falaise looked away nervously. "Denzil suggested
that if my husband were to have to leave the throne, I might consider marrying
him."
Landlaw again. The oldest traditions held that by being the King's wife,
Falaise took on part of the mystique of the crown, if not its authority. If
Roland died without leaving children, and one of the possible heirs married
Falaise, it would go far to strengthen his claim in the minds of a great many
people. There were a considerable number of families with enough royal blood
to pursue the throne, and many technically closer to it than Denzil. But none
of them had tried to suborn Falaise . . . It implies he's fairly sure she's
soon to become a widow. "That's treason."
Her expression was earnest. "I know."
Thomas closed his eyes and rubbed the bridge of his nose. "What did you tell
him?"
"I didn't answer him." She made a helpless gesture. "I tried to put him off. I
was afraid if I said no he would tell Roland lies about me, but if I said yes,
even if I didn't mean it, he might go through with what he planned. I didn't
know who to go to."
Yes, you did. You Just couldn't get me fc> listen to you. Thomas noticed she
had refrained from jointing that error out to him, but it would've been
against Falaise's lifelong training to tell a man he had made a mistake. No,
she would try to delicately manage him, which would make it all the more
difficult to get the truth out of her. Yet that tactic had worked well with
Denzil. She must have made a good job of stringing him along, if she had kept
it up for several days without the young Duke losing his patience. Thomas
could easily imagine Falaise swooning, gracefully weeping, and doing
everything a woman about to give in did except actually give in. He looked up.
"And he didn't give you any hint of how he was going to accomplish this?"
236
MARTHA WELLS
"No. If he had, would that make things any better?"
"Probably not."
Falaise was knotting the ribbons on the sleeve of her coat. "It is very bad,
isn't it?"
"Yes. If we ever get the evidence against him to bring a formal charge of
treason, then he can take you to the gallows with him. You could bring the
charge yourself, but I doubt Roland would take your word over Denzil's. There
are plenty of others who know Denzil and probably would take your word before
his, but their opinions won't count." He shook his head. "We'll just have to
make sure it won't come to that."
"How?"
It was just one more reason for Denzil to die a hero's death at the earliest
opportunity. It might not stop Grandier now, but it would clear up a number of
miscellaneous side issues and relieve the feelings of several people, among
them Kade, Ravenna, Falaise, and himself. But it didn't make it any easier.
They were not under Roland's nervous eye anymore, but with the knights and
High Minister Aviler as biased witnesses, it was still a difficult problem.
"The less you know now, the better," he told her.
"Wait." She hesitated. "I wanted to tell you that my patronage is yours,
whatever happens. I know that Roland is against you, but if the Duke of Alsene
is gone he would be so much easier to deal with and if things get back to the
way they were .. . When Ravenna isn't here anymore, when I'm patron of the
Queen's Guard, I want you to stay as Captain." Her eyes lifted to meet his for
the first time. "My patronage, and my very sincere . . . regard."
Oh, fine, Thomas thought. In the language of the court, her meaning was clear.
Regard equalled favor, and favor meant access to her bed in return for his
support. He looked at her a long moment, and said, "I'll remember that, my
lady."
Listening in the anteroom, Kade knocked her head ungently against the wall and
thought, And that is the tale of my life. She slipped out, unnoticed.
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
237
When Thomas went out into the anteroom, Lucas was telling Gideon, ". . . and
when he heard about it he went absolutely mad and you're lucky if you're not .
. ."
They both looked up when he shut the door. Thomas said to Gideon, "When this
is over we're going to have a talk, but until then we won't refer to it. Now
stay here and make sure no one walks off with her."
The young lieutenant winced, and said, "Yes, Sir."
Thomas went out, Martin and Lucas following him. A servant wearing a steward's
chain approached them, somewhat warily. "Lord Aviler would like to see you,
Captain."
Lucas raised an eyebrow and casually adjusted one of the pistols in his sash,
but Thomas shook his head. He followed the man through a small gallery hung
with family portraits and to a door at the far end, the others trailing along.
As Aviler's man knocked on the door, Lucas dropped into one of the armchairs
and Martin leaned on the wall. The servant eyed them nervously, but didn't
voice any objections.
Inside was a study warmed by a fire in a pink marble hearth and lit by gray
late-afternoon light from two windows in the far wall. The floor was covered
with bright eastern carpets probably brought back from the trading voyages A
viler the Elder had made his fortune on, and through chance or careful
planning, they managed not to clash with the striped red silk covering the
walls. The High Minister was standing with his back to the fire as Thomas came
in. He motioned for the steward to withdraw, then said, "Lord Denzil's
preparing to leave. I thought you might be interested."
Thomas limped to one of the windows. The snow had stopped and the view gave
onto the street below where they had fought that morning. The wrecked coaches
were still there, though the city troop must have brought in the bodies. The
carriage doors below were just opening. Night would fall in an hour or so; it
was a nearly suicidal time to be venturing out.
Aviler said, "For a house under siege, there's a great
238
MARTHA WELLS
number of people coming and going. I know what you're planning."
Thomas watched Denzil emerge on horseback with his men grouped behind him.
They began to pick their way down the snow-choked street before he turned back
to die High Minister. "Do you?"
"You're going to take the good Duke of Alsene down. If I hadn't been there,
your lieutenant would have killed him in my dining room." Aviler crossed to a
long draw table piled with books and papers and sat on one corner, watching
him. "I don't mind what you do to each other, and he did put the Queen in
unpardonable danger by keeping her from leaving the city." He leaned forward.
"But don't do it here."
"I don't have that choice anymore, it seems. And he's done more than put the
Queen in danger."
"I can hardly believe anything you tell me at this point."
Thomas started for the door. "Then I won't tell you. But if you think he's
going to join Roland, you're laughably wrong. Send someone to follow him and
you'll find he's taking the street back to the palace. Then ask yourself why."
He went out. Lucas looked up as he shut the door behind him and said, "Well?"
Thomas said, "We're getting the Queen out of here tomorrow, whatever it
takes."
The court had ridden into Bel Garde in the late afternoon, and now in the
gateyard Ravenna sat her horse amid the turmoil of servants, courtiers,
Albons, Cisternans, and her own men, watching as Renier ordered guard
placements. The late Dr. Braun's apprentices already stood before the closed
outer gates, working with books, incense burners, and other odd tools to
temporarily ward those fragile barriers of metal and wood against the fay.
They had been attacked again passing through the city gates, and several
parties had been scattered or killed, but the fay had not followed them out.
Satisfied with the arrangements being made here, Ravenna let her guards urge
her farther into the fortress.
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
239
Once through the inner gate and the portcullis, Bel Garde's celebrated
interior court with its fountains and miniature gardens was visible, though
smothered now under a heavy blanket of snow. The stonework on the newer
bastion looming over them was as ornate as gilded filigree, with curves,
curls, and the faces of classical luck sprites worked into the carving. A gem
of a fortress, someone had called this place, Yes, Ravenna thought, but
because a sword is jewelled does not mean the blade is no longer deadfy. "Find
Lieutenant Gideon and tell him to bring Falaise to me at once," she told the
nearest guard.
As he rode off she looked down to see Elaine trotting beside her horse and
tugging urgently on her riding skirt. "My lady, if you don't come out of this
wind you'll get your sickness again."
Ravenna leaned down to remonstrate with her and found herself coughing
helplessly into her sleeve.
Acknowledging physical weakness was not something she did gracefully. Once she
could speak again, she cursed Elaine, the guards who came to help her down,
and, rather unjustly, her horse, who stood rock steady with well-trained
patience throughout the whole episode.
They led her through a wide door into a large, beautifully appointed entry
hall. It was too cold to remove her cloak, but Ravenna had to admit the relief
from the wind was welcome. She gestured Elaine away impatiently and paced,
knotting her fingers together, noting the servants who worked to build up die
fire were her own and not those of the fortress. "I want this place searched
top to bottom."
"Yes, my lady."
The guard she had sent after Falaise came through the door, letting in a blast
of cold air. His eyes were worried and Ravenna tensed. "My lady," he said,
"Lieutenant Gideon and the other men who rode escort to the Queen aren't
anywhere to be found."
Ravenna stopped, staring at the carved panelling in front of her. "And
Falaise?"
240   MARTHA WELtS
"Not with the Albons or His Majesty's party." Ravenna nodded to herself and
whispered, "Denzil."
Later Thomas sat in front of the fireplace in the parlor of the suite they'd
commandeered for a headquarters. Gideon and most of the others were guarding
Falaise, and Lucas had led an expeditionary force consisting of himself,
Martin, and the two Cistemans down into the kitchens after food. Berham and
Phaistus were sitting at a table across the room making bullets, the older man
holding the leather-wrapped bullet mold and the younger carefully pouring hot
lead from the small crucible.
The most badly wounded guard had died a short while ago. With men Thomas had
led and fought beside for years dying and in constant danger, it was foolish
to grieve over the death of someone he had in actuality never really known,
but he found his thoughts going to Galen Dubell.
He had never been so completely taken in by anyone, Thomas decided, and that
was what disturbed him the most. He had first come to court younger than
Roland was now, and had made his way through all the traps and pitfalls alone.
Never allowing himself to trust anyone, he'd escaped machinations that had
ruined others and had learned how to deceive with the best of them. Perhaps he
had believed Grandier because the old sorcerer had never asked for anything.
Thomas wondered how Dubell had felt when he'd realized the trusted friend or
servant that Grandier must have pretended to be had been watching, learning,
gathering information for an impersonation that would kill its victim. If the
old man had even been allowed to realize that, if he hadn't died in complete
ignorance of what was happening to him.
Kade wandered into the room with the air of someone waiting for a public coach
and settled into the other chair, and he was glad of the distraction. Thomas
had not asked her why she hadn't left the city. They had all assumed she had
the means to do so, though diey had never had any proof of it.
It had occurred to him that he was taking her for granted,
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
241
like taking gunpowder for granted when one carried pistols much of the time.
And now she was staring at him. He said, "Yes?"
She said, "What do you think Roland will do when he finds out about Denzil and
Falaise?"
He had the feeling this wasn't really what was on her mind, but he wasn't
willing to pursue that suspicion. He said, "I don't know." At the moment he
was too tired to care about a possible outburst from Roland, though he
supposed later he would have to manage it. Interesting to think how it was
possible to grow out of the need for power, and to desire freedom from the
constant wrangling of those who still wanted it. "Roland, Denzil, and Falaise
make an interesting triangle. It's a pity I can't confuse the issue any
further by pursuing Falaise." The young Queen was beautiful, but so were most
of the other women at court. She was also the kind of woman for whom men would
continually ruin themselves, and he was past that stage. Did Denzil want
Falaise, or was that the only way he knew to approach her? Falaise had
evidently not wanted him. Thomas doubted she wanted anybody. Her offer to him
had held no warmth. She offered her body because she thought it was part of
the process of sealing an agreement.
Was I like that? Thomas wondered. Was that what I thought when Ravenna first
approached me, all those years ago?
Kade interrupted his thoughts, asking, "Why not'"
He had time to notice that he had spoken to her in the offhand way he might
speak to a friend, without any regard for propriety or anything else. He also
suspected he had just opened the way for her to ruthlessly question him about
whatever subject occurred to her, but it was too late to stop at this point so
he answered, "If I were going to raise a child, I'd have started before now."
Kade greeted this with another long moment of enigmatic
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MARTHA WULS
THE ELEMENT OF MRE
243
silence, then she said, "Oh." She looked into die fire for a little while,
then chuckled to herself.
He glanced at her suspiciously. "What?"
"Nothing." Another pause, then she asked, "How did Den-zil get such a hold on
Roland? That he can threaten die Queen, of all people, with her too afraid to
ask for help?"
Thomas watched the fire for a moment, remembering. "Right before your father
died, Roland tried to kill himself by cutting his wrists, but he bungled it.
Denzil found him, bandaged him up, concocted a story to explain it. He also
kept him from attempting it again."
Kade bit her lip, thinking, then shook her head. "But that almost seems like
Denzil must care for him, and I may be odd, but I can't imagine that."
"You can care for someone and hate them at the same time. And Denzil was
nothing without Roland's support then. He needed a live prince to attach
himself to." He glanced over at her. "Don't look like that. Roland didn't have
to fall into Denzil's clutches. Look at you. You haven't got a Denzil hanging
about somewhere in Fayre, have you?"
"Of course not." She shuddered dieatrically at the concept. "And I was not
looking guilty, I was looking thoughtful."
Thomas hadn't mentioned die term "guilty," but he didn't intend to point that
out. If she could fall into such an obvious trap dien she must be considerably
distracted.
A log rolled to die edge of the hearth, and- he stood, somewhat awkwardly,
supporting himself on the arm of the chair, to push it back in with die poker.
Kade winced and said, "I'm sorry about that."
He dropped back into the chair. "About saving my life? There's a cheery
sentiment."
She refused to be diverted. "What if it never heals?"
She was just as well aware as he was about what it would do to his speed in a
fight. "Well, I'm getting old for a duelist. It probably won't make any
difference in the long run."
"Don't say dial; I have enough to worry about." Kade
slumped farther down in her chair. "How are we going to get rid of Denzil?"
Thomas wondered how she could sit like that without breaking her back. He
answered, "I'm going to kill him, if I ever get the chance. But I'd like to do
it without dooming Falaise, myself, or anyone else."
"I could do it. Roland hates me anyway, and he can't come after me where I
live."
He snorted. "I'm hardly likely to ask you to do a thing like that."
"It's nothing I haven't done before."
;i     The somewhat airy way she said this caused him to doubt
•I       she was as indifferent as she pretended, but he answered, "I
I      don't care if you go about murdering people every afternoon.
You'd make me look a fool or a worse scoundrel than Denzil,
and I'd think of some horrific way to retaliate."
She shrugged and rubbed the arm of the chair distractedly. |        "It
shouldn't matter, even if I am related to him. I wished my s        fatiier
dead." 1     Thomas frowned. "What makes you say that?"
Her eyes on the fire, Kade said slowly, "I wished it, very hard, with
everything I had, which I was beginning to realize might be quite a bit. And
he died." \ "He didn't just fall over dead." |            "Yes, he did." She
looked stubborn. I            "No, he did not. Were you there?"
|      "No, of course not, but I know what happened because I 4,      caused
it."
f      "I don't know why i bother to listen to you argue in ''-      circles."
"Because you can't come up with anything better than 'No, he did not.' How do
you know? My magic was wild then, I didn't know what I was doing, I could have
caused any amount of harm."
He was silent for a long moment. He said finally, "Does it h        matter, as
long as he's dead?"
244
MARTHA WELIS
"No, I suppose not." She sank farther in her chair and stared at the fire.
Thomas glanced back at the two servants. Berham was deep into a story of one
of the last battles of the Bisran War, and Phaistus was so engrossed in it he
was getting hot lead all over the table. He turned back to the fire. "Fulstan
was poisoned."
Her expression went blank, and it was hard to tell if she was astonished or
not. He said, "Ravenna did it. I got the poison for her. It was foxglove, as I
recall."
Kade stood up and walked around the room in a circle. After a few moments she
wandered back to the fire and sat down again as if she had just arrived.
Thomas added, "Believe it or not, Ravenna never quite realized what Fulstan
was doing to you or to Roland. She's very single-minded. He knew he should be
wary of her, but she couldn't touch him under court* or landlaw, and I suppose
he thought his position was safe. After your little outburst in die cathedral,
she began to wonder why you'd become such a terror. I discovered some of the
details for her so she sent you out of the city to the convent. You'd been
gone a week when Roland botched his attempt to bleed to death, and when she
heard about that she made the decision." He shrugged. "There wasn't any
dancing in the streets, but most of the mourning was insincere."
She was silent for a long time, and Thomas listened to the fire crackle and
Bertram's voice in the background. Finally Kade said quietly, "I never thought
anybody wanted to kill him but me. Even Roland thought it was something he
did, like not riding well enough or playing games badly."
Thomas leaned forward and added another log to the fire. "Well, it was time
you knew."
It was much later and most of the house was asleep when Kade made her way up
to the highest attic and eased up the sash of a window there, mindful of the
nails in it. It was cold, bitterly cold, with a patina of frost glittering
over every surface
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
245
and clouds hiding the stars. It was very dark and the moon was in its waning;
in the Old Faith, it was the dark time, the death of white magic. The reigning
time of the Host. The gray-black rooftops spread around her like an angular,
un-moving sea. She could just see the palace from here as an odd collection of
shapes, some recognizable as towers, another as the dome of the Summer
Residence. The faint glow of witch-light flickered over the walls.
She climbed out onto the slate-shingled roof of the gable just below and sat
in front of the window, to keep anything from trying to enter the house behind
her back. She shivered and hugged her knees, though she had augmented her
clothing with a man's shirt Berham had found for her and Thomas's battered
buff coat.
/ did not kill my father. Her emotions were as tangled as a jumbled collection
of beaded necklaces. She wished she could untangle the strands and run them
through her fingers one by one. Disappointment, that she could understand. It
was not an odd emotion for someone who had believed a lie was the truth,
particularly as it was a lie she had told herself. Confusion, anger,
remembered fear, all these were explicable, if hopelessly intertwined. It was
the strange sensation of release, the sense of freedom that she couldn't
understand, that made her face hot and her hands numb with the strength of it.
As if something tightly coiled inside her chest had relaxed a trifle. It
seemed to make other things possible as well. It seemed to imply that it might
be possible to forget, eventually. Time to stop dreaming tike a child, she
told herself with an irritated toss of her head. Time to tMnk and plan.
She closed her eyes and whispered, "Boliver, come here now; I need to talk to
you." A gust of wind carried the words away.
Nothing happened. / hate it when he makes me do this. "As Queen of Air and
Darkness, and on my sovereignty of Knockma, I call Boliver Fay."
For a long breathless moment there was no answer, then out of the
cloud-covered sky a star fell. It plunged toward her
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MARTHA WELLS
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
247
and landed lightly at her feet, then resolved with a flash of light into
Boliver, who said, "It's not bloody easy getting here, you know." He was about
Kade's height, wizened and red bearded, and his vivid blue eyes were worried.
He wore a high peaked hat and a somewhat tattered velvet doublet.
"No, I don't know. That's why I called you. How is Knockma?"
"Not so good. There are members of the Host drawn up on the border to Fayre,
though not a sign of them on the mortal side, so far. They didn't like you
much to begin with, and now with you taking the human part in this war ..."
"Is everyone all right?" Kade had worried about her household. Some of them
were human, and none terribly good at defending themselves.
Boliver was offended. "You know 1 would not let anything happen to them. But
why are you doin' diis? Have you gone witless? You didn't make up with your
brother by chance?"
"No, of course not" Kade doubted she ever would. Roland wouldn't welcome such
an overture, and she wasn't certain she wanted to make it anymore. There was
too much history between them, and they might only remind one another of
things better forgotten. The news that he had tried to take his own life had
been an unpleasant surprise, and her thoughts shied away from it. She looked
out over the dark dead city again. "I've got a reason for it."
" 'A reason,' she says. Oh, joy." Boliver rolled his eyes.
She rubbed her forehead. "I'll hold Knockma for us, don't worry."
"I'm not worried." He let his knees knock and his teeth chatter convincingly.
"I'm petrified. I have no wish to vanish down Evadne's gullet. Or watch me
bosom companions do likewise."
"Neither do I." She shifted impatiently. "I need your help."
He snorted. "As if I had a choice."
"Well you don't, so be quiet and listen. I need'you to fly over the palace and
tell me what you can see."
"Fly over the palace? What have I done to deserve it? With all those
boglie-woglies everywhere?"
"Yes. I'd do it if I could, but I can't, and that's all there is to it!"
Boliver was her oldest friend in Fayre, and she didn't want to risk him, but
there was no other way to learn what she needed to know. If there was one
thing Kade regretted, it was her lack of the fay ability to shape-change and
to fly.
"Yes, yes. I know. You've got your head set on defeating the Unseelie Court
and their minions one-handed, I suppose, and there's no dissuading you. Well,
wish me luck."
She stood as he vanished into starlight and streaked away toward the shadowy
bulk of the palace towers. "Luck," she whispered.
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
249
12
THOMAS WOKE BEFORE dawn,
the wound in his leg stiff and sore. Despite the fire, the room was frosty and
he sat on the bed and struggled into his doublet. He stood and limped around
until he could walk without obviously hobbling, then tried to do a fencer's
full extension. He got halfway down and needed the help of the bedpost to get
back up.
Phaistus was sleeping in front of the doorway, rolled up in a rug and snoring.
He hadn't stirred when Thomas was bumping around the room and didn't wake when
he stepped over him and opened the door.
The anteroom was lit only by two candles on the mantel, their soft light
making the blue wallpaper dissolve into shadow and hiding the disarray of the
fine furnishings. Kade was sitting on the floor with the contents of an ebony
trinket cabinet spread out around her. It was probably the silver-gilt
curiosities and mother-of-pearl boxes that had attracted her attention, but it
was the seashells, the baby's skull, and the ostrich egg that had undoubtedly
kept it.
She looked up at him and said, "Are you going back to the palace today?"
It was too early for this. He dropped into an armchair. "Wouldn't that be an
extraordinarily foolish thing to do?"
"I don't know. I don't think about things that way." She held up a seashell
with her bandaged hand, passed the other hand in front of it, and the shell
disappeared. "I suppose it
would depend on why you were going. And who went with you." She pulled the
shell out of her right ear. "Do you want to find the keystone?"
Thomas watched her for a moment. She was giving the shell the sort of
concentration usually reserved for a deep philosophical problem. He was
certain Denzil had returned to the palace yesterday, and he meant to discover
why. He'd thought the keystone was a lost cause. "Would that do any good?"
"The wards themselves are still there, drifting about over the older parts of
the palace, and the other wardstones are still in place. If we replace the
keystone, it will pull the wards back down into their original courses, and
the Host will have to leave or be trapped inside."
They knew Grandier must have taken the stone, probably soon after he had
arrived at the palace, but that still didn't leave them a clue of where to
look for it. "He could have hidden the keystone anywhere inside the palace. Or
more likely, he handed it to Dontane, that night at court when he was there,
to hide somewhere in the city. It would be like looking for one certain rock
in a quarry."
"But it's a very special sort of rock. If I could get to one of the plain
wardstones, and take a chip from it," Kade said slowly, "I might be able to
use it in a spell, to find the keystone."
Thomas frowned. "How?"
"Years and years ago when all the stones were placed in the matrix of the
warding spell, they became one. Even when the keystone has been removed, and
the matrix isn't diere anymore, the stones remember. It's like using a lock of
hair to find a person." She stared at the shell in her hand, vexed. "I should
have thought of this before we left the palace yesterday."
"There aren't warding stones in the Old Courts. It would have been just as
dangerous to go into the other part of the palace then as it is now," he said.
And you had other things
250
MARTHA WELLS
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
251
to think about. "If you came with me, you could do this spell while we were in
the palace, and discover if the keystone is still there?"
Kade considered this a moment, her eyes moving through the collection of
curiosities on the floor. "No. Am I a fool for being honest?"
"No. Am I a fool for expecting you to be honest'" Even as he said it he
realized it was true. He had been prepared to believe her answer, even if it
had served her purpose.
Kade didn't look up at him, staring instead at the shell lying quiescent on
her bandaged palm. "So, whatever are we going to do?" She closed her hand, and
opened it again. The shell had vanished.
"Don't play coy; it ill becomes you."
She pulled the shell out of her ear again and for the first time looked at him
directly. "All right, will you say I can come with you or do we have to have a
loud fight about it and attract the attention and speculation of the entire
house?"
Thomas sighed and looked at the ceiling. "I don't know, I could do with a loud
fight. Gets the blood moving." He had seriously considered asking her to come
already. She could escape any danger far more readily than he could and with
her help his chances of accomplishing something increased to the point of the
almost possible.
Kade made the shell vanish again, stood to lean on his chair arm, and
apparently found it in his ear.
This time he saw it come out of her sleeve. "Get away from me," he told her
cordially.
Kade smiled. "I'm going with you, am I not?"
He said, "Yes. We'll both be fools together."
Falaise did not complain when told she had another long ride ahead of her. She
seemed just as anxious to go as they were to send her on her way.
The Queen's presence had assured them the loan of some of Aviler's horses, and
the servants readied them in the large roofed court that held the house's
stables. The large chamber
was warmed somewhat by the presence of the animals and was probably one of the
more comfortable areas of the house. This did not entirely account for the
number of city guardsmen who had ostensibly shown up to see them off, probably
on Aviler's orders.
Thomas was sending all the guards who had survived the flight from the palace,
even the most badly wounded. Aviler would probably interpret this as the
basest form of distrust, but at the moment the last thing Thomas cared about
was the High Minister's opinion of him.
He drew Lucas aside while Gideon was helping Falaise to mount and said, "I'm
not going with you. I'm going back to the palace."
He hadn't thought this would be well received and he wasn't mistaken. Lucas
stared at him incredulously. "Why?"
They keep asking me that, Thomas thought. Do I seem bored, that I have to
invent these things to keep myself busy? "Why do you think? That's where
Denzil went. He must realize that we'll get the Queen out of here, and with
her gone he's not likely to come back."
"What if he isnt there?"
"If he is, it's the best chance I'm likely to have at him. If he's not, I can
at least have a look at what's happening there before I go on to Bel Garde."
He didn't know if Aviler had sent someone to follow Denzil or not; probably
not, and he didn't want to give his own plan away by asking. It seemed
unlikely that Aviler was in the plot with Denzil, but it had seemed unlikely
that Galen Dubell was anything other than what he had appeared.
Lucas said, "Send someone else, Thomas. Or I'll go."
"No, it's a fool's mission. I'm not Roland, to send someone off to die on an
idiot whim." Thomas glanced around. The argument, though low voiced, was
attracting the attention of the city guards who were loitering in the stable
and of Lord Aviler himself, who was watching from the narrow second-floor
balcony where an arched door led into the rest of the house.
252
MARTHA WELLS
Lucas noticed and made a concentrated effort to appear calm. "You're going
alone?" he asked.
Thomas found himself curiously reluctant, as if he were admitting to
something. "No, Kade is coming with me."
Lucas winced.
"She's a sorceress, and she can get me back in without a fight."
"I know, I know." The lieutenant hesitated. He looked toward the other men who
were saddling the horses, or waiting half-nervously and half-impatiently for
them to get on with it. "She could do it by herself. You don't need to go with
her."
Thomas shook his head. "She's not invincible, she only thinks she is."
"So do you." Lucas looked back at him. "hi your condition, you'd probably slow
her down."
"Then it's no loss to anyone if I don't come back."
Thomas had spoken with more heat than he had intended, but Lucas seemed to
realize that line of argument was not going to get him anywhere. He said,
"I'll wait for you here."
"I need you to go with Falaise."
"Gideon can do that. He's not a fool; he'll get her mere."
They were both silent a moment. Thomas didn't want to force the issue, not
here, not now, and not with an audience. He said, "All right, then, but keep a
couple of the men with you. And don't wait too long. If it takes more than a
day, we'll have to hole up somewhere for the night, and this place may not be
safe much longer. If something starts to happen, get out and ride like hell
for the gates."
Lucas nodded abstractedly, then without looking at him said, "You know that
girl's half in love wim you."
"Falaise will keep." Thomas looked over at the Queen, who sat her horse with a
kind of delicate ease, a few ringlets escaping from her hood. "If anything, it
will make things easier in die long run . . ."
"I'm not talking about Falaise."
"What'"
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
253
"You didn't see her when she thought you were dying. I did."
There was only one other "her" he could mean. Thomas said slowly, "Well, she's
die excitable type."
"It was more than just that."
"You're mad," Thomas told him, but couldn't help thinking about a woman who
chuckled wickedly to herself at odd moments and offered to kill people for
him.
"I'm only telling you to watch yourself, that's all," Lucas said seriously.
"She's not exactly an ordinary woman."
"I realize that," Thomas said. Believe me, I realize that.
"You think you do, but I've known you a long time and you've got a blind eye
when it comes to this type of woman."
Thomas said, "Now I know you've gone mad," and turned and went back toward the
odiers. Gideon was holding the bridle of Falaise's horse and looked up as he
approached. Thomas said, "Do you think you can get her back to Roland without
losing her somewhere along the way?"
The younger man's eyes lit up at the chance to redeem himself. "I'll get her
there safely if I die for it."
"Don't die until she's out of the city."
Falaise leaned down and said, "Captain, remember what I said."
"I will, my lady," he answered, thinking, Let's all survive the day at least
before we start plotting again.
Kade was waiting beside the sorrel gelding Thomas had chosen for their outing.
He had managed to get his buff coat back from her, and she was wearing instead
a thick wool doublet that Berham had scavenged for her over about a dozen
other layers of assorted clothing. She asked, "What was all that about?"
He checked die girth, then swung up into the saddle. "None of your concern."
"I'll wager it was."
He looked down at her. "Would you like to be left behind?"
254
MARTHA WELLS
"Not particularly," she answered brightly, dropping the matter with an insight
that shouldn't have surprised him. She held up a hand and after a moment he
leaned down and helped her climb up behind him. Two grooms opened the carriage
doors, allowing in a wave of frigid air, and she said, "What a nice day this
is, except for the prospects of being killed and freezing to death and all
that."
Thomas, feeling the light pressure of her weight at his back, tried to avoid
thinking about what Lucas had said.
He guided the horse out onto the street and waited until Gideon, Falaise, and
die others had started on their way to the city gates, then turned back toward
the palace. The sky was gray, almost the same color as the dingy snow piled
deep in the streets, and the wind played roughly over the tops of the houses.
He was reluctant to take the direct route they had used to escape, but the
first side street he picked was blocked halfway down by rubble and a pile of
collapsed scaffolding, some noble's building project that had not withstood
the shock of the attack, let alone the test of time.
They backtracked, then cut through an alley to the next street. It was slow
going, the horse picking its way through the knee-deep drifts with some
difficulty. The town houses towering up on either side gradually gave way to
the more dilapidated structures of the trading classes. The shingled roofs
became wood instead of slate, the brick facades showed signs of wear, and
ramshackle balconies overhung the street. It was hard to tell how much damage
had been done here; the windows were tightly shuttered as if for night, and
there was no sign of life. Thomas was keeping an eye on the tops of the
buildings, and spotted the fay before it saw them only because he noted the
unevenness in the spacing of the ornamental gargoyles atop the roof of an
aging church. Kade said, "Wait," and he reined in, the horse sidling uneasily.
The quality of the light around them changed as she covered them with
illusion, then they moved slowly on beneath the waiting presence, unnoticed.
THt ELEMfNT OF FIRE
255
They had ridden a short distance down the deserted street when Kade said
suddenly, "I wonder why they did it."
"Who?"
"The Unseelie Court. The Bisran document said they wanted souls to trade to
Hell for their immortality, but that's nonsense. Not even the Host trades with
Hell. Besides, you can't just send someone there; they have to go on their
own. So what did Grandier give them?"
Once Thomas had known who Grandier was, the plot had started to peel away like
the layers of an onion, but there was still much they didn't know. The old
sorcerer's motivation for helping Denzil for one: Thomas refused to believe
Grandier was acting simply out of madness. "Maybe it isn't what he gave them,
but what he's promised them. What would they want?"
"The only thing that stands against them is the Seelie Court. And iron wielded
by humans."
"Destroying us isn't going to do anything to the Seelie Court, is it?"
"No, they don't care about anyone."
"So . . . They can't destroy our ability to make iron. No matter how badly
they ravage the countryside, they can't get every blacksmith." He paused as an
errant gust of freezing wind whipped down into the street, momentarily making
breathing difficult, dien continued, "Bisra will invade long before they can
get around to that, and they'll have another iron-wielding army to deal with."
Kade looked thoughtful. "Will the Bisrans come here?"
"No, they'll strike at Lodun. It's closer to their border, and they have to
eliminate the sorcerers there before they advance any further, tf they move
fast, if our crown troops are still trying to retake this city, they just
might succeed." Lodun had been a small town before die founding of the
university. It had since outgrown its confining and protective walls and
depended on the strength of the border garrisons for its defense against
possible attack from their longtime enemy. With the
256
MARTHA WELLS
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
257
capital in chaos and unable to send provisions or fresh troops, those
garrisons could be swept away. "There are some powerful sorcerers there, but
without troops to back them they can't hold off a large assault. The Bisrans
would have to cross a countryside where there would be a peasant in every bush
with a matchlock; but of course that wouldn't do more than delay them. They
would finish us, then tear through Adera and Umberwald." It would be a long,
bloody war.
"Human sorcerers," Kade said,
"What?"
"I was wrong. The enemies of the Unseelie Court are the Seelie Court, iron,
and human sorcerers."
"Which Lodun is well supplied with. Grandier could have told them that he
would destroy Lodun. And he will. Bisra will do it for him." It was a neat bit
of reasoning, but it didn't explain Denzil's position. Could he possibly be
bargaining to be a puppet princeling under Bisra's domination? There wouldn't
be anything left worth ruling; the Bisran Church would condemn as a heretic
everyone from Lodun sorcerer-philosophers to the peasants who kept a sprig of
rowan over their doorways. "Right now Grandier has us over a barrel. We're on
the defensive, forced to react to whatever he chooses to do. If Bisra invaded
again, we would have to forget an attempt to retake this city and use the
troops to fortify Lodun and the border."
"But Grandier must hate Bisra, hate it worse than anything," Kade protested.
Thomas reined in. "There's something coming down the street."
Kade leaned forward. "I can't see it."
"It was near the ground."
The horse reared suddenly, and it took Thomas all his. strength to wrestle it
down. Kade slipped off and staggered in a high drift, and Thomas dismounted.
He held onto the reins and tried to soothe the horse as the animal whinnied
and jerked its head. Behind him Kade murmured a curse. He looked down and saw
white mist rising out of the snow. It was
no more than a foot or so above the ground, but it was becoming thick and
solid with alarming speed.
The horse made a violent convulsive movement that nearly yanked Thomas off his
feet and he let go of the reins to avoid being knocked down. The horse bolted
awkwardly away, leaving a trail of blood in the snow. It was only able to make
a short distance up the street before it staggered and collapsed, felled by
whatever was rising out of the ground.
The nearest building, a three-story stone structure that seemed to be leaning
slightly under the weight of the snow, had a staircase running up its side to
the roof. Though it looked casually put together and was slippery with ice, it
seemed a safe haven at the moment. Kade had already retired to a step above
the rising mist, and Thomas quickly climbed after her.
"It's a boneless," Kade said. She was digging in the pockets in her smock and
muttering to herself. Above her rough gloves, her wrists were dotted with
blood where she had touched the ground to catch herself when she'd stumbled.
"This may be a problem. It doesn't have eyes to fool, and I don't have a spell
that can hold it back, the way it oozes around obstacles."
Thomas said, "Go farther up."
They climbed to the level of the second floor and Thomas stopped to see what
the creature would do. The mist had taken on a kind of half-solidity, becoming
a white undulating form. On the step above him, Kade shifted impatiently.
It reached the stairway and hesitated. A white translucent tendril touched the
bottom step, then it flowed onto it and began to climb after them. "I didn't
know it could do that," Kade said, obviously taking the thing's action as a
personal affront. Thomas gave her a push to get her started and they climbed
up to the third floor.
The houses were so close together that the street might have been lined with
one continuous structure. The garrets of one hung over the next one's roof,
and the overhanging balconies were awkwardly shoved together. There was a
slippery
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MARTHA WELLS
step down to a projection of ice-covered roof, then a brief scramble over the
wooden rail to the next house's balcony. Kade climbed like a monkey.
They went that way down the street, balcony to balcony, taking to the icy
roofs only when it was absolutely necessary. They were more exposed to the
wind up here and the cold was intense. Thomas kept up a good pace, trying to
ignore the aching wound in his leg.
They reached the end of the street, which opened into a square with the far
side formed by the palace wall and the Postern Gate.
It was deadly quiet. Before the attack, this area had been a small
marketplace, crowded with street vendors, musicians, pickpockets, and madmen
proselytizing new cults. Now it looked as if it had been run over by a cavalry
charge. The ramshackle stalls that had grown like spiderwebs between the
pillars of the large countinghouse forming the left side of the square were
smashed, and the statues atop the public fountain in the center were broken
off, their naked copper pipes leaking trails of ice.
The last house had partially collapsed, and the nearest stairway to the street
level was blocked by wooden debris.
As Thomas wresded the heavy wooden boards aside, Kade said suddenly, "What are
you going to do afterward?"
"After what'"
"After this is over."
He stopped and looked back at her. She was holding onto the wooden railing and
shivering with cold, and had put the question with the same puzzled intensity
she had shown during their speculation over the Host's motives. He said,
"Don't you think that question is a bit premature?"
"Would you accept Falaise's offer?" she persisted.
There was a smudge of dirt on her nose, which he decided not to mention to
her. He said, "Do you have to know everything?"
"I wasn't asking about everything."
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259
He turned back to clearing the stair. "I might have to accept it."
"Only if you wanted things to go back to the way they were before."
Only if he wanted to hold onto that power he had sentimentally wished to be
rid of last night. "Why would I want to change it,"
It wasn't a question but she answered it anyway. "Because there are things you
don't like about it, like killing people who get tricked by Denzil or get in
the way of someone powerful . . ."
"Do you mind?" he interrupted her. He shoved the last board aside and they
climbed down to ground level.
The Postern was smaller than the huge edifices of Prince's and St. Anne's. It
had no gate tower and was much narrower. One of the great doors stood open,
the other lay in the plaza. Thomas hoped whatever had rammed into that
yard-thick wood now dearly regretted it. "Lucas was right," he said. "The way
that door's been flung, something broke out, not in."
They paused in the rubble-strewn shadow of the last house and Kade considered
a moment, frowning. "They'll expect us through the Prince's Gate, since it was
safe before."
"They'll be watching all the gates."
"They might not. They're not very quick thinkers, most of them, and they might
not remember things like that. And Denzil didn't have too many knights with
him."
"He may not have any knights with him now. He can't afford witnesses," Thomas
said dryly.
They skirted the square, staying close to the buildings, finally reaching the
shadow of the wall and slipping within the gate.
To the right of the snow-covered yard there was a high wall, part of the inner
defenses designed to trap intruders, and to the left, the three-storied Gate
House with gaping holes in its dressed stone wall. Directly ahead was the icy
canal, which came in under the north wall and went out under the east,
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MARTHA WELLS
where it was covered over by stone for a mile or so before rejoining the main
river that cut through the city. The drawbridge that had allowed access to the
rest of the palace compound was a ruined heap, but the siege wall beyond it
still stood, blocking the view of the park. Thomas stopped beside a hole in
the Gate House wall and took a cautious look inside. "I want to see what's
around the Gallery Wing before we rush over there. If I can get up to the
second story here, I can see over that wall."
Kade followed him through the gap, saying, "Why do you think Denzil's in the
Gallery Wing?"
"I don't know where he is, but that's where the Host seemed to hit the
hardest, and that's where the explosion was. I'd like to see just what in hell
they wanted there."
light came down through the torn roof, and the shattered beams had buried many
of the defenders. Only the cold kept the atmosphere from resembling that of a
charnel house, and a dull patina of ice hid most of the unpleasant details.
The interior staircase had come free of the wall and hung at a crazy angle,
but a pile of smashed beams and rubble allowed Thomas to climb to a window on
what had been the second floor.
"They might have any reason for doing that," Kade said.
"Yes, well, I'd like to know what it was."
"It might have to do with the way they arrived here. However that was."
Something about the way she said it made Thomas wonder for a moment if she had
some suspicion she wasn't ready to explain. He considered pressing her about
it but he reached the window and found the shutters jammed shut and had to
brace himself and batter the hinges off with his swordhilt.
He pried the shutter away. On the other side of the canal, the park stretched
out, an ice field marked by occasional snow-covered trees. Beyond the park,
the Gallery Wing stood, the inner wall and the bastions to the other side
looming like monoliths, contrasting dramatically with its graceful outlines.
Nearer to the Gate House was the dome of the Summer Resi-
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
261
dence, which doubled as an observatory for astrologically inclined nobles and
scholars. A wall sprouted out of the classically designed circular building
and met the side of the Old Palace, sheltering the Gallery Wing and the
gardens from the public areas on the other side. There was a servants' passage
in that wall, and in the thick outer wall of the Old Palace. They could make
their way out the opposite side of the Gate House and along the curtain wall,
cross the canal where the unused mill bridged it, then enter the Summer
Residence and take the passages into the Gallery Wing.
He climbed awkwardly down again, trying to avoid putting weight on his weak
leg. Kade, who had been prowling about the place on her own, met him with a
worried expression. She said, "The stupid dark fay have used most of the
glamour around here. If it's like that all through the inside, I won't be able
to hide us from them."
Thomas considered that. He had come too far to go back at this point. "If you
want to stay here and wait for me, or start back ..."
"Do I look like a coward?" she asked, with an exasperated expression.
"No, you don't look like a coward."
For some reason this seemed to disconcert her considerably, and Thomas
reminded himself again to be careful. She tapped one foot impatiently, then
said, "Well, all right then. Let's go."
KADE FOUND HER warding stone
along the passage into the Old Palace. It was cold and silent in the narrow
little hall, and only the soft glow of a lamp they had appropriated from the
Summer Residence held back the darkness. Thomas waited while Kade dug through
the clay seal near the bottom of the wall to pull out the round water-smoothed
stone.
He used his dagger to chip a piece off for her, and when he handed the stone
back to her she said, "That's odd. It's tingling, as if it's still part of the
warding spell."
She was staring at the stone in perplexity, so he said, "Maybe it's something
to do with the wards over the Old Courts?"
"Maybe. It's very odd." But she replaced the stone in its niche and they moved
on.
When they reached the Gallery Wing, the narrow passage opened into a small
bare room with a curtained doorway in the far wall. Thomas pushed it open a
slit to look out and saw they had come out about where he had thought they
should. On the right wall was the wide sweep of stairs leading back into the
lesser galleries, which would eventually lead to the Grand Gallery with its
terrace giving onto the park. To the left was the arched entrance to the Old
Palace and the main hall. This area at least was empty, bare of any intrusion
except a fall of blown snow across the parquet floor.
They hadn't seen any fay, though twice in their trek across the palace, Kade
had steered them around places where she
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
263
seemed to sense some presence. Most of the creatures who could stand daylight
were out hunting the streets. As for the others, and the main body of the
Host, they might be hidden anywhere. It had been a cold trail marked by the
dead, and the amount of damage was worse than he had suspected. Now Thomas
waited until Kade put out the lamp, then pushed the curtain aside and went
cautiously to look into the entrance of the nearest gallery. At his side, Kade
said, "What is this?"
Light fell through long narrow windows high in the opposite wall to illuminate
a formal gallery with a vaulted ceiling and delicately sculpted columns
decorated with blue and gold inlay. The floor was littered with refuse and
debris, most of it looted from other portions of the palace. There were
pallets made of tattered blankets, tapestry work pulled from walls, and the
heavy damask of curtain material. Gold and silver plate, dented candleholders,
and ornaments prized off statues formed glittering heaps. Thomas picked his
way through it, thoughtful and wary of anything that might be lurking under
one of those piles. Besides the loot, there were more prosaic items such as a
scatter of gunflints, green glass shards from a shattered wine bottle, and
more of the trash left by military camps. With the toe of his boot, he turned
over an empty wooden powder flask and said, "It's a troops' billet."
"Troops? DenziTs troops?"
"Very likely. Bel Garde is a private estate, and he has the right to maintain
a force to garrison it, even if it is within sight of the city." But where are
they now? Thomas wondered. lean see why he had to have them. You can't take a
throne without a private force whose loyalty you can trust, but why aren 't
they here?)ewe\rf that must have been stolen from the bodies of the slain had
been left casually about. He picked up a pearl clasp and saw it still held
strands of long dark hair from where it had been torn from its owner's head.
He tossed it back onto the floor in disgust and looked around, entertaining
the idea of torching the place. Broken furniture would provide plenty of
kindling. But it would reveal their presence, and when the troopers returned
they would only move to the next gallery.
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MARTHA WELLS
He glanced back at Kade and saw she was staying on the edge of the encampment,
looking around uneasily. "What is it?"
"There's a great lot of iron in here." She retreated to a marble bench along
the wall and began to scrape the bottoms of her boots off on it.
Thomas knelt and brushed gloved fingers across the layer of dust and filth
covering the warm butler color of the inlaid wood floor and found small
particles that glinted dully in the light. "Iron filings. They're everywhere."
So these men did not quite trust their fay allies. He had wondered if they
would find evidence of the human servants of the Host that had led the attack,
but they wouldn't be here in the presence of all this iron. They might have
been only shock troops, to be expended in the battle. If the siege lasted much
longer, the Host would certainly be able to replenish their supply when
starvation began to drive more people out into the streets searching for food.
He dusted his hands off and went back to Kade at the edge of the camp.
"If they stayed here last night," she asked, "where are they now?"
"If we knew that, we'd be a damn sight better off." He considered a moment,
weighing the danger against what else they might discover. "We have to go
farther in."
"All right. But I think it's going to get worse."
They followed a lesser-used path toward the center of the Gallery Wing,
through a connected row of state dining rooms and smaller pillared halls, and
it was there they found most of the dead. Many had died running, caught alone
by some creature of the Host with the walls shaking from the explosion that
had marked the start of the battle and lamps going out in the foul wind that
had followed. There were small groups of Cisternan guards and sometimes
servants and courtiers who must have tried to band together to escape. Worst
of all, they came upon a small room with the remains of a smashed barricade
across the door, where a group had held out for a time.
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
265
Hours, at least, Thomas thought, leaning against the remains of the doorframe
and feeling a rage as cold as the ice outside. Judging by the condition of the
mom. He recognized some of the men, and one of the women. She was Lady Anne
Fhaolain, one of Ravenna's gentlewomen, and she clutched a fireplace poker in
a delicate hand that had never held anything more dangerous than a sewing
needle.' He would have to tell Ravenna that Anne had died bravely, trying to
swing a weapon. He would also have to convince himself that if he had been
here the result would have been the same, only there would have been one more
body in the cold litde room.
He turned away to find Kade standing behind him, trembling in impotent fury.
She said softly, "There's nothing that can make up for this. Not if I hunt him
all the way to Hell itself."
Somehow he hadn't expected that it would make her as angry as it did him. He
said, "You take this all very personally."
After a moment, Kade shook herself all over like a cat coming out of the rain
and said, "I take everything personally."
There was more evidence of the presence of the fay. Not far from the sad
little room, they found a silken web stretched across the width of an arched
doorway. Kade examined it cautiously, then detached it from the doorframe. It
drifted gently to the floor all in one piece like a fine section of lacework.
So far they hadn't found any answers to their questions. The day was getting
on and Thomas's bad leg was aching from walking, and he knew they didn't have
much time left here before the danger became extreme. They would have to
settle for seeing the Gallery Wing and then making their way out.
They reached the foyer of the Grand Gallery, where there was a heavy foul
smell, reminiscent of bats in a deserted cathedral. Thomas whispered to Kade,
"They could be in the walls all through here."
She nodded. "Spriggans. They're asleep. I hope." She flit-
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MARTHA WELLS
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
267
ted past him into the archway. He saw her pause there, and as he came up
beside her he saw why.
Light from the steps that gave onto the loggia illuminated the foyer, and the
arched entrances provided a panoramic view of the Grand Gallery. The floor had
been blown up from below and the back wall of windows that looked out onto the
terraces had been smashed outward. This had to be the source of the explosion
the night of the attack. This was the center of it then, Thomas thought, and
beside him Kade said, "They did a job of work in here."
The orange trees between the pillars were frozen but still green, the cold had
caught them so by surprise. Thomas sensed there was something alive here and
looked up from the blasted ruin of the floor to the shadowy stillness of the
vaults above. But nothing moved in the silence.
In the center of the room, the foundation stones had been pushed up from
underneath by some powerful force and were scattered on the bare twisted earth
visible beneath. But not scattered randomly. Thomas took a few steps inside,
wondering at it, then climbed the dais so he could get a better view. As he
had thought, the broken area of the floor was in the shape of a large circle,
with an outline too perfect to be accidental. The shattered stones formed
concentric circles within it. It couldn't be anything but a fayre ring.
Peasants found them occasionally in the deep country, circles of trampled
grass, stones, or strange growth, and avoided them like the signs of a
dangerous infestation that they were. Stories about humans who blundered or
ventured into them were not pleasant; usually they were found on the edges of
the rings as dried, withered husks, as if they had aged a hundred years in a
moment. Any attempts to recover the bodies caused them to dissolve into dust.
If they were all like this Thomas couldn't imagine someone foolish enough to
wander into one accidentally. It felt dangerous, and it was as unmistakable as
a sharp drop off a cliff.
Kade had stood regarding the ring for a long moment, and now she followed
Thomas up onto the dais. She looked back
at it again and said, "Fancy that." She sounded more satisfied than anything
else, as if the sight confirmed some hypothesis of her own.
Looking down at her, Thomas felt the beginning of a new suspicion. He said,
"They used that thing to get in somehow, didn't they?"
"They came through it. With the wards confused and floating away, and no
spells guarding it, it was the easiest way. I mean, not too easy, with the
stones on top of it like that, but all of them together could do it."
"Through it?"
"Yes." She glanced at him, then explained, "It's a doorway."
"A doorway to where?"
"To Fayre, maybe. To lots of places."
He looked back at the ring, its tumbled stones a silent but definite presence
in the shadowy room. Kade grabbed his elbow. "Listen."
After a heartbeat, he heard it too. Voices, echoing down to them through the
long galleries locked in cold silence.
Thomas went back to the archway, trying to pinpoint the direction. Tracking
the sound echoing off so much stone and marble wasn't easy. The men might be
in any one of the several galleries and long halls that led up to the Grand
Gallery. Neither he nor Kade had spoken in louder than a whisper, and it was
doubtful that whoever was coming this way had heard them.
They crossed the spriggan-haunted foyer, and Thomas chose a smaller hall used
for diplomatic processions, where the sound had for a moment seemed louder.
They went down it, keeping to the partial shelter of its supporting pillars.
The voices had ceased.
"I don't think this was it," Kade whispered.
"No, it must be another . . ."
They both heard the footsteps at the same time.
Kade looked around frantically. "There's not enough glamour in here."
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MARTHA WELLS
Thomas searched hastily along the wall and found the unobtrusive servants'
door that was designed to blend into the panelling. He went to it, sliding his
hand down the crack that marked it until his fingers touched the catch and he
pulled it open. Inside was a cramped stair leading up into the wall. Climbing
it, they came to a landing with a damask-curtained doorway and another broader
stair leading down and away from the hall. Thomas pulled the curtain back and
saw that the door led to a small musicians' balcony, one of many spaced around
the gallery.
He put his hat aside and crawled out to look down through the balusters. Kade
crawled after him.
Denzil and Dontane came into the gallery from an archway below and a little to
the side of diem. So the bastard's alive, Thomas thought, watching the man
following Denzil. Dontane had been imprisoned in the Cisteman Guard House
during the attack, and Thomas had assumed he had been killed with die others.
The two men were arguing animatedly and were trailed by diree men armed as
common troopers. The Albon knights who had accompanied Denzil at Aviler's
house were probably dead; they would not have betrayed Roland, and it must
have been obvious at this point that the young Duke's game was more serious
than a petty attempt to disgrace the Queen's Guard.
Denzil was dressed for battle, and Dontane still wore black court brocades. He
made quick nervous gestures when he spoke, but it seemed to be more from
intensity and anger than anything else.
The echoes now turned against them. The two were speaking more quietly after
the first shouting that had revealed their presence, and Thomas could not
quite make out what they were saying. He heard Denzil mention Bel Garde, and
he thought he heard Roland's name, but the rest was inaudible.
He edged back and sat up on one elbow, pulling a pistol out of his sash and
winding its mainspring. The faint click it made was disguised by the two men's
voices.
THE ELEMENT Of FIRE
269
Kade glanced back, raising her eyebrows inquiringly when she saw what he was
doing.
He motioned for her to go back through the doorway and she crawled backward
out of the way.
The range was not the best; with a pistol, closer was better. He steadied the
weapon on his arm and squeezed the trigger. Both men reacted to the sound of
the blast, and Denzil staggered. Thomas scrambled back out the door, shoving
the empty pistol back into his sash. There would be no confusion about where
the shot had come from; the white smoke hanging over the little balcony would
reveal their presence like a flag-
Kade was already on the landing, and he followed her down the wider stair. It
came out through another servants' door in the foyer, and they could hear
running footsteps and a man shouting, and a low humming sound that seemed to
come from everywhere.
Looking around, Kade gasped, "Damn, but that woke them up."
A gray-skinned spriggan with a face like a melted wax mask dropped out of
nowhere to land within arm's length of them and Thomas ran it through with his
rapier almost before he realized it was there. It reeled away shrieking and
more of the creatures appeared in the doorways and were racing toward them
down the halls. Something troll-like, squat and hairy, leapt out of a doorway
and blocked it, snarling at them.
If they could just get outside and out of the things' sight, Kade could hide
them with illusion. Thomas thought of the broken expanse of window in the
Grand Gallery. This idea must have occurred to Kade because she was already
trying to drag him in that direction.
They ran under the archway and toward the broken windows that led out to the
terrace and die park land. Skirting the torn section of floor where the ring
lay, they were almost there when one of the clawed hideous demon-horses came
leaping up the terrace steps. Thomas swore, spun around, and drew his last
loaded pistol.
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MARTHA WELLS
The howling pack of spriggans were catching up with them in leaps and bounds,
and he fired into the group to make them draw back. They scurried and
scattered as the ball tore through them.
Something shoved him from the side and he stumbled, then felt his bad leg give
way. Unable to catch himself, he fell over the edge of the broken floor . . .
... and felt a rush of warm air and landed in soft verdant grass. He gasped
and pushed himself up. He was in a wide open field under a sky of an odd
crystalline blue. Nearby Kade rolled to her feet and shook out her hair,
dislodging only a small amount of the greenery caught in it. Around them was a
ring of stone menhirs, each nearly ten feet in height and weathered by great
age. It was warm and the grass was the deep green of spring, touched with
splashes of red from the occasional poppies.
He stood up, stumbled a little, and looked around. About a hundred yards away
the craggy face of a cliff towered above them, dotted with grassy clumps and
hung with a thick growth of ivy. In the distance he could see that the ground
rose gently up in a gradually increasing grade, as if they were in a deep
bowl-shaped valley. "Where in hell are we?"
"Knockma," Kade said. She looked defensive.
He stared down at her. "Fayre?"
"No. Well, yes. In a way." At his expression she burst out, "If you don't mist
me I really can't think why because I haven't done anything deceptive for
days."
But Thomas had looked up at the sky, and barely heard her. The deep blue was
there, and far above floated drifts of puffy whiteness that were clouds, but
there was a barrier that seemed to hang at about the level of the cliff top.
It seemed solid and yet malleable, and was transparent, allowing the sunlight
in but gently muting it. He felt a soft breeze come up, stirring the grass
with a faint rushing sound, and the barrier shimmered with it as if it were
made of the most delicate glass
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
271
or ... He managed to tear his eyes away and looked at Kade. "Is this ... the
bottom of a lake?"
"Yes."
He was getting over the shock, and starting to realize exactly how angry he
was. "You knew all along how the Host got into the palace."
Kade paced around in a circle, not looking at him. "I knew about the ringv It
was how my mother got there in the first place years ago, but Galen and Surete
and the others added a spell to the wards that blocked it. The ring could have
faded away; sometimes they do." Though he hadn't had a chance to reply, she
threw her arms up in exasperation and continued, "All right, and I sent
Boliver to fly over the palace last night and he said they must be using the
old ring because there weren't any new ones. I didn't say anything because I
wasn't sure." She stopped and shook herself. "No, that's not true either. I
don't know why I didn't tell you."
"You could have mentioned what you were about to do."
"There wasn't time."
"There was time when we were standing there staring at the ring before we
heard Denzil and Dontane." He looked around for his rapier and found it buried
in the high grass a few feet away. It and his pistols had come through the
ring intact, and he wasn't sure whether to be surprised by that or not. He
slipped the blade back into the scabbard and said, "Damn it, woman, I trusted
you. I told you something I swore I'd take to my grave unsaid. I let you watch
while I shot the goddamn King's buggering cousin. You know enough to get me
drawn and quartered a dozen times over." He was shouting at her now. "You
could have bothered to mention that you not only had a quick method of escape
from the palace, but that it involved taking me into Fayre which I think you
realize is not a place where I wanted to go."
Kade shouted back, "I had to think about it and by the time I did tiiere
wasn't time anymore and this is not exactly Oberon's Court I mean I live here
and it's not the most
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MARTHA WELLS
dangerous place on the map for humans and you could credit me with some
sense." Her smaller lungs gave out and she sat down hard on the grass. After a
deep breath, she continued in a normal tone, ". . . and I'm not used to
trusting people either and I find it very frightening, and sometimes I don't
know what to think about you."
What she had said about trust being frightening had hit home with more force
than she could have realized. More calmly he said, "Neither do I."
Neither spoke for a few moments. Kade sat in the grass and looked tired.
Thomas felt he could hardly argue with her for saving their lives, even if it
had involved frightening him half to death. He said finally, "So you live
here?"
"Actually, over there." She pointed.
He looked behind them and then up, and thought, foolishly, No, you haven't
seen everything. More than half the length of the lake away, a small round
island was suspended in the crystal surface of the illusory water. On top of
the island stretching high overhead was a castle. It was ancient, its stones
tinted green by a covering of moss, its three towers capped with round turrets
in a style decades out-of-date, stairways curving up them like twining vines.
What was amazing was that its reflection in the water that was not water was
not a reflection.
A second castle grew downward from the island that was the base of the one on
the lake's surface, like a stalactite growing from the roof of a cave. It was
a mirror image of the castle above, and the sharply pointed top of its
tallest, or lowest, turret was gently brushed by a willow tree.
"It's nice, isn't it," Kade said softly, standing at his side now.
Thomas felt he had to agree. "Did you make it?"
"No, it's been here forever. It's a Great Spell, like the palace wards, only
more complicated and much older. The people from Merewatch, the village up on
the shore, can fish in the lake and row boats on it, and drown in it if
someone down here doesn't happen to be watching. But if you know it's a
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273
spell, you can walk into it without getting wet." She dragged a foot through
the grass thoughtfully, then said, "I'm sorry I brought you here without
saying anything first. It was rude."
He looked down at her. "I overreacted. I didn't know there would be places
like this. I thought it was all blood and bogles, like the city is now."
"I hate bogles." After a moment she pointed back at the ring marked by the
stone menhirs. "That's the Knockma Ring. I think it was here before the lake.
With it I can make a ring anywhere there isn't iron or wards or something to
prevent it. It's the only ring I know of that can do that, and both the Seelie
and the Unseelie Courts want it. I can send us back to the street outside
Aviler's house, to see if Lucas and the others have left yet." She hesitated.
"Now that Denzil's dead . . ."
"I don't know if he's dead. I'm sure I hit him, but he might be only wounded."
"That would be very inconvenient."
"To say the least." Thomas couldn't get his mind off the castle, and looked
back at it. "When you're inside, are you upside down?"
"No, that would be silly. It's bad enough as it is, with the stairs all funny
in some places. In the middle, between the castle on top and the one below,
you have to climb a ladder for a bit and no one likes it."
They stood in silence for a time, until Thomas saw something oddly like a
large red dog leaping over the grass toward them. "A friend of yours?" he
asked.
Kade said with a sigh, "I suppose so. That's Boliver."
By the time Boliver arrived he had managed to become a wizened little man
about Kade's height with red hair and an odd peaked hat and the bluest eyes
Thomas had ever seen on anyone.
When he had reached them Kade asked, "How did you know I was back?"
"How could I help but know? They must have heard the yelling in the next
century." He jerked his head back toward the castle. "The others are watching
with a spyglass from the
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wind tower, and it fell to me to come out and ask just what was doing." He
eyed Thomas speculatively.
Kade shaded her eyes and peered at the castle. "Don't they have anything
better to do?" She shook her head and turned back to Boliver. "Have the Host
tried an attack yet?"
He said, "No, but I been to the village and they say they've seen a hag in the
pond and there have been odd things setting the dogs to barking and the sheep
to running."
The look on Kade's face explained the danger. "It's what I thought." She
nodded to herself. "The Host will come here soon."
Thomas hated to see her so torn and desperate. "Look, you've done enough. Send
me back to Aviler's house and stay here."
She shook her head. "No, that's what they want. If I let them chase me about,
then they'll know they can make me do anything they please."
Thomas understood that only too well. It was a damnable trap, one he'd been
caught in half his life. He watched her, knowing there was nothing he could do
to help her and that his own involvement had made her decision all the more
difficult.
She paced and tugged on her hair. "This place is very strong. It can hold
itself against them without me for a time. The village . . . Damn it, the
village." She stopped and told Boliver, "Go up and tell them there's going to
be a battle; tell them to run."
"Very well, I will." The fay hesitated then and, with what had to be uncanny
and devastating perception, said, "So here's your reason. Well he's got my
heartfelt sympathy."
Thomas looked at Kade, though it was a struggle to keep his expression
neutral. The look Kade directed at Boliver should have dissolved him into
charred coal on the spot. She said quiedy, "You're dead."
Boliver shifted uneasily, as though realizing he might have overstepped
himself. He said, "I'll just go and have a word with the village, shall I?"
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
275
"Yes, why don't you do that."
"Have to be quick, you know. Wouldn't want to be caught by the Host."
"It wouldn't be nearly as terrible as some things I've just thought of."
"Ah. I see. Well, I'll be going now." Boliver whirled around rapidly, becoming
a ball of heatless flames, then shot toward the lake surface above like a
firework.
"Do me one favor," Thomas said.
"What?" She was blushing furiously and attempting to ignore the fact.
"Don't kill Boliver."
Kade sighed. "I wasn't going to. I just wanted to think about it for a bit."
She dug in the pocket of her smock and produced the chip they'd taken from the
wardstone. "I can do this now."
She started toward the castle, and still half-unwilling, he followed her.
As they reached the base of the hilly garden, the castle had begun to look
almost ordinary, as if it were perfectly normal to hang upside down from an
island suspended in glass with its top turret brushed by a tree. If he had
ever thought about it at all, Thomas would have expected a place like this to
be eerily perfect, without blemish, as if it were carved out of marble by a
sculptor who smoothed away all imperfections. This fayre castle had cracked
stones where heavy climbing vines had silently invaded, had moss growing
around its windows, and was crumbling around the edge of its parapet.
Below the lowermost turret, a stone stair curved up the hillside garden to
meet one of the windows, and he followed Kade up to the top. The garden itself
was a little overgrown, as if it was only tended when someone had the time.
The grass was tall, flowers hung out of their beds, and heavy rosebushes had
all but taken over the low wall that circled it, but the fountain was running
cheerfully.
The room inside the turret was round, taking up the entire
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top, or bottom, level. It was lined with book-filled shelves, and clay jars
seemed to be crammed into every available space that wasn't occupied by the
books. It smelted thickly of herbs and flowers, and sunlight from the wide
window had faded the once-bright colors of the carpet and the chair covers.
Kade hopped down onto die wide stone window seat and then to the floor, and
turned to look back at Thomas as he was getting his first bemused look at the
room. "Not what you were expecting?" she asked.
He stepped down from the window seat after her. "If I'd ever considered it, I
wouldn't have expected to see the place and still be in any kind of condition
to comment on it. You were a deadly enemy of the crown not so long ago,
remember?"
"I'd forgotten." She crossed over to the shelves on the far wall. "Well, it
doesn't look like the abode of a wicked fay sorceress, but this is where it's
all done, all the plots, all the nasty little tricks." Kade ran a hand along
the shelves, and selected a large dusty volume.
She flipped through the book until she found the page she wanted, and he
watched her as she stood on the lower shelves to take down several of the day
jars. He asked, "How did you find this place?"
"It belonged to my mother. She had others, but she lived here most of the
time. After I left the convent, I looked for her. I looked so long and so hard
she eventually had to let me find her."
Kade dumped the armful of jars on the draw table. "She wasn't a very nice
person, not exactly what I was hoping for. But she was taken with the idea of
having a daughter, for awhile at least." She paused in dumping the herbs and
powders out of their containers and smiled at some memory. "She gave me a
fayre ointment to take the mortal scales off my eyes so I could see through
fayre glamour. She had more people here, fay and humans, all of them bound to
her somehow." She went back to her task. "She had Boliver locked up inside a
stone in the garden. He's a phooka, and he likes to change
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into horses and dogs and fool people, but he's mostly harmless, and he wasn't
very happy inside a rock. I broke it and let him out, and Moire threw a
terrible fit, but she didn't really do anything about it. That's when I
realized that I didn't have to do what she said. I knew sorcery, and she was
wary of it."
While she tossed ingredients into a bowl and muttered to herself, Thomas paced
the room. After a time, she stopped to glare at him and he took the hint and
settled into the window seat. He looked out into the bright air of Knockma and
the realization of what Grandier and the Host had done to the city struck with
renewed force. If Ravenna and the others hadn't reached Bel Garde safely . . .
It wasn't long before Kade said, "Now we wait until it works." She ran her
hands through her hair. "If it does."
"If it does," Thomas said. "The keystone's place was in the largest
undercellar of the Old Palace, in the base of the fourth pillar from the north
side on the third row." At her look of surprise he explained, "I wasn't
comfortable being the only one alive besides Urbain Grandier who knew that."
Kade came to stand next to him at the window seat, looking out into the
garden. She was blushing, and he wondered why. He said, "What happened after
you released Boliver?"
She lifted a comer of the faded gold curtain and looked at it as if she'd
never seen it before. "I disobeyed her frequently. She pretended not to care.
Then the Unseelie Court tricked her and she had to go to Hell, and I inherited
everything. Most of her people ran away as soon as she was gone. Boliver
stayed because he's feckless and hasn't anything better to do, and a few
others stayed because they haven't anywhere better to go." She was quiet for a
moment, looking out at the overgrown comfortable garden.
It was hard to believe that Boliver had ever been imprisoned out there, or
that anyone but Kade had ever lived in the quiet dusty peace of this room.
Thomas said, "Or maybe they liked it well enough where they were, once your
mother was gone."
Kade looked down at him, her gray eyes serious. "I think
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MARTHA WELLS
you like me a little bit, even if it would half kill you to admit it."
"It would not half kill me to admit it." The sunlight, muted and changed by
the layer of illusory water above, transformed the color of her hair to the
same dusty gold as the drape. After a moment he said, "I know what Ravenna
told you, that night in the Guard House. She was oversimplifying the case. She
does that when she's trying to get something she wants very badly."
Kade clapped a hand over her eyes, reeled around, and half fell into one of
the wooden chairs. "Do you know everything?" she demanded.
"No. If I knew everything, we wouldn't be in this situation." He smiled. "But
I suppose I should be flattered that she considers my presence an inducement.
I'm old enough to be your father."
"But you're not." She slanted a deliberate look at him. "You're not?"
"No, I wasn't at court then. And I do keep careful track of those things, in
the event they become important later." Thomas realized he could hardly be
doing a worse job of putting her off if he had actually set out to seduce her.
"I told her I didn't want the blasted throne."
"I know. If you'd accepted, it would have been a rare disaster. Exciting, but
a disaster all the same."
"Well, that's what I diought." She hesitated a long moment, drawing a design
with the toe of her boot on the floor. "Do you trust me?"
Tell her no, he thought, and whatever it is that's happening between us will
end. But he didn't want it to end. He wanted to see what would happen next, to
follow it to its conclusion. He wanted it more than anything else he'd wanted
in a long time. He said, "Yes, oddly enough, I do."
She bolted back across the room, stood for a moment in front of the shelves
there, then took down a white-and-blue banded jar. She wandered back, and not
looking up at him, she said, "This is the fayre ointment my mother gave me. It
will
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
279
let you see through glamour. Not all the time, because fay can use glamour to
fool each other, but if they don't know you're there, or that you can see
them, they won't know to hide from you. I mean, if you want it."
There's more to this than Just that, he thought. It will make some kind of tie
between us, and then what will happen? Anything or nothing. He pulled off his
glove and held out his hand.
The room was cold and still, windowiess, a single candle sparking color from
the blood red fabric of the walls, leaving all else to fade into the
gray-black of shadow. Urbain Grandier sat at the table, the polished wood
chill under his hands, his face turned toward a framed parchment map of
Ile-Rien. The southern border with Bisra was marked in red, Umberwald and
Adera to the north and east in blue, and the compass rose and the faces of the
four winds were rendered in precise and loving detail. The old sorcerer could
not possibly decipher the ornate script that described towns, rivers, and
borders in the wan flicker of the single candle, but his eyes were as intent
as if he treasured every faded brown scratch of the artist's pen.
There was noise outside, voices, then an alarmed shout. The door banged open,
revealing Dontane and an Alsene trooper, half carrying, half supporting the
young Duke of Alsene between them. Denzil's shoulder and left arm were soaked
with blood, his doublet and buff coat torn aside to reveal lacerated flesh.
There were more troopers out in the brightly lit anteroom, and one of the
young lords of Alsene who had arrived with the duchy's troop that day was
shouting at them. Urbain Grandier rubbed his eyes under Galen Du-bell's gold
spectacles and said mildly, "Put him on the daybed. And for heaven's sake,
shut the door."
Grandier stood and winced. He still felt the old pain; his mind tracing the
path of injuries that this body had never known. He lit the other candles in
the room as the two men took Denzil to the couch and gently let him down on
it. The Duke's face was bleached white, fierce with pain. One of
280
MARTHA WELLS
his young pages had followed them in and now knelt anxiously beside the couch.
"How did it happen?" Grandier asked, watching them.
"The Gallery Wing," Dontane replied. He stepped back from the couch, breathing
hard from exertion, sweat gleaming on his forehead. "Someone was there, and
fired at us from cover. It woke the fay sleeping in the walls, and they
overran the place so quickly we didn't have a chance to pursue him."
Grandier tut-tutted under his breath, taking his leather-covered apothecary
box out of a cabinet. "To be expected."
"Expected . . . ?"
"Of course. It would be a very great mistake to think our opponents are fools.
They were bound to investigate at some time."
"Then they know the Alsene troop is here." Dontane's sharp features were
fearful.
"I would imagine so, yes."
Dontane strode for the door, gesturing for the Alsene trooper to follow him.
DenzU watched the young sorcerer go, perhaps knowing as Grandier did that
Dontane would take this opportunity to order the Alsene troops and officers,
using the Duke's authority. Denzil was in no position to object; his blond
hair was soaked with sweat, and he was biting his lips until blood came from
the effort of not crying out.
And bleeding like a slaughtered pig on good furniture, Grandier thought. After
the poverty of his early life in Bisra, the abundance of first Lodun and then
the capital city and the palace had astonished him. He-Rien had little
understanding of its own wealth, of how valuable was the flow of goods from
the foreign vessels flocking to its trading ports, of the surfeit of arable
land that allowed any peasant with enough coins in his pocket to own it. Of
how this wealth would affect those who did not possess it. His voice dry, he
told the kneeling page, "You may go. This won't take long, and he can do
without the necessity of adoration for a short while."
The boy was too afraid of Grandier to argue and left without protest but with
several longing backward glances. Denzil
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
281
took a breath, brow furrowed with exertion, and whispered, "Jealous,
sorcerer?"
It did not surprise Grandier that the Duke would make the effort to say
something vicious despite his agony. The sorcerer examined the large wound in
Denzil's shoulder where the pistol ball had penetrated and frowned at the
visible bone splinters. "Oh, yes, terribly," he answered. "It affects my
judgment, you see." He turned back to the apothecary box to select the
necessary powders. Dontane had been the messenger in the forging of the
alliance between the Bisran sorcerer and the Duke of Alsene in Ile-Rien, and
that alliance had never been anything but uneasy. And Grandier did not like
the accord he saw at times now between Dontane and Denzil.
"Your affectation of superiority is amusing." Denzil gasped, closed his eyes
briefly, then continued, "I hardly think you can take the high moral ground in
this situation."
"I, at least, am not a traitor. My homeland turned against me long before I
returned the sentiment." Grandier came back to Denzil's side. On the panel
supporting the daybed's canopy was a painted scene of nymphs, satyrs, and
human shepherds enjoying each other's company in several ways that would have
been displeasing to the Bisran Church. The casual displays of sensuality and
the acceptance of it in Ile-Rien had also been a surprise. Like the acceptance
of sorcery. Grandier had heard about it, about the university at Lodun, but he
had not really credited the rumors until he had seen the reality. I wish I had
come here as a young man, he thought. So much might have been different.
"And what excuse do you make for your betrayal?"
"Attempting to excuse the inexcusable is always a mistake," Grandier said.
"Why not simply admit that greed overwhelms loyalty, affection, and common
sense."
"I have no affection or loyalty for Roland," Denzil said, voice grating with
pain. "He serves my purpose."
"I wasn't speaking about you," Grandier said. Denzil might have grown to hate
the young King because of the power Roland held over him, even though as
Denzil's friend
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MARTHA WEUS
and patron Roland had never exercised that power. Grandier understood this all
too well. He knew the danger of allowing any individual, any state, any force
of whatever kind, to hold one in its power, to control one's actions. "This is
going to hurt, but I can't think why you should mind. You seem to enjoy the
pain of others."
Denzil's chuckle was weak, but it held real amusement. "You mean that as a
taunt, but even you would be shocked at how accurate your assessment is."
For an instant, Urbain Grandier hesitated. He knew Denzil to be a smiling
killer, as excellent an actor as the hags who lured children to their deaths
with their own mothers' voices. No, that was not quite the analogy he was
searching for. He is not a monster, the old man thought, but forces beyond his
control have warped him past reason. Even as they have me. "Perhaps I would,"
he said, actually enjoying Denzil's presence for the first time in their short
acquaintance. "We are both in good company."
"ROLAND, I WANT you to come with me." Ravenna stood in the doorway, her look
of determination as grim as the faces of the Queen's guards accompanying her.
Her son looked up at her nervously. He sat in an armchair holding a small
lapdesk, though the paper on it was still blank. The room would have been
light and airy in the summer now the wooden winter shutters covered the large
windows and the fire in the hearth could not dispel the cold. There was no one
with him but his personal servants; Ravenna had made sure she would not have
to do this under the eyes of any courtiers or hangers-on.
Roland turned the pen over in his hands and got ink on his fingers. "Why?"
She said, "1 have something to show you." Roland stood reluctantly. "Has
something happened?" Ravenna knew he wasn't interested in anything besides
news of Denzil's whereabouts and that he would realize she would not be the
one to bring such news to him. "Take your cloak; we'll be going out on the
wall."
Immediately an impassive servant brought a thick fur-trimmed cloak from the
bedchamber, and Roland stood still for the man to arrange it around his
shoulders. "Where's Renier?"
"Downstairs, attending to the guard placements." "Oh." He followed her through
the other rooms in the suite and out to a landing of the grand stairwell. Even
though
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MARTHA WELLS
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
285
the four knights guarding the door to his chamber followed them and Ravenna
was accompanied by her gentlewoman Elaine, she could tell Roland was uneasy.
They went up the stairs to a lesser-used floor, then waited as one of the
Queen's guards unbolted a door and forced it open against the wind's pressure.
They walked out onto the wall, which was sheltered by a shoulder-high parapet,
and the wind tore through the crenelations like a mad creature.
Ravenna and Elaine held onto a guard's arm to steady themselves, and Roland
forced himself to walk along unaided. Ravenna held her head down and tried to
breathe the shockingly cold air, knowing she would pay for this ordeal later
with coughing fits. In the face of everything else, it was a minor
consideration.
The sun was making a brief appearance, though dark clouds were visibly
building up in the distance. To the north, if one could have forced oneself
close enough to the parapet to take in the view, were several miles of
snow-covered fields and men the rise of the city, like a man-fashioned
mountain range. The wind had torn away much of the haze of wood and coal smoke
that normally hung over it, and the snow made it appear pristine and empty.
The other side of the wall looked down on the inner court, where Denzil had
hosted gatherings in the summer and displayed the little fortress's wealth and
elegance. When they had arrived yesterday, they had found the usual garrison
depleted, and the steward had said that the Duke of Alsene had ordered most of
his men to one of his other estates to quell some tenant problems over taxes
some weeks ago. Messengers had been sent on to the Granges, a day's ride to
the south, to General Villon.
Not for the first time, Ravenna wondered if Thomas was alive.
There was no other man she had ever felt closer to, or who had actually
understood how her mind worked without condemning her for it. When he had
first been accepted into the Queen's Guard it had not been his political
astuteness or his wit that had attracted her, though from the occasional
flashes
of ironic humor she had witnessed, she'd suspected that he might possess those
qualities. No, most of that she had discovered later, and that discovery had
added more meaning to what had been one of the most pleasurable times of her
life.
You 're getting old, my dear, Ravenna told herself. Old and frail and
helpless. It was the constant underground war of intrigue that had beaten her
down. She and Thomas had once found such subtle battles exhilarating, but now
. . . Palace power struggles had always been intense, but since Roland's
maturity, the battles had escalated into full-scale wars with no clear
victors. Denzil had much to do with it, but it was also that the wolves sensed
Roland's weakness. And her options to remedy that were severely limited.
She forced her mind back to the present. Grandier had rendered the court's
tenuous balance of power a matter for future academics to consider. If Thomas
was alive, he would come to her when he could. If he wasn't . . . That would
be for her to face alone.
They were heading toward the old keep, a rough square tower more than seven
stories high, that had been the center of the fortress before the bastion
behind them had been built.
They reached the door into the side of the tower, and two of her guards split
off to post themselves at it. The others went inside, and Ravenna shivered
gratefully. The keep felt warm after the wind. A guard stopped to light a
candlelamp with flint and steel, and Ravenna saw that the Albon knights were
standing stiffly together as if anticipating an attack they could do nothing
to prevent Roland saw it too and said, "What are we doing heie$mother?"
Ravenna dran't answer immediately. She started up (he stairs, the guard with
the lamp going on ahead, and there was only room for Roland to walk beside
her. Finally she said, "I've made allowances for you, where Denzil is
concerned."
She could see he was slightly shocked that she brought this up in the presence
of her guards, let alone Elaine, and in an effort to outdo her effrontery, he
said, "Allowances? You've been trying to turn me against him with lies for
years."
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THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
267
Ravenna stopped and looked at her son for a moment. As always, it hurt that he
found her eyes hard to meet. She said, "My dear child, I didn't think you had
noticed."
Roland stared at her. "You admit it?"
"Of course. Recent developments have made it possible."
She continued on up the stairs, and Roland followed her, wonderingly. He said,
"I don't understand."
"That man has made a fool of you."
"He has been my only friend . . ."
"He has used you to accumulate power and wealth' beyond his reach under
ordinary circumstances."
"He's been the only one who cared for me; I gave him all those things . . ."
"Of course you gave it all to him, Roland; that's the way these people work."
Ravenna stopped on a landing and faced him. Roland was out of breath and must
have forgotten that he was King and able to order her to be silent, if he
could enforce it. He said, "You certainly never showed me any affection. You
never gave a damn for me."
"Perhaps you are right," Ravenna said. "You look too much tike your father,
and God knows I never gave a damn for him." She took a key out of her sleeve
and handed it to a guard, who unlocked the door and pushed it open.
"Go in there," Ravenna said.
Roland didn't move. He was trembling, and his eyes were dark with hatred. He's
not stupid, Ravenna thought; he must know his cousin's protestations of
eternal love are not sincere. But perhaps he thinks he can earn his respect by
doing everything Denzil asks. It made her feel sick at heart, though her
expression betrayed nothing. The world doesn't work in that fashion, and
Denzil is not interested in respecting you, my foolish son. The guard with the
lamp stepped into the room but stayed close by the wall. After a moment Roland
went through the doorway. Inside was a large shadowy room, dark wood a rough
veneer over the stone walls. The back half of it
was filled with wine barrels and other boxes stacked to die high ceiling. "You
wanted to show me this?"
"Why would anyone store wine here, Roland, away from the livable portions of
the fortress, high up where the air is so very dry, in a place more fit for
the storing of other things?*' She nodded to one of her guards. "Open one."
He went forward and carefully knocked out the bunghok in a barrel at the
bottom of a stack. Something dark flowed out. Roland started toward it,
stopped halfway there when die smell reached him, but still went to kneel and
touch the dark granular substance. "It's powder," he whispered.
Ravenna said, "The four floors above us are as well stocked as this one. The
supply does not quite rival the city armory, but I'm told that it approaches
it. More than enough to stage a palace coup."
Roland lifted his head, saw the pity on the face of the guard who had opened
the barrel, then looked back at his mother. Ravenna knew her expression showed
only weariness. She folded her arms. "Surely you are not going to say we
brought it with us."
He shook his head mutely. He stood and walked the length of die row. The lid
had already been pried off one of the long boxes, and he lifted the coarse
wood to see matchlock muskets packed in heavy cloth.
Ravenna said, "There is another store of powder and shot, a small one, enough
to supply the garrison for a few months, set where it should be near the gate.
There is only one reason for all this."
Roland began to tremble. "He will have an explanation."
"Undoubtedly."
"I'm going back now." He strode past her and down die stairs.
His knights came to his side, the Dowager Queen's party following. They
reached die landing where die door led out onto die parapet, and Roland
stopped, waiting. Ravenna
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MARTHA WELLS
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289
reached him and regarded him quietly for a moment, then nodded for one of her
guards to open the door.
As the door swung back she caught a glimpse of the sky and saw it seemed
inexplicably dark. Then she saw the body of a man lying half in front of the
threshold, before the guard slammed the door and braced his weight against it.
"Run," he said breathlessly. "Something's out. . ."
A force struck the door half off its hinges,
Ravenna ran, pushing Elaine in front of her, all thought for the moment purged
from her mind. She saw Roland dragged by one of his knights, half flung up the
stairs, shoved on when he stumbled.
Below them, the door flew off its hinges and was smashed into the wall.
Someone fired a pistol and the noise seemed to galvanize Roland and he ran up
the stairway with them to the landing. Ravenna grabbed the door there and
flung it open, and Elaine stumbled inside. Then Ravenna stopped and looked
back. She saw that the guards and knights were trying to hold the stairwell,
and there was already blood on the floor. There was screaming, and something
roared, the sheer volume of sound making the ancient walls tremble.
Roland was standing and watching, blank faced, in shock. He stood there until
Ravenna seized his arm and pulled him into the chamber with Denzil's gunpowder
store.
Elaine was holding the candlelamp, trembling and wild-eyed with fear. Ravenna
shut the door and bolted it, then stepped back, looking around the room and
rubbing her hands together. Roland leaned against the wall, watching her"
helplessly.
There is a way out, Ravenna thought. There was always a way out. She had never
been trapped yet, and by God, she wouldn't be now. "This is a corner room,"
she muttered to herself. "There must be . . ." She took the lamp from Elaine
and set it carefully down by the wall, then went toward the back of the room,
trying to make her way past the boxes and barrels. "Roland, damn it, help me."
After a moment he joined her, wrestling a box out of her
way but moving stiffly, as if terror had frozen his blood. "What are you
looking for?" he gasped.
"This, perhaps." It was made to look like part of the roughly panelled wall,
but Ravenna's fingers found the edges and Roland helped her lift it away in a
shower of cobwebs and dust, revealing a small wooden door set back into the
stone wall. He tugged on the iron handle and it came open with a protesting
squeak.
Dank, freezing air was released. It was a well within the outer wall of the
tower, and handholds had been carved out of the stone, leading down into
darkness below.
"For sieges," Ravenna said. "It will lead all the way down to the bottom
floor, with an opening on each level."
Roland looked down and bit his Hp. Ravenna knew what he was thinking: it would
not be a pleasant climb for him, let alone the two women. He said, "Do you
think you can make it?"
"Of course not," Ravenna said flatly. She knew someone would have to stay to
close the door and draw the cover over ft or the fay would have them within
moments. "Go on. You'll have to help Elaine."
"But . . ." Roland automatically reached for the girl's arm as Ravenna pushed
her toward him. "You can't. . ."
Elaine said, "No, I'm staying with you." She twined her arms around Ravenna
with unsuspected fierceness. "I won't leave you."
Ravenna tried to pry her loose. "Damn you, you silly child, I ..."
Roland protested, "Mother, you can't stay here, they'll kill you, at least try
to . . ."
The door cracked as something heavy struck it. "Roland, go on!" Ravenna
whispered fiercely.
He stepped onto the little ledge, then cautiously felt for the handholds. He
looked back and said, "I . . ."
"Start climbing," she ordered and swung the door closed. Elaine helped her
with the cover, and they got it back in place and moved away from it just as
the door gave way.
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MARTHA WELLS
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291
Ravenna put her arm around Elaine's shoulders and the girl clung to her as the
fay poured into the room.
There were a dozen at least'of varied shapes, bogles with distorted grinning
faces, some hulking things with no faces at all, a delicate winged creature
that looked something like both a demon and an angel. One of them had blood
spattered on its mouth; Ravenna wondered if it was from one of her guards, and
it was rage, not fear, that turned her to stone. They scampered or strode
through the room, disarranging the boxes, searching, for the moment ignoring
the two women. Ravenna wondered if they would casually toss a barrel onto the
lamp; they did not seem to have any fear of the powder.
Another fay entered. This, Ravenna knew, was the leader. He was tall and
slight, human in shape but blue skinned, with a face of childlike
attractiveness and a horrible leering smile. He bowed mockingly to her.
"Greetings, Queen of Nothing. I am Evadne, a prince of the Unseelie Court."
"What do you want?" she asked. She felt cold down to her bones, and it had
nothing to do with the temperature of the room, but her voice was still hard.
"Your boy-king; why else would we go to this trouble?" He looked around the
room ostentatiously. "You've hidden him, of course."
She felt Elaine quiver slightly beside her. Ravenna said, "He isn't here."
One of the troll-like creatures left off its search and grunted something at
Evadne, who glared back at it, then said to Ravenna, "We saw him come into
this tower. You will tell us where he is."
"He did not come into the tower. You can see that for yourself. Whoever saw
him must have been mistaken." She didn't look around at the other creatures
but she could tell they had stopped searching. They would have looked harder,
she knew, if they had really been positive that Roland had come into the
tower. They must have observed from a distance, and Evadne had taken the
chance.
Evadne paced across the room, glaring at the other crea-
tures, who shrank back or snarled at him. He stopped and thought for some
moments, his smooth brow wrinkling, then leaned down and spoke to the other
fay. Ravenna could tell that some of them did not seem happy with his
decision, whatever it was.
He turned and came back toward the two women. "You will tell your men to bring
him to us, or we will kill you."
How daft, she thought. This thing doesn't understand us at all, does he? But
it gave her an idea, and she thought she knew how to play him now. She said,
"I can't do that."
"You can. You will."
Ravenna pretended to falter. She thought she did it well; she raised a shaking
hand to her brow, and said, "Please . . ."
"A King or a Queen, what is it to be?"
"I . . ." She managed a fairly creditable sob. "I'll send the message."
Evadne sneered down at her. He snapped his fingers and a small winged creature
with a hideous face produced a gold-chased quill, inkpot, and a ragged piece
of parchment out of the air. It set the things down on the box in front of
her.
Ravenna gently disentangled Elaine's hands from her arm until the girl stood
alone shivering, and sat down on the box. She picked up the pen and dipped it,
then paused to frame her thought. She wrote, Accede to no demands and keep the
men away from the tower. By my hand Ravenna Fontainon Regina.
She hesitated. The fay didn't ask to see the note and had made no attempt to
watch her write. He couldn't read, then. It made sense. Why would a fay read?
Except for Kade, of course. Ravenna would have given quite a bit to have Kade
at her side rather than Elaine, whom she had to protect.
But would Renier and the others obey the note? Without Thomas here, there was
no way to be sure. How could she make sure they would do it? There wasn't a
way.
Evadne snapped, "Hurry, old woman."
Ravenna knew the expected response and tried to com-
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MARTHA WELLS
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
293
pose her features into something like fear. She had spent so much of her life
concealing her fear that she had forgotten how to show it. She felt she looked
more confused than afraid, but it apparently satisfied the fay. She said,
"I'll have to seal it, so they will know I wrote it."
"Go on, then."
She folded the note and Elaine took the candle out of the lamp and handed it
to her without being told. Ravenna looked up at her and saw the girl's
expression, and knew she had read the note over her shoulder. There were both
fear and trust in her eyes. She thinks I have a way out of this.
Ravenna took the candle and dripped the wax, onto the paper, then pressed her
ring into it. Her personal seal, the crescent moon embossed by the family
symbol of the salamander. It was not until then she realized she had signed
herself Queen, not Dowager. Damn. Well, let them put that in their history
books. Elaine reached for the candle but Ravenna set it down on the crate,
grinding the base into the wood so it would stay upright. Now for the next
part. She handed the note to Elaine and said, "Take this to Renier, dear."
With an awful childlike smile, Evadne said, "I'm not sure I want to part with
so lovely a hostage."
The paper crackled a little in Elaine's grip. Ravenna said, "Perhaps you would
take the message yourself, then. No doubt my men would like to meet you."
He looked amused, enjoying Elaine's fear. "I suppose you're hostage enough for
their good behavior. The girl may go."
And you need no hostage for my good behavior? Ravenna thought. She resisted
the urge to kiss Elaine good-bye and merely said, "Go on, dear."
Elaine looked down at her, bit her lip, then turned and hurried to the door. I
taught her not to cry before enemies and she doesn't. Ravenna nodded to
herself, satisfied. That one turned out well.
Evadne watched the girl go, but made no attempt to stop her. Ravenna waited
until she heard Elaine's steps out in the
passage, then relaxed a little. She settled herself more comfortably on the
box and watched Evadne.
The fay said, "He told me you would be weak. I see he was right again."
It surprised her. "Who told you that'"
"Our pet sorcerer, Grandier. He had leisure to study you."
Your pet sorcerer! Your pet snake is more to the point. She said, "He doesn't
like you very well, does he?"
"He is a human, and therefore a fool."
"I see."
The time passed slowly. Ravenna counted her heartbeats and stared at the
candle flame. It kept her mind off wanting something to do with her hands. She
saw Evadne grow impatient. He began to pace again, snarling at the other
creatures, and to distract him she said, "I thought your kind could not attack
during the day, only your servants and the lesser members of your court."
He grinned at her implied insult. "Our sorcerer has made the sky darken for
us, made the clouds turn black so the sun does not disturb us. Even now, one
of our great ones perches on the outside of this tower, ready to destroy your
men in the courtyard." He glared down at her. "Why don't they send out your
king, old woman?"
"It will take them some time to persuade themselves that there is no
alternative."
Evadne's stare turned curious, and she realized she had spoken with a smile.
She thought of trying a fearful expression again, but it was too late for
that. Oh, I'm leaving everything undone. Roland, learn from this if nothing
else. Probably Elaine had unintentionally helped matters by telling Renier
that Ravenna had some plan of escape. Roland had had more than enough time to
climb to the bottom of the tower. Or fall to it, God help him, she thought.
"They take too long. I think I'll tell my friend outside to kill a few men
down in the courtyard, to hurry the others along."
Ravenna said, "I think you won't."
Evadne laughed.
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MARTHA WELLS
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
295
She said, "I may be old, but not too old to deal with you." She stood, and
before he could think to come at her, she tossed the lit candle into one of
the broken barrels of powder.
The blast blew gaping holes in the outside wall, and brought the upper floors
and the roof down on top of them. The flying creature perched on the side
drifted to the ground in a ball of flame, keening most of the way.
When Roland's reaching foot touched solid stone he gasped in shock, then
leaned against the rough wall and sobbed in relief. His arms were shaking and
his ringers had begun to bleed with the strain. A hundred times he had seen
himself falling to the bottom of the narrow well, bouncing off the walls,
dying in filth and darkness, but the most painful thoughts did not concern his
own death. He'll have an explanation. Powder and shot hidden in the tower,
enough for a small army, and the fay have come and he isn't here, and wherever
he is, he's taken Falaise with him... He will have an explanation. After a
moment Roland rubbed his sleeve over his face and began to feel for the wooden
door in the pitch darkness.
Roland found a catch but the door was stiff from disuse. He managed to push it
open a crack, enough to let in a breath of air, but no farther. He hesitated,
afraid to make too much noise. If the fay had taken all of Bel Garde, if they
had won past the gate Braun's apprentices had said was sealed against them . .
. Then we'll all die, mother and Elaine in the tower, everyone down here, and
when they catch me . . .
But then he heard voices, rough human voices, the familiar city accent. A
woman asked some inaudible question, and a man's loude^ tone replied, "That's
what I said, but they're looking for the King down here, and why he's down
here I ..."
"In here!" Roland yelled. "In here! I'm here!"
There was consternation outside, more voices, then lamplight fell through a
crack in the top of the door, and Roland looked up into it gratefully. He saw
a brown human eye gazing at him in astonishment. "I'm here," he said again.
The eye withdrew, to the accompaniment of profane cursing. Then the door was
pried open, the wood bending at the center and cracking under the pressure,
and Roland saw why he had not been able to push it any further. A wooden floor
had been built up to it at about waist-height, probably dividing an ancient
high-ceilinged room into two usable compartments. The man outside had to break
the wood to get it open, and Roland reached upward and was drawn out by strong
arras in a rough homespun shirt.
The man, who was large enough to be a blacksmith, set him on his feet, then
steadied him when his legs tried to give way. The room was a storeroom or
pantry, shelves on the walls, piled with bags and barrels, and a group of
servants and several wide-eyed children were staring at him in astonishment.
"God," one woman shrieked, "it's the K . . ."
She was leapt upon by several of her companions, one ripping an apron off and
shoving it against her mouth. "Those demons are in the tower overhead,"
another woman hissed. "Who d'you think they're looking,for?"
"He's all over blood," someone else whispered. "They've tried to kill him."
"No." Roland looked down at his hands and winced. "I was climbing. I have to
get to Renier. I have to tell him . - ."
"I'll go and fetch him. Your Majesty," the man who had pulled him out said.
"Best you stay here; the beasts could be anywhere."
"Yes, you're right." Roland leaned against the wall and watched the man pick
up a musket and hurry out. A voice in his head whispered, Denzti lied to you
all along. His friendship ended the day they put the crown on your head,
Roland thought. But he saved my life. He did save my life, that wasn 't a He.
But he was a boy then, and he wasn't my heir. He needed a live prince. But a
dead king is a different matter entirely. One of the older women came forward
with a scarf and, without meeting his eyes, started gently to wipe the blood
off his hands. "Thank you," he said automatically.
The woman who had tried to scream had been released
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MARTHA WELLS
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
297
and allowed to take the apron out of her mouth. She said in an audible
whisper, "Now he seems a nice lad, not like what they say at all."
Roland started to laugh. He knew they thought he was being brave, or
hysterical, but he was laughing at himself. / must have always known what
Denzti was, but I didn 't care, I didn't care, and now he's going to kill me.
Then the door opened again and two of his knights stood there gaping at him.
And Ravenna and Elaine were still in the tower. The memory jolted him back
into his senses and Roland started toward the knights. "Where is Renier? We
have to . . ."
The pure shock of the explosion knocked him to his knees. There was screaming,
and Roland knew past his own fear that the others in the room were reliving
the moment of the explosion in the palace, when the nightmare had started. One
of his knights was standing over him, as if the man could shield him from
falling stone and timber with his own body. Dust settled around them, but
nothing fell.
After a moment Roland caught the knight's arm and pulled himself up. He felt
pitifully weak from the long climb, from fear, from everything else. Many of
the servants were still huddled on the floor, and he heard a woman weeping.
"It's all right," he said, then repeated more loudly, "It's atl right." He saw
Renier then, standing in the doorway and staring at him. "What was that?"
Roland asked. "What's happened?"
Renier came forward and led him out of the room to a narrow passage beyond,
out of sight of the others. "What is it?" Roland asked again.
"Elaine said there was a gunpowder store in the tower." Renter's face was so
pale he looked sick.
"Yes. Elaine's here, they escaped? Where's my mother?" Roland couldn't
understand Renier's expression.
"She was up there with them."
And Roland knew. To the last he had fooled himself into believing he had been
sent for help, not sent away from death.
But part of him still failed to comprehend, and that part said, "What was that
noise?" "That was the tower."
The cold was a shock.
Thomas shook his head and blinked hard. They were in an open square in front
of Aviler's house. The walls of other town houses rose up around them, and
snow had buried the fountain in the center. Around them the new fayre ring
appeared in the snow as a shallow trench in the shape of a perfect circle.
It was almost twilight in a gray world of muted color and dim light. The
corner of the house loomed above them, the shingled roof dusted with ice and
thin gusts of smoke issuing from the chimneys. It was quiet, the dim glow of
candlelight showing through the shutters on the upper floors. Thomas said, "I
didn't realize it was this late."
"It takes time to travel through the rings. We've lost an hour or so out of
the day," Kade said, but she was looking up and frowning. She folded her arms
and shivered. "Though the sky is very dark."
Thomas started toward the house, thinking that one over, and Kade followed
him. He supposed it made sense that time would be lost travelling from ring to
ring, even if it didn't make sense that one was not aware of that time's
passage. The spell that Kade hoped would show her the location of the keystone
was still inert in its bowl when they left. Once Thomas found out if Lucas was
still here, Kade was returning to Knockma to see if there had been any result
yet.
They moved around the side of the High Minister's house to the alley, and
Thomas stopped and loaded his pistols. In making the open attempt to kill
Denzil, whether it had succeeded or not, he had crossed a line and there was
no going back. As far as the rest of the world knew, he had committed treason,
and he had to get to Ravenna and tell her what he'd done before Roland learned
of it.
There was a servants' door along the alley wall, and some-
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MARTHA WELLS
one had taken the precaution of nailing iron cutlery to it to discourage fey.
He listened at it for a moment, then tried the handle. It was locked, but the
catch was not strong and he drew his dagger to pry at it. In the deep shadow
of the alley the cold was far more intense, and Kade bounced up and down with
her hands in her pockets in impatience. Thomas didn't comment; after the mild
climate of Knockma, he was feeling the cold more as well.
The lock broke, and he slowly eased the door open.
Inside was a servants' passage with doors opening to either side. A candlelamp
on the wall was still lit, but the tallow collected in the bottom showed it
hadn't been attended to for some time. Kade slipped in behind him and he
closed the door silently.
She whispered, "Something's wrong."
He nodded. The house was far too quiet. Aviler might have left the city,
though Thomas thought the High Minister had meant to hold out here until the
last possible moment. If Aviler had abandoned the place, he'd had good reason.
He whispered, "Wait here."
She drew breath to protest and he put his hand over her mouth and said,
"Please."
After a moment, she nodded. He removed his hand and she said, "Just this
once."
He went down the dimly lit passage to a door that stood half-open. The small
room on the other side was dark. There was a curtained doorway on the opposite
wall, light flickering just past it. Then he heard the low mutter of voices.
He tried to ease the door open only to find it stuck against something that
lay on the floor. He shoved it open enough to see in and stopped.
It was Lucas.
Thomas felt the wood of the doorframe crack under his hand.
The lieutenant lay on his back, and he had been shot in the chest, probably
just as he had come through the door. He walked into a trap, Thomas thought,
just as I have.
299
The hesitation undid him. Armed men burst through the curtained doorway,
shouting.
Thomas ducked back out of the room and into the servants' passage, then halted
when he saw more of them coming out of another narrow hall, blocking his way.
In the dim light all he could tell about them was that they were dressed in
the ragged buff coats and mixed armor pieces of mercenaries or private troops.
One drew a pistol and Thomas ran into a dark scullery and out the opposite
door, momentarily losing them. He hadn't seen Kade at the end of the hall
behind them; she must have slipped out the door.
They would expect him to stay on the ground level and look for an exit, not to
head for the upper floors. He found a narrow servants' stair behind a
curtained door and climbed it swiftly. He heard men pound through the passage
below, but they didn't come up. He reached the second floor and made his way
through a darkened salon and anteroom set, searching for a windowed room at
the back of the house. Climbing down the icy stone would be a problem, but
he'd risk the drop.
There were more crumpled bodies on this floor, mainly city troops. Possibly
the civilian refugees had been allowed to escape, though small chance that
would be once night fell. He was one room away from the family's private
staircase and could see it through the open doorway when he heard voices and
stepped back against the wall, half behind an arrangement of heavy drapes. It
was shadowy and ill-lit here, where most of the candles had guttered.
The group at the stair paused as someone gave orders, then spread out to the
surrounding rooms. The light from the lamp one carried clearly showed Thomas
the badge of the Duke of Alsene on their brown soldiers' doublets. It was a
troop from one of Denzil's manors.
There was a shout as someone saw him and Thomas turned and slipped back
through the salon. The darkness and confusion worked for him, but they knew
where he was now. He stopped in a darkened room to wind both his pistols. It
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MARTHA WELLS
would be dangerous to carry them like that but he was past that point now. He
checked the doors as he went through and closed the bolts of the ones that had
locks.
Thomas paused outside the door of the next chamber. The stairs down into the
stable court were just beyond it.
A quick glance showed him two men waiting in the beautifully appointed room,
both looking down toward the stairs. He pulled back as one started to turn
toward him, and drew his pistol.
Thomas stepped into the doorway and fired as the first Alsene trooper started
forward. The ball struck the man in the chest at a range of no more than ten
feet, knocking him backward into a row of lacquered cabinets.
Thomas dropped the first pistol and drew the other just as the second man
reached him. He deflected the thrust of the soldier's rapier by hitting the
narrow blade with his forearm and batting it away, almost managing to grab the
blade and pull it out of his opponent's grasp. As the man closed with him,
Thomas's pistol was knocked upward. It went off, the blast deafening him and
scattering burning grains of powder down onto his attacker. The soldier
faltered at the pain, giving Thomas time to shove him away and draw his main
gauche. As the man rushed him again, Thomas stabbed him under the ribs.
He stepped back as the soldier collapsed, and in the sudden quiet he could
hear others breaking through the locked door into the room behind him. He
grabbed up his other wheellock from the floor and tucked it into his sash with
the second pistol. Drawing his own rapier, he took the -dying man's discarded
sword and went out onto the landing above the stables. There he shut the door
and wedged the extra blade through the catch to keep it closed. It would not
hold them for long.
He turned as the carriage doors below were flung open and a large group of
Alsene troops burst in. Thomas judged the odds and knew this was it. He stayed
where he was, to let the narrow landing guard his back for him.
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
301
The first one to the top of the stairs came at him like a madman with
something to prove. Thomas parried the first flurry of blows, then took the
offensive, driving the man back a step. The lack of room worked to his
advantage; with his bad leg he would not have been able to fight as effective
a running battle. There were more of them waiting on the stairs below, and he
knew he wouldn't have a chance to run.
His opponent tried an unsuccessful feint and Thomas drove his blade deeply
into the man's side. The soldier stumbled backward and the man on the step
below lunged forward, only to be speared through die neck. He collapsed on the
top step, choking and bleeding copiously, and temporarily blocking the
landing.
There was a brief moment of respite as the others below tried to wrestle their
fallen comrades out of the way and Thomas hung onto the railing, panting. He
could hear them battering away at the other side of the door, and it looked as
if the thick wood around the wedged blade was beginning to give. The man with
the neck wound made a loud strangled cry and stopped moving.
Then Thomas saw a trooper on the stable floor below aiming a musket up at him.
He flung himself back from the rail in pure reflex and this left room for
another attacker to leap over the body blocking the stairs and come at him.
Thomas parried the blows, letting himself be put on the defensive, trying to
maneuver the man between himself and the musket. But moments passed and there
was no impact or even the blast of a missed shot. They were trying to take him
alive.
This realization energized him and he closed with his attacker, bringing their
swords hilt to hilt and trapping the other blade in the quillions to hold it
away from him. Pushed back, the man stumbled on the corpse behind him and
Thomas shoved him down the stairs. He leapt after him into the momentary clear
space, slashing at the men below who were struggling to disentangle
themselves. He caught one in the face, the point tearing through the man's eye
and cheek before glancing off bone. The soldier fell against the wall,
screaming.
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MARTHA WELLS
Another struck upward at him, and he felt a tug and sudden pain as the point
punctured his leather sleeve and stabbed into his arm. He cursed and tore
himself free, falling backward on the steps now slippery with blood. The
idiots were still trying to incapacitate rather than kill him. No matter what
their orders, I've given them enough provocation, he thought in disgust.
Another man fought past his two fallen comrades in time to be stabbed in the
chest, but Thomas's grip on the hilt was weak now and the point slid away
instead of going deeply into the trooper's flesh. But it was enough to send
his opponent reeling backward into the railing and Thomas struggled to his
feet again.
Then he was struck from behind, between the shoulder blades, knocking him into
the wall with stunning impact. He slid down it, unable to catch himself,
blackness flowing in at the edges of his vision.
Waiting beside the door in the darkened hall, Kade kept her freezing hands in
her pockets and tried to calm her thoughts. Anything to keep her mind off the
man who had driven her half-mad standing there on die green plain of Knockma
being too much a gentleman to take any notice of what Boliver had said.
With effort she managed to drag her attention back to the immediate problem.
She didn't think Grandier could really be helping Bisra. Why not lure us into
invading them? She could shrug and say it didn't matter; she would kill him
anyway for what he had done to Galen Dubell. He was so like . . .
The soldiers burst out of a door five short paces in front of her. Their backs
were to her, and she instinctively searched for glamour to hide. There was
hardly any in the dark hall, but the candlelight provided just enough for her
to slip out the door unnoticed.
Outside she dropped the barely adequate illusion and started to run down the
alley to the front of the house. She
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
303
would have to get in another way, use glamour from the snow outside . . .
The wall just in front of her exploded.
She hit the ground, more from surprise than any impulse to duck. When the
building did not collapse on top of her she looked up and saw several men
crossing the square toward her, one of them carrying a musket, die glow from
its slow match just visible in the dusk.
Shooting a poor little girl like me with something that large is hardly fair,
she thought, dazed by the suddenness of it. At a distance and in bad light her
red smock probably looked bloody. It wouldn't fool them at close range.
She dug in her pocket, hiding the movement in the snow, and managed to draw
out a piece of guncotton stained with powder she had prepared earlier. She
brought it up to where she could see it without having to turn her head and
stared at it, trying to conjure a spark. Sympathetic magic, or unsympathetic
magic as Galen had preferred to call it, was faulty and difficult to use. She
might only burn her fingers. If she could call flame at all. Damnit, Kade
thought, a spark, Just a little spark. But she did her best work under
pressure, and as the men came nearer, her mind stopped chattering and attained
the right level of concentration. The edge of the cotton began to glow.
Now. Just as the one with the musket suddenly shouted and raised his weapon,
she finished the concurrence spell and every grain of powder within a ten-foot
radius ignited.
The musket exploded almost over her head, and there were screams and blasts as
pistols went off, then a storm of little popping sounds as the scattered
grains of powder from the musket's blast ignited.
Kade scrambled to her feet, the snow and her clothes dotted with someone
else's blood. Three men lay dead or dying on the snow, two more were running
away around the corner of the house. She followed them at a run, down the
alley between Aviler's house and the next, into the street
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MARTHA WELLS
where they had fought the battle with the fay the day before.
Kade stopped abruptly as she reached the street and felt her heart hit the pit
of her stomach. The carriage doors stood open and there were armed troops
milling in front of them. She could tell by their dress only that they were
not city or crown troops. It looked as though there were a hundred of them.
Someone saw her and shouted, she saw the slow match of a musket glow in the
twilight, and she darted back around the comer and ran.
"Where's the girl?" Dontane stood in the carriage doorway.
"Gone," Grandier said. The sorcerer stood in the middle of the street, wrapped
in his scholar's cope, thoughtfully studying the sky.
Dontane strode out and started around the corner of the house. "I sent five
men after her. Damnit, she was running."
"Perhaps she wanted someone to chase her," Grandier said, and followed him.
On the other side of the house, they found the remains of the first group in
the bloodstained snow. Dontane stared down at them a moment, then looked at
the older sorcerer. Grandier was humming to himself and contemplating the sky
again. Then the younger man saw what appeared to be a pile of rags on the snow
farther into the square and went toward it.
It must be the men he had sent after the sorceress, though all were dead and
none was recognizable. They looked like corpses that had been left to mummify
in some desert, dry desiccated husks.
Dontane started forward but then stopped, his attention caught by Grandier,
who was watching him with a speculative half-smile. Dontane took a step back
and said, "There's a ring here?"
Grandier pointed to a faint circular trough in the snow. He said, "It doesn't
do to walk uninvited into Fayre. Or run, for that matter."
THE ELEMENT Of FIRE
305
Dontane looked down at the pitiful remains of the Alsene troopers and wondered
if Grandier would have let him walk unknowing into the ring. But he only said,
"Good, we're rid of her then."
"Oh, I think not." Grandier smiled and turned back toward the house. "We have
something she wants, you see."
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
307
THOMAS WOKE WHAT must have
been only a few moments later, lying on the steps in someone else's blood with
one of the soldiers standing over him, slapping him awake. He'd been disarmed
and his head hurt incredibly, and he made a grab for the man's arm only to
miss entirely. They dragged him to his feet and he thought, It can't last too
long.
He made them half drag, half wrestle him down the steps to the stable floor.
Troopers wearing Alsene's badge moved around the enclosed court, stripping the
weapons from the bodies of dead comrades as well as from those of the city
troops who had tried to defend the house. The outside doors were open and cold
air poured in as a smothering blast, temporarily lifting the thick odor of
death that hung over the room.
Dontane waited for him at the bottom of the stairs. He had participated in the
battle—the powder-stained buff coat and the pistols proved that—but the pallor
of his face made him look half-dead and his eyes were red-rimmed and haunted.
He smiled down at Thomas and said, "It seems I can now offer you my
hospitality."
Thomas looked past him but couldn't see Kade, not as a prisoner and not as a
crumpled little body on the flagstones. The pain radiating through his skull
made it impossible to concentrate. He managed to focus on Dontane and said,
"Really? And I was given the distinct impression that your position in all
this was a subordinate one."
Dontane's expression tightened into anger before returning to the studied look
of amused contempt. He glanced toward the open carriage doors where the
daylight was beginning to fail, where Grandier must be waiting somewhere out
of sight. His self-control had slipped since he had been in Lestrac's house
biding his time and waiting for that young foolish lord to die. He looked back
at Thomas and said softly, "It was you who shot at us in the palace, wasn't
it? How very foolish of you to go back there. The Duke of Alsene isn't dead,
you see. He's very much alive. And you are going to regret that."
If they had caught or killed Kade outside, surely Dontane was the type to brag
of it. "I have regrets already. I regret you weren't on our side of the siege
doors when the Host attacked, where after sufficient persuasion you would have
accused Denzil and informed us of Grandier's disguise. I regret I didn't spare
the time today to blow your head off . . ."
He didn't even sense the blow coming. It rocked his head back and for a moment
he sagged in the grip of the troopers as everything went black. He had time to
hope that it would stay that way before the world slowly but relentlessly
reasserted itself. The stable roof swam into hazy focus, and he swallowed
blood and managed to lift his head. He said, "Careful, you might bruise your
knuckles."
"Grandier wants you alive." Dontane stepped closer. "What does he want with
you?"
Thomas heard the underlying tension in that cool contemptuous tone and sensed
a possibility opening up in front of him. If only he could pull his
pain-scattered wits together enough to take advantage of it. "Ask him."
"It's easier to ask you."
"And I had the impression you two shared confidences." Thomas knew he was
provoking the other man too much, losing what little control he had over the
situation. He had the sudden impulse to goad Dontane further into rage, just
because he could, just because it was so easy, no matter what the
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309
consequences to himself. It was astonishing how difficult he found it to
suppress that urge.
Dontane struggled for calm and managed to lower his voice to say confidently,
"Cooperate with me and it will go easier on you. Or do you really want to be
handed over to that old madman?"
"If you've taken him as your master, you're far madder than he is."
Dontane snarled, "That's your last . . . ," and Grandier's mild voice
interrupted, "That's enough."
The old sorcerer had stepped into the circle of lamplight, appearing suddenly
out of the dim cold twilight outside. From his tone he might have been
encountering the younger man at a promenade or a market square, but Dontane
whipped around to face him.
Grandier regarded him imperturbably. Dontane started to speak, thought better
of it, and stepped back.
Moving forward, the old sorcerer said, "An unexpected pleasure, Captain." He
still wore the baggy black scholar's cope, still wore Galen Dubell's face.
That was the hardest part. Now that I know who he is, he should look like a
monster, not like. . . Not like an old friend. Thomas tried to pull free of
the troopers and was surprised when they allowed it. He stood on his own,
swaying a little. "Are you getting what you want out of all this?" he asked
Grandier. About ten of the Alsene troopers were grouped around him; he thought
about fighting but his bad leg was trembling, threatening to give way, and the
room kept swaying. He thought about attempting it anyway.
Grandier regarded him silently for a long moment, his gray eyes calm as ever.
"Not yet. But soon."
At that moment it occurred to Thomas just why Grandier might want him alive.
The sorcerer turned away, and while the troopers' eyes were on him, Thomas
dove sideways and slammed into one of the men, ripping the sword out of his
surprised grip and slashing upward at him. But a hilt cracked down on Thomas's
head from behind before he could turn it on anyone else, and in the end they
took him alive.
Roland walked along a colonnaded porch open to the interior court of Bel Garde
with his knights surrounding him, feeling as if his mind were a rusty
clockwork that hadn't been wound in far too long. Everything felt out of
proportion, and time seemed to move in fits and starts. He said suddenly, "The
steward of this place must have known about the powder store. Arrest him at
once."
"Sir Renier has already done so, my lord."
"Oh. Good." God, he realized suddenly. My mother is gone and there's no one to
think of these things. He looked up, seeing the confusion in the court for the
first time, and recognizing the figures in the center of the milling crowd of
servants and guards. It was Falaise, sitting her horse in her riding clothes
with Queen's guards around her, obviously just come through the gates.
Breaking free of his escort, Roland ran across the court to catch her bridle.
He had never made the effort to get to know Falaise very well, but he was glad
out of all proportion to see that she still lived. It seemed to promise that
the world as it was had not been completely destroyed. "Falaise, we thought
you were dead! Where were you?"
The Queen looked down at him, startled. Her expression was frightened and
there were dark circles of weariness under her eyes. Her horse stamped and
tried to nibble Roland's sleeve. She said, "My lord, I must see Ravenna at
once. There is something I must . . . something I must . . ."
"My lady," he said, not quite recognizing his own voice, "my mother is dead."
Falaise turned white, the blood draining out of her face as if she were dying
in front of him. Shocked, Roland called for help. Guards came to help the
Queen from her horse; her ladies and servants appeared in the court. An Albon
knight urged Roland away, saying, "My lord, you must come inside. It's not
safe out here." Numb, Roland let the man lead him into
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311
one of the rooms off the court, thinking, Something has happened. What is she
so terrified of?
The room was long, with many windows to look out onto the garden court, their
lace curtains woefully inadequate to stop the drafts. Roland paced tensely,
rubbing his cold hands together, ignoring his knights and unsure of just what
he was waiting for.
The Queen appeared in the doorway, half-supported by the Queen's Guard
Lieutenant Gideon. Past them, Roland could see two of the Queen's gentlewomen
waiting outside, huddled together like children expecting punishment. Holding
tightly to the lieutenant's arm, Falaise managed to cross the room, then
collapsed at Roland's feet. He looked at Gideon in bewilderment, and the
lieutenant bent over the Queen, saying, "My lady, you must tell him."
"Tell me what?" Roland said. Sickness hit the pit of his stomach suddenly, and
he groped for the table to steady himself. He remembered that Falaise had
disappeared at the same time as Denzil.
Falaise looked up at him, her face tear-streaked and frightened, but something
in his expression must have encouraged her because she said, "My lord, I
should have spoken days ago."
Roland listened in agonized silence to Falaise's story of more treachery, of
how Denzil had deliberately kept the Queen from leaving the city so that she
would be in his power. "Before this, he had offered me marriage if you were to
die, Your Majesty. I ... I don't mean to accuse him but. . ."
"No." Roland had to stop her. He didn't want to hear how she had concealed
treason out of fear of him. He understood her reaction to his mother's death
now. She had been counting on telling this to Ravenna first, counting on
Ravenna to protect her from him. More nails in my coffin, he thought. "It's
all right, really. I don't blame you. There are . . . Other things have come
to light which . . . Perhaps you should go to your ladies now."
The lieutenant led her away, and Roland stood at the table,
staring at his own reflection in its polished surface. He had never loved
Falaise, knew he never would, but this was the first time he had realized that
he might have saved a great deal of trouble by simply making a friend of her.
When Denzil is with me it's as if I can't think. His fist struck the table and
the face in the reflection twisted. Oh God, let him have an explanation.
Thomas didn't remember much of the trip back to the palace. They bound his
wrists and got him on a horse, and he leaned over the saddlebow, unable to sit
up. The cold grew intense as night took the city in a dark wave and the
freezing air was raw on his throat and lungs. His stomach was cramping with
nausea, and dizziness kept overwhelming him.
He came back to full consciousness only when they were passing through St.
Anne's Gate. He lifted his head and shook back the hood of the cloak someone
had thrown over him sometime during the ride.
They were passing between the Cisteman Barracks and the Mews, as he had days
earlier bringing Galen Dubell into the palace for the first time. / could not
have been more helpful if I'd been in the plot with them, he thought. He
hadn't even been able to get them to kill him.
The barracks were a gutted ruin. The wooden panels over the three arched
doorways had been torn open, exposing the dark pit of the interior and the
piles of snow that had drifted inside. With the outer gate closed and guarded,
the assault from within the palace would have caught the Cistemans completely
by surprise. In the narrow corridors of the ancient stone structure the attack
by the fay must have had the devastating effect of a hunter blocking all the
holes but one of a rabbit warren, and then releasing his ferrets.
The gates into the old siege wall stood open. As they rode through them and
toward the towering wall of the Old Palace, bogles dropped out of the eaves of
the two long stone buildings that housed the city armories across the court.
Gray-skinned, ugly, distorted creatures, their yellow eyes gleamed
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in the gathering darkness. Each was short and squat, their arms hanging
disproportionately long and their wide mouths grinning with rows of pointed
teeth. Sniggering in almost human voices the bogles ambled toward them, and
the nervous horses shied away.
They stopped in the paved court beneath the bulk of the Old Palace, where lit
sconces illuminated the high double doors of the westside entrance. Thomas
managed to get off the horse on his own without falling. He held onto the
saddle a moment while his head and legs became reconciled with the notion of
standing. The troopers hung back from him now, watching him warily. He
wondered if it was due to his unpredictability or his apparent familiarity
with Grandier
Inside the circular entrance hall the few lamps made hardly a dent in the
shadows. This area of the Old Palace seemed remarkably undisturbed, the
untouched rooms and short halls leading off into darkness and silence.
Grandier was standing beside him suddenly, and Thomas was too weary to be
startled. The old sorcerer said, "This way."
Both Dontane and the sergeant in charge of the Alsene troops turned to look at
him, but Grandier ignored their unspoken questions. He said to Thomas, "I want
to show you something."
Grandier led the way down a lesser-used series of rooms, lit only by the lamps
the soldiers carried, and to a staircase leading down to the lower levels. At
the third turn of the stairs Grandier led them into an old stone-walled
corridor, and Thomas realized they were going toward the same cellar where the
keystone had been concealed. He looked at Grandier walking beside him, but the
older man's features betrayed nothing.
As they moved through the cold rooms the flickering light revealed the sheen
of sweat on a soldier's face, a white-knuckled grip on a swordhilt or musket
that told volumes about the troops' relationship with the fay invaders.
They reached a plain wooden stair leading down, and
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313
were now roughly backtracking the route they had taken away from the cellar
the night of the attack, but heading toward the lower passageways they had
been unable to reach because of the collapsed corridor. The strain of the
fight had exacerbated the pain in Thomas's bad leg and it was protesting this
treatment, but he managed not to limp too obviously.
The stairs led to an unblocked passage below the storerooms, and the stale air
carried the fetid smell of death. His thoughts kept turning back to Grandier's
shape-shifting ability. Not that way. I don't want to die that way. He had
given up everything else—his honor, his right to say he had never killed a
helpless opponent, his claim on his ancestral lands. Voluntarily or pushed to
it by circumstance, bit by bit everything had gone to win a few years or a few
months or a few days of political stability in a world where so few others
seemed to care and most of them were dead now. He was willing to die for
duty's sake but the thought of giving up his identity turned his heart to ice.
Light was coming from up ahead, from a place where there should be stygian
darkness. Abruptly raucous noise, growling, and a high-pitched keening echoed
off the stone walls. A few more of the uneasy troopers drew their swords.
The corridor turned, and the first thing Thomas saw was that a large chunk of
the stone wall had been knocked out, allowing a view down into the cellar.
Grandier moved to the edge, and after a moment Thomas followed him.
The Unseelie Court had found a home here. Fay with long emaciated bodies and
huge leathery wings flew in lazy circles over the foul revelry below. There
were hundreds of them, bogles, spriggans, formless creatures like the boneless
that had attacked them in the street. The mockery and distortion of human and
animal forms was endless and infinitely varied. He could see them much more
clearly this time, perhaps because they were not troubling to conceal
themselves anymore. The light came from a mist that crept up the walls and
wreathed around the giant columns supporting the ceiling.
This opening had been made at about the second level of
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the cellar, and the wide pillars met the ceiling another two levels above
them. Below were the remains of two flights of stairs and the narrow well that
had enclosed them, now a mound of broken stone and shattered wood.
Corpse-lights flitted around the stairs and the tops of the columns.
The unnatural light was bright enough to let Thomas see the dark openings in
the ceiling for the air shafts and the doors through which the larger siege
engines had been lowered. Chains and frayed ropes hung down from some of those
doors, the old system of block and tackle. Thomas said, "They fly up those
shafts."
"Yes." Grandier's gaze was on the unholy revelry below. "It protects them from
daylight, but gives them access to the surface." He turned back to the others
and said, "Dontane, they seem disturbed. Go down and ask them what's wrong."
Dontane moved forward, threw an unreadable look at his mentor, then started
the awkward climb to the bottom of the cellar.
"So he is a sorcerer," Thomas said.
Grandier glanced at him. "He's learning. He had been refused admittance to
Lodun, and in anger he came across the border to Bisra, and to me for teaching
before my arrest. I refused him, because I felt he lacked moral character." He
smiled, amused, apparently, by this earlier self who had had the leisure to
make such judgments. "Trust was a very important issue, among those of us who
practiced sorcery in Bisra. The merest suspicion of necromancy, or anything
else the Church could interpret as traffic with demons, was death. But after I
escaped from the Inquisition, I sought him out. I had discovered I needed a
man who lacked moral character. He was at Lodun with me after I was Galen
Dubell, but one of the masters learned he had been across the border, and
became suspicious of him. The rumors that I had come to Ile-Rien had already
started, you see. So I sent him on to contact the Duke of Alsene for me, which
he did through our unfortunate and foolish Lord Lestrac."
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315
Dr. Braun had visited Lodun frequently, Thomas remembered. "You killed Braun
because he recognized Dontane."
"I would have had to eventually, anyway."
Thomas watched Dontane pick his way down the remains of the steps and said,
"Are you sure he's not the one who turned you in to the Inquisition?"
"Oh, good try." Grandier smiled. "No, that man is dead."
Dontane had climbed halfway to the bottom, and now one of the winged sidhe
flew to meet him, cupping its wings to hold itself in midair and gesturing and
shouting at him in a high-pitched shriek. Dontane turned and waved at
Grandier, his posture betraying irritation. Grandier said, "It appears this
needs my attention." He nodded to the Alsene sergeant, then looked back at
Thomas. "I'll see you shortly, Captain."
Without Grandier's presence, the troopers muttered nervously as they made
their way back, but Thomas was too preoccupied to notice. Why did he want me
to see that? What did it accomplish? A will-o'-the-wisp followed them part of
the way, playing in the unlit wall lanterns and taunting them silently.
Thomas felt each step of the various stairways as a short stabbing pain. By
the time they reached the upper floors of the Old Palace he was limping badly.
They entered one of the smaller halls that had been set up as temporary
barracks, now occupied by a few sullen troopers gathered around the hearth
fire, and they passed through it into an attached suite. The last room had
been stripped of furniture and wall coverings, and it was dark except for what
light flickered uncertainly in from the lamps in the anteroom.
Thomas watched tiredly as one of them pounded an iron spike with a set of
manacles attached to it into the wall. With respect for his unpredictability,
one held a pistol to his head when they untied him to put the manacles on.
The chains were short but he was able to sit down against the wall, and the
troopers withdrew into the anteroom to huddle in a nervous knot near the
hearth.
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MARTHA WELLS
He tested the set of the spike in the wall to see if it could be worked loose,
but it held firm. Well and trufy caught this time. He rested his pounding head
back against the cold wood, and tried not to think.
"I didn't believe they would let you live." It was Aviler's voice. Between the
dim light and the distraction of various injuries, Thomas hadn't seen the
other man chained to the opposite wall. The High Minister's dark-colored
doublet was torn and bloodied, and from the livid bruises on his temple it
seemed he had not been taken easily.
Thomas closed his eyes a moment, damning the fate that had consigned him to be
imprisoned with Aviler. Then he said, "Grandier wanted me alive, and if you
imply I'm in league with him, I'll kill you."
At the moment it was a supremely empty threat, but Aviler answered, "Don't
take me for a fool, Captain."
"I don't know what else to take you for." Thomas sat up and gingerly felt the
back of his head. His hair was matted with blood, and there was a sizable lump
composed of pure pain.
"You can take me for a man who did not acquire my power in a Queen's bed."
"Yes," Thomas agreed. "In her bed, on the daybed in die anteroom, on a couch
in the west solar of the Summer Palace, and other locations too numerous to
mention, and if you had the slightest understanding of Ravenna at all, you
would know it never made one damn bit of difference as to whether she took my
advice or not. And no, your father handed you your power wrapped in ribbon on
his deathbed."
The High Minister looked away. After a long moment of silence he said, "I
expect it doesn't matter now."
Already feeling the bite of the manacles on his wrists, Thomas expected it
didn't matter either.
Aviler rubbed his eyes, making his own chains jingle slightly. "Galen Dubell
really is the sorcerer Grandier, then. Denzil told me something of it when he
brought the Queen to me, but under the circumstances I don't place much
confidence in his word."
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
317
"Dubell really is Grandier. He got a shape-changing magic from the fay, and he
killed Dubell and took his place." The stab wound in Thomas's left arm was
still bleeding sluggishly, though the pain of it hardly competed with that in
his head. The thinner sleeve leather of his buff coat had absorbed some of the
force but the blade had still penetrated a couple of inches at least. He tore
a strip of material from the tail of his shirt to use as a crude bandage. "Why
are you alive?"
"I don't know. No one's bothered to say. What's your opinion on the subject?"
"He wants to keep his options open. He can't stay Dubell forever."
As Aviler considered the unpleasant implication, Thomas tightened the rag
around his arm, taking malicious satisfaction in letting the other man in on
his private terror. He knew he had more to worry about on that score than the
High Minister did. Grandier hardly knew Aviler.
With Lucas dead—he hesitated in tying off the makeshift bandage, wondering who
had done it, Dontane or some nameless hireling trooper—there was no one but
Ravenna who knew him well enough to realize the deception immediately. He
didn't think anyone could find a way through the complexities of his
relationship with Ravenna, but that would only mean Grandier would have to
kill her the way he had coldly eliminated anyone who might have noticed that
Galen Dubell had changed more than time could account for.
Then diere was Kade.
Kade had done well enough leading her own erratic and dangerous life before
Thomas had dragged her into this, talked her into staying with tfiem past the
point at which she could have left safely. And made her vulnerable. The tittle
idiot trusts me. Lucas had been right. And he remembered that the last
conversation he'd had with his friend had been an argument; stupid thing to do
in a war, and he'd regret it the rest of his no doubt short life.
Kade was her own woman, and he was too old to bother lying to himself anymore
and too young not to want her. But
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MARTHA WELLS
any chance of anything between them was wasted, as point -lessly wasted as
Lucas, Vivan, and ail the other lives lost and destroyed by Denzil and
Grandier.
There was a stirring among the men in the anteroom, and after a moment Urbain
Grandier appeared in the doorway, carrying a candlelamp and a short stool.
He set the lamp down on the scuffed floorboards, and glanced once,
thoughtfully, at Aviler. Then he looked back to Thomas and said, "I felt I
owed you more of an explanation."
Thomas had a sudden impulse to delay whatever the sorcerer had come to say. He
said, "You have Dontane fooled. He thinks you're mad."
Grandier shook his head, put the stool he had brought just inside the doorway,
and sat down. "I give him what he expects." He sighed, and looked like a tired
old man. "He imagines himself to be subtle and dangerous, and I suppose he is,
but there are levels of complexity he fails to understand. Denzil, on the
other hand, is rather like an incompetent copyist's version of you."
As die clear gray eyes met his Thomas felt a stab of pure fear. Worry about it
later, he thought. Grandier had probably noticed it but there was no help for
that. He said, "Do they know what you're planning? And there is a plan, isn't
there?"
"Yes. I first conceived it in my cell in the Temple Prison at Bistrita. I had
to think about something besides the torturers, and the death by fire that
waited for me." He looked down at his hand and stretched die fingers,
contemplating the unbroken skin as if he did not quite recognize it as his
own.
Ami perhaps he doesn't, Thomas thought. Watching him, he remembered the
catalog of tortures the court documents had listed. The sorcerer was driven,
dangerous, and intelligent, but not insane. It was almost as if he had passed
into another phase of being that was not madness or sanity but some lawless
ground in between.
Across the room, Aviler shifted a little, breaking the silence with a faint
clink of chain, and Grandier said, "Then an emis-
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
319
sary of the Unseelie Court appeared with their offer, which you know about
already. Part of a scheme on their part to suborn a human sorcerer, to make
the Host more powerful in our world. It's a contest they have with the Seelie
Court, their opposites in Fayre. Having a sorcerer at their beck and call
would be a coup of sorts." He shrugged. "They thought me a likely candidate."
Thomas realized he was trying to control the conversation out of panic, and
that Grandier was allowing him to do it. Try to be a little less transparent,
he told himself. You've helped the man enough already. Grandier seemed to
expect a comment, so he said only, "The more fools they."
"I thought so." Grandier smiled a little. "It's not entirely their fault, the
trusting creatures. They are accustomed to Fayre, which bends to their will.
The mortal world has sharp edges, bends to no man's will, and events occur
with fatal finality. Mistakes are not suffered. Evadne was pressing me to give
up this game and go on to something more entertaining. He was one of their
self-proclaimed leaders, a very annoying character. He's dead now, of course.
I rather thought someone might kill him eventually. And I meant to tell you,
Kade escaped through the ring and is presumably in Fayre, at the moment."
That's one mercy. He fought not to show relief and asked, "Why are you helping
Denzil?"
"The Duke has offered me what I want. A war with Bisra."
"We've had a war with Bisra. It didnTt turn out that well for anyone." But
things began to fall into place. Ravenna would never have agreed to another
war. They had been the victors of the last long conflict with their mortal
enemies to the south only by a bare margin. Even if Roland had supported such
a suicidal course, Aviler and the other High Lords and advisors would have
prevented it at any cost.
"There was a war," Grandier conceded. "But I was not involved. And I have the
Host."
Unbidden, the memory of the monstrous turmoil in the
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321
cellar came to Thomas's mind. He said, "If you want to turn them loose on
Bisra, be my guest, but why do you have to destroy us in the process?"
"I have no intention of destroying Ue-Rien. But I will have to alter it
somewhat. Denzil needs the war to cement his position as usurper. When word
leaks out that the capital is under a virtual state of siege by creatures of
Fayre, Bisra will move to take advantage. They need He-Rien's wealth to
maintain a balance of power with Parscia, on their southern border, and their
Church fears any sorcery not under its control. Justifiably so.
"When the landed lords of Ue-Rien realize Bisra is marshalling its forces to
attack, they will support any central authority that has a chance of
marshalling a resistance. The Duke of Alsene will be that central authority.
Oh, that won't be all. There is to be some document of formal abdication,
signed by Roland. Under what circumstances, I don't know." He looked over at
Aviler, who had been listening in a kind of horrified fascination. "That
explains your presence. Your position allows you to deputize the King's seal
on state documents during an emergency when the King has been removed for his
own safety. I doubt the originator of that particular tenet of courtlaw
intended documents of abdication to be included in that category, and it would
be laughed off if Roland's supporters took power again, but Denzil intends to
keep all his options open."
"I will not sign anything for Denzil, for you, or for the Prince of Hell
himself."
"I know." Grandier nodded seriously. He turned back to Thomas. "Once die
Bisran army crosses the border, and are no longer protected by their priests'
defenses, the Host will help to harry them and they will be driven back. At
that time, outrage against the Bisrans will be so high it will not be
difficult to turn an army of defense into an army of offense."
Thomas shook his head in disbelief. "The Host participates in this out of the
goodness of its collective heart? What did you
offer them, the destruction of Lodun? What are they going to do when you don't
keep up your end of the bargain?"
Grandier looked up, surprised and pleased. "Oh, very good. Go on."
"DenzU's motive is plain: he has to own everyone and everything around him.
The Host wants the death of as many human sorcerers as possible. And you want
Bisra. And I'd wager anything that you mean for no one to get what he wants
except you."
"And how will I accomplish this?" Grandier asked softly, eyes alight.
"I don't know. But I don't think you'll let them destroy Lodun."
"No, I would not let them do that." He looked away a moment. "Evadne was the
one demanding I destroy Lodun. He is not a factor anymore."
Grandier hesitated, his face craggy and harsh in the candlelight. "I don't
like the young Duke of Alsene; he is cunning and I will need help to manage
him. But he will give me what I want, and so I must use him. Bisra will be
struck by the might of your armies. Once their priests can no loner defend
them from the fay, I can further the collapse. In time, there will be nothing
left but to sow salt into the empty fields ... and Bisra will cease to be. It
will probably take many years, I know, but I have the time." He looked
thoughtful a moment, then shook his head. "I regret the necessity of a long
war that will have ill effect on this land, but I really can't see any other
way to start the process of collapse. You will agree that an all-out conflict
can be particularly devastating."
Thomas just looked at him. There was nothing to be said. Grandier was setting
forces in motion he couldn't possibly control. The old sorcerer might never
see his goal accomplished, but he would see years of destruction.
Quietly, desperately, Aviler said, "What you are planning—dreaming—will never
come to pass."
Grandier got slowly to his feet, as if the cold hurt his back.
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"I have ridden the tide of events for many years. I am quite capable of
guiding it now."
Thomas looked up at him, and knew any argument was useless^ but he said, "You
are mad. You're handing the kingdom to Denzil, and he doesn't give a penny
damn for you or your plans."
"That remains to be seen."
In a tone of quiet rage Aviler said, "I hope you burn in Hell with your damned
fay allies."
Grandier chuckled. "I have already burned in Hell. You see the result. Heaven
help us all if it happens again."
Thomas said, "Has Denzil noticed that anyone who gets in your way dies?"
"I don't think so. Not yet, at any rate. But then, you're not dead, and you
were certainly in my way."
Not nearly enough, Thomas thought. "That's only a matter of time, isn't it?"
"It's what I'm told." Grandier regarded him silently for a moment, then said
seriously, "There is one more thing. The Queen . . . The Dowager Queen Ravenna
is dead."
Thomas felt the silence stretch, felt Aviler staring at him. Calmly he said,
"You're lying."
"Not about this. She was trying to protect Roland. She succeeded and destroyed
several important members of the Host in the process."
"You're lying." Thomas tried to stand and the chains jerked him back to his
knees. He didn't notice.
Grandier closed his eyes a moment. "No. There are some things I regret, but
this isn't one of them. She was too dangerous."
And then he knew it was true. "You fucking bastard!" he shouted at him.
Grandier turned to go and Thomas said, "You are a coward. You didn't have to
do this."
His back to him, Grandier paused in the doorway, but then continued out.
Thomas sank back against the wall. Aviler said, "It is a lie, surely."
"No. No, it's not." It was the last thing he said for several hours.
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
325
KADE LANDED AWKWARDLY in the
high velvet grass of the Knockma ring and rolled to her feet. She pressed her
hands to her temples and tried to concentrate, feeling the lines of force
radiating out from the ring around her. She reached out along them to open a
ring in the maze court below the Old Palace. She opened her eyes and saw the
green sward of Knockma, the menhirs standing around her in silent
contemplation, and in the distance, the mist-shrouded column of the castle and
its reflection.
She snarled, shrugged out of her coat, and tried again.
After four failures she knew it was no good; she couldn't form a ring inside
the palace. What did Grandter do? The Bisran sorcerer would have had to ward
the palace against her, that would take . . . But travelling the rings from
the palace to Knockma, to Aviler's house and back here, had distorted her
sense of time's passage. By the sky, they had lost nearly an hour on coming to
Knockma and returning to the city. Moving from the less-powerful ring she had
made at the High Minister's house and coming back, she could have lost more
than that.
Grandier could have begun the spells against her when he was alerted to her
and Thomas's presence in the palace. It would not have taken long if he used
the wards already in place. No time at all if he had used another keystone
prepared earlier when he had first known she was coming to court.
Kade knotted her hands in her hair until the pain stopped the rise of bile in
her throat.
She opened her eyes. Boliver was standing at the edge of the ring, watching
her and scratching his bearded chin. He said, "What happened?"
"They have him," she said simply.
His eyes widened a little. After a moment he shuffled his feet, then said,
"What are we going to do, then?"
"Wait here." She scrambled to her feet, touched the power in the ring, and
took that step that carried her away.
The cold embraced her first. Kade had left her coat in the forever-spring of
Knockma. She was outside the palace wall, near the Postem Gate where she and
Thomas had got in earlier that day. The square with its broken fountain was
still empty of life in the gathering dusk, the buildings staring down at her
with gaping dark windows.
Kade stepped out of the newly formed ring in the snow and moved to the gate,
and the hair on the back of her neck rose. Cursing, she dug in a pocket for
the last of the gascoign powder she had with her and rubbed it into the comers
of her eyes.
The wards rose up from the ground in front of her in a corona of light,
stretching up and curving over the wall. He has put the wards back.
High above, a razor-winged shadow dove out of the clouds, passed unharmed
through the corona it could not see, and disappeared among the palace towers.
That was a member of the Host. And it went through the wards. She raised a
hand toward the light and saw the gooseflesh spring up on her arm. And I
can't. He turned the wards against me, to let the Host in and keep me out.
Kade stepped back, and felt the awareness of the hostile presence of the wards
recede. There was one other way in. She could go through die ring that already
existed in the shattered remains of the Grand Gallery. Yes, that way, the
trap.
Kade went back to the snow ring and took the turn that brought her into the
Grand Gallery.
The cold was no less bitter for the shelter of the walls. The
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MARTHA WELLS
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327
huge hall was dark and silent and a wind flung snow through the broken terrace
windows.
A winged fay with blue skin and an angelic human face was sitting in the
middle of the floor, picking its toes. It glanced up, saw her, and screamed.
As it fled the room, Kade lifted a hand to touch the edge of the ring. Almost
there, she felt the heat of hostile force. The old ward around the ring was in
the same etheric structure as the wards around the palace. She could not step
outside it.
The floor was piled with chunky broken stone from the foundation, shattered
wooden flooring, and dirt. She began to trace the outer edge of the circle,
stepping up onto one of the larger pieces of foundation, leaping to the next.
It took concentration. A recently formed ring would have hardly any mark on it
at all. The Knockma Ring was ancient and well used, but it was a still pool of
power. This ring was a whirlpool of conflicting forces, stirred up like a
hornet's nest by the Host's passage. It had originally been her mother Moire's
work and had rested atop the polished wooden floor of the gallery. Dr. Surete
had sealed it off with spells long before he died, and the pressure of the
wards had eventually pushed it down to this level, even with the foundation.
After some moments she heard footsteps and looked up to see Dontane and
Grandier standing in one of the archways. Dontane was levelling a pistol at
her.
She smiled grimly. He fired, the blast reverberating through the room, echoing
off the high sculpted ceiling. Kade didn't see the ball until it entered the
ring's sphere of influence, where it veered abruptly from its straight course
and began to travel the ring's outer circle, orbiting around her like the
philosophers claimed the sun orbited the earth.
Grandier said, "Don't waste your shot." He crossed the room to stand within a
few yards of the ring's outer edge, and after a moment the other man joined
him. Kade had already resumed her halting progress around the outer rim. The
pistol ball whizzed past her again, starting a breeze that stirred her hair.
To Grandier, Dontane said, "What are you waiting for? Kill her."
"She isn't here," the Bisran sorcerer said. "She is a breath away from a
thousand other places, aren't you?"
Without interrupting her progress, Kade glanced up at Dontane and said, "Come
and get me."
He took an impulsive step forward, then hesitated, looking at Grandier.
Ignoring him, the sorcerer said seriously, "I don't have to ask what you want
here, Kade."
She had found the ring's pattern now and hoped her slight hesitation at the
cardinal point would be put down to reaction to his remark. She said, "I want
you dead."
"He's alive."
This time the hesitation was unplanned. She had not allowed herself to think
Thomas might be dead, but from the sudden suffocating constriction in her
chest, some part of her mind had recognized it as a very real possibility. She
forced herself to step to the next rock. / shouldn 't have come. This was what
Grandier wanted, this was why he had not sealed this ring against her. Now he
could ask her for anything he wanted, and she would have to give it to him.
She thought about fleeing now, but it was too late. She took a deep breath,
and continued her progress around the ring. Her head was buzzing, and she was
going to have to leave soon to find somewhere private to be sick.
Dontane was watching his master carefully.
Grandier said, "I want you to stay out of this, Kade."
She took another deep breath, but did not look up at him.
"I know it won't be easy . . ."
All the fear and panic inside her crystallized into an icy knot of pure rage.
Without betraying her intentions by the flicker of an eyelash, she tapped the
fayre power in the ring and released the orbiting pistol ball. Grandier
staggered against Dontane, and the ball struck the far wall with a loud crack
and a shower of plaster and dust.
The sorcerer reached up and touched his right ear, smiling
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MARTHA WELLS
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
329
ruefully when his fingers came away lightly spotted with blood.
Dontane had drawn his second pistol. "She missed you by a hair's breadth," he
hissed.
"On the contrary, she hit exactly what she aimed at," Gran-dier answered
dryly, straightening up with an effort. "And I'll thank you not to casually
toss her any more shot."
Kade was waiting for him to look at her, and when he did, their eyes locked
for a long moment. Then Grandier said, "Very well put. I will not patronize
you again."
Dontane swore and said, "Are you going to let this mad creature get away with
that?"
"Your appraisal wounds me to the heart," Kade said softly, before Grandier
could answer. "Believe me, I shall fall down in agony at some more convenient
time."
"She knows my death will not affect the wards that keep her out, or the
presence of the Host, or any of the other plans I have set in motion." He was
speaking to Dontane, but his eyes went to Kade. "She has no choice but to
cooperate."
There was a keening howl from outside the galleiy, and a sudden eddy lifted a
scatter of ice crystals from the floor.
"The Host is coming," Grandier said. "Perhaps you had better go. They will
follow you."
"Will they?" Kade smiled. No choice, her thought echoed. But appearances are
everything.
They began to stream in through die doorways, the bogles, the grinning
mock-human fay, the distorted animals, the hideous inhuman shapes, flying,
crawling or running, bringing the stink of death. Dontane wheeled to face
them, involuntarily moving closer to Grandier.
Kade waited until the first were almost to the edge of the ring, then stepped
back into Knockma.
Thomas awoke leaning back against the wall, stiff and freezing. The candlelamp
on the floor had burned low, a pool of tallow collecting in its base. An iron
brazier had been placed in the center of the room and was putting out just
enough heat
to keep them from freezing to death. He was surprised that he was alive at
all. He had remembered that lapsing into sleep with a head injury was often
fatal.
"Are you all right?" Aviler asked, watching him closely.
His head hurt so badly he didn't think he could move it, but he said,
"Whatever gave you the idea I wasn't?"
Aviler was not fooled by this sally at all. The High Minister said, "Do you
know where you are? Forgive my persistence, but we've had this conversation
before."
"Oh." Thomas watched the flicker of light over the sculpted ceiling for a
moment. He remembered who was dead. "Yes, I know where I am. Unfortunately.
How long was I out?"
Aviler tried to shift his own position and grimaced in discomfort. "Several
hours. 1 believe it may be near morning, but it's difficult to say."
Near morning of the third day since the attack. Not much time for travellers
or refugees to carry word of the disaster. And if Ravenna was dead, what had
happened to the rest of the court? Thomas tried not to care, and was surprised
to find it impossible. There were Falaise and Gideon, Berham, Phais-tus, his
other men. If Denzil realized Falaise had betrayed what little she knew of his
plans to Thomas, even if she had done it too late to be of any help . . .
He saw that Aviler was trying to loosen the heavy iron spike that held his
chains to the wall with an air that spoke of several hours' familiarity with
the process. Thomas shifted over enough to reach the peg holding him and
started to work on it, for all that it felt absolutely immovable.
Another Bisran War. All the heroes of the last terrible years of war were
gone. All the famous names that had passed into folklegend and ballads were
the names of the dead. Aviler the Elder had succumbed to illness or possibly
poison; the Warrior-Bishop of Portier had been thrown from a horse; Thomas's
old captain was killed at duty; Desero, who had been Renter's predecessor as
Preceptor of the Albon Knights, retired and passed quietly away in the
country; and all the
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MARTHA WELLS
others were killed in later battles or by the weight of years. For the last
year or so there had only been Ravenna, Lucas, and himself, and they had come
into the legend only at its triumphant conclusion. Now there was only himself,
who had been the youngest of the lot, and who would not live to be executed by
Roland for some imagined offense, or to see his skill degenerate from time and
old wounds. It was the end of an age.
Then Thomas heard someone come into the anteroom, heard one of the troopers
reply to some question. He glanced at Aviler, who looked grim, and he
remembered that Denzil had wanted the High Minister to sign a falsified
document of abdication.
After a moment Dontane appeared in the doorway. He stood there, smiling down
at them coldly, and Thomas leaned back against the wall, relieved it wasn't
Grandier. He couldn't find it in himself to feel anything but contempt for
Dontane, for all that he was a sorcerer. After Grandier's example of how far
one man could go for revenge, Dontane seemed nothing but a persistent gadfly
of a schemer, not unlike the young nobles Denzil had used as cannon fodder in
his plans.
"The Duke of Alsene has much to discuss with you," Dontane said then, and
motioned to the soldiers outside. Two of diem entered the room, one standing
back with a drawn rapier and the other unlocking Thomas's manacles.
Thomas made no attempt to stand, letting the trooper jerk him to his feet.
That was the only way he would've been able to get there; his leg had
stiffened up again.
They led him out of the makeshift prison and down one flight of stairs into an
area heavily guarded by more of the Alsene troops. Men were crowded into the
disordered rooms, and every candle and lamp was lit to fight the darkness and
the presence of the fay. The fear was palpable.
Dontane asked suddenly, "What did Grandier say to you?"
Thomas remembered Dontane's persistence in demanding why Grandier should want
him alive when he had first been captured. He had suspected then that the
young sorcerer felt his position was insecure. Only a sane reaction,
considering
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331
how many people Grandier had disposed of to further his goals. Thomas said,
"He told us all his grand plans. Do you want to know if they included you?"
Dontane did not turn to look at him, and Thomas sensed he was struggling to
control a bitter anger, which was probably directed at Grandier almost as much
as it was at him. After a moment the young sorcerer replied, "If Denzil
doesn't rid me of you, I'll just have to think of something myself, won't I?"
Dontane led the way through a suite piled with supplies, to where servants
with the Alsene badge waited outside two large double doors.
Inside was a long low-ceilinged council room, decorated in blue and gold with
a long draw table across the back wall. Three men stood with their backs to
him, consulting a map spread out on the table. Dontane went to lean against
the wall, watching with folded arms, but the troopers stayed to either side
ofThomas. The men wore the heavy velvet brocades of nobles, and two were
blond. Alsene lords? he wondered. A couple of servants waited by the other
door, with a dark-haired boy-page. Then Thomas saw that the man in the center
of the group at the table had his left arm in a sling, and he forgot about
Dontane and the others.
Denzil turned to face him, and Thomas said, "Pity I missed."
"Pity for you," the Duke of Alsene said, smiling as he came toward him. "It
was a good shot; it shattered the bone, but our fine sorcerer Grandier healed
it." Thomas must have shown his disbelief because he added, "Yes, I thought it
impossible too, but it seems he's more skilled than most. Quite an advantage
to me."
Quite an advantage. If not for Grandier, Denzil would have died, or lost his
arm. One of the other nobles, watching from across the room, grinned and said,
"So this is the one who gave you so much trouble, my lord; you didn't tell us
. . ."
Denzil spun around and snarled, "Shut up!"
The silence became absolute. Thomas noted he was the only man in the room who
hadn't started at the sudden
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MARTHA WELLS
transformation from urbane calm to nearly blind rage. He had always known
Denzil was capable of that kind of anger, but that the young Duke had hidden
it from his followers came as no surprise.
Denzil turned back to him, again the cool amused young noble. Smiling, he
said, "Relatives are a necessary encumbrance."
"For now," Thomas agreed. He could see the family resemblance to Denzil in the
other two men's features, the cold blue of their eyes. The one who had spoken
looked resentful at being publicly chastened; the other was watching the scene
with amusement, as if it were a play put on for his enjoyment. If Denzil
succeeded, Thomas wouldn't have bet copper on the chances of either of them
living out the year. He said, "Did you get Roland?"
"No." The young Duke's eyes were very bright and he was flushed slightly from
excitement. Excitement at the power. He was watching Thomas carefully. He
said, "Ravenna's dead."
"I know," Thomas said, able to keep his expression neutral and wondering if
Grandier had told him first only to spoil his ally's fun.
Denzil was too good at this to betray even a flash of irritation. He only
shook his head in mild regret and said, "Grandier again, hmm? And I was so
looking forward to telling you myself."
At that moment Thomas knew for certain that Denzil had brought him up here to
kill him. He had suspected it as soon as he had walked in, but now it was all
there to be read in the younger man's face, the way he carried himself. He
said, "You hide your disappointment well."
"Do you think so?" Denzil drew the main gauche from the sash at his back and
touched the point thoughtfully. This wasn't the deadly toy with the serrated
edge and extra rods for breaking blades but an elegant weapon with a long
utilitarian blade and a gold-chased half-shell guard. Thomas watched Denzil's
opaque eyes and tried to keep his mind blank.
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
333
Denzil said, "I don't suppose you're surprised by this," and stabbed him in
the stomach.
For the first moment Thomas only felt the force of the blow. It doubled him
over, and as the blade pulled free and air reached his sliced flesh, the pain
began. A wave of icy cold rose around him, and his legs gave way. He didn't
notice that the troopers had let him go until his knees struck the floor. For
a moment he supported himself with one hand braced against the wooden planks,
the other pressed to his stomach. The blood felt hot against the chill of his
skin, and there was so astonishingly little of it at first. He was distantly
aware of noise in the room, voices raised, but then his arm gave way and that
was all.
Out of the warm darkness of fevered sleep, he heard voices.
Galen Dubell... No, Grandier said, "I don't have to justify my actions to
you."
"Don't you? You're putting me on a throne, and I'm going to help you get your
heart's desire, and you don't think you owe me a few words of explanation?"
Denzil said, his tone soft and reasonable.
"Correct."
There was silence. Thomas managed to open his eyes. He lay curled on his side
on a couch, and a large spot of the heavy damask upholstery was soaked with
blood. He knew this because his left hand lay in it. His doublet had been
unbuttoned and his shin pulled aside. It was cold, though not as frigid as the
room where he'd been imprisoned. His limbs felt too heavy to move, and there
was something about the absence of pain that was shocking.
Grandier's back was to him, and he could see Denzil across the room.
The young Duke's brows had lifted in gentle inquiry, but when Grandier
remained politely attentive, he said, "That man is my enemy."
"That isn't my concern."
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MARTHA WELLS
Denzil was ominously still for a moment, though Gran-dier's reply had been in
the same mild voice. He said, "Consider that you would do better not to
antagonize me."
"Perhaps. But I have already antagonized you, it seems, so I see no point in
not continuing on my chosen course."
"Very well. It means nothing then, but . . ." The Duke shrugged gracefully,
only a slight tremor revealing his rage. "Do be more careful in the future."
Thomas closed his eyes, feeling darkness sweep up over him in a moment of
dizziness, but he heard Denzil's steps cross the room and a door close.
He opened his eyes again and saw Grandier shake his head and turn around. The
sorcerer smiled when he saw him awake and said, "Really, the man is driven mad
by anyone who fails to succumb to his particular charm. But then, you are
aware of this."
"Intimately." The sarcasm was automatic, and Thomas's voice slow and rusty. He
winced at the sound of it.
Grandier turned away, and Thomas managed to lift himself a little on one
elbow. Pain seized him for one sporadic moment, doubled him up, and let him
go, leaving him breathless. His fingers found the small web of tight white
scar tissue about five inches below his heart. That was all that was left of
the puncture wound where the blade had entered, but his body remembered its
presence all too well.
When he looked up, Grandier was watching him with a puzzled frown. "You are
fortunate," the old sorcerer said. "He could have injured you in a way less
easily remedied."
Thomas took a deep breath, but the pain didn't return. The stab wound in his
arm had stopped its insistent ache as well. He said, "You don't think he knew
that'"
Grandier shook his head. "He was angry because I did not allow you to die."
"He was angry because you were so calm about it. Before he did it he was very
careful to tell me how you healed his arm after I shot him."
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
335
The old man hesitated a moment, eyes thoughtful, then said, "A valuable
insight."
He sent Dontane to contact Denzil for him, Thomas thought. That had
undoubtedly gone well for Denzil. Might as well send sheep to bargain with
wolves. Grandier had crossed the room to a round table that held a number of
jars and bottles, probably apothecary powders. He was tightening the stoppers
and putting them back into a leather case. Thomas wanted to ask why the
sorcerer wanted him alive, but he suspected he would find that out anyway in a
moment or two. He wished the damned Bisran priest who had heard Gran-dier's
confession in prison had asked for more specifics about the shape-changing
magic. How a potential victim could escape it, for example- But there was one
thing he wanted to know regardless of what happened to him next, and he asked,
"How did Ravenna die?"
Grandier paused, without turning, and said, "Evadne and a band of fay had
trapped her in the tower at Bel Garde, and attempted to exchange her for
Roland. She fired a powder magazine Denzil had hidden there, killing Evadne
and the others. A few fay who had clung to the outside of the tower survived;
I had the story from them."
Firing a powder magazine. God, woman, did you think about what you were doing
to yourself? No, probably not, even if she could have considered it as
anything other than a means to an end. She would have given her own life the
same weight as anyone else's, done her best, and then proceeded on her course
with style. Oh, but the bastards must have been surprised.
When he looked back, the sorcerer was watching him thoughtfully. After a
moment Grandier said, "You wondered why I felt the need to show you the Dark
Host."
"Yes."
"It was not intended as a threat. It was a test."
A test ffailed, Thomas thought suddenly.
"There was no light in that cellar," Grandier continued.
336
MARTHA WELLS
"Or no light visible to mortal eyes. The men with us heard strange cries and
laughter, and caught brief glimpses of foul things darting out of a wall of
darkness. I could see the Host, as could Dontane, because we have been touched
by their power. How was it that you saw them?"
Coming out of a wall of darkness, like the attack in die Old Hall. Wary,
Thomas answered, "If you knew enough to perform the test, then you must
already have a theory."
"She took you to Knockma, didn't she?"
Thomas watched him, saying nothing. Kade's Fayre kingdom had been like an
island of calm reality in the midst of a nightmare. It had been easy to forget
that the pact he'd made with her there would have an effect in die violent
whirlwind of the present.
Grandier said, "The change is noticeable, to those who know what to look for.
Perhaps even to those who don't. But she did more than take you there, I
think. She has opened die Otherworld to you."
"And what does that mean to you?"
"I could use your help."
"With what?"
"With the Duke of Alsene, for one example. As you have pointed out, my
understanding of the way his mind works is woefully incomplete." Grandier
closed the leather case and leaned back against the table. "Ravenna is gone,
aad Roland is alone. Even if you could free yourself and reach him, he
wouldn't listen to you, not about Denzil's involvement. Those who might have
organized resistance to the Duke's bid for power are either dead, scattered,
or will not learn of it in time. I agree with you. Denzil is dangerous,
unamenable to my influence, and too clever to control. It will be a battle to
make him carry out my wishes, at least until I no longer need him. You could
help me win that battle."
Thomas's first impulse was to play for time. He knew what a flat refusal to
cooperate might get him, and he wasn't willing to give up yet. He asked, "What
about Kade?"
"She can no longer enter die palace, as I have turned the
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
337
wards against her, but I spoke to her some time ago through the ring in die
Grand Gallery. She is somewhat angry with me."
"You've tried to kill her at least twice."
"And was unsuccessful. You helped her in the Old Hall, and she handled my
golem herself without much trouble." The sorcerer smiled a little, almost in
pride, as if he'd been the one to teach her and not Dubell.
And Thomas thought, / wonder if sometimes he thinks he is Galen DubeU . . .
But the smile faded and Grandier said slowly, "He would never talk about her.
How much he had taught her, what fay powers she had, where she was likely to
be ... He kept all her secrets, even at die end, when he became confused and
told me what I needed to know about the palace wards."
Thomas thought of Galen Dubell, who had been so trusting despite his
occasionally acerbic wit. He had known him only through the faulty mirror of
Grandier's imposture, but that imposture had fooled Kade who had known die old
man better than anyone, so much of it must have been accurate. He said, "Is
that how you do it' Get someone's confidence, earn their trust, learn dieir
secrets, and gradually draw every scrap of information out of them until
diere's nothing useful left?"
"Yes, in a way. It is a domination of the personality."
"You sound like Denzil."
"Perhaps I do."
"Don't pretend to delude yourself," Thomas said, too angry to stop the words,
to play die game safely. "You're not like Denzil; you're not blinded by
self-absorption or maddened by what die Bisran priests did to you, however
much you'd like us to think so. You've calmly made die decision to take your
revenge this way, and you're aware of exactly how much pain you're causing."
"Perhaps that is a sin of which we are all guilty. We sane men who participate
in insanity for reasons of our own." Grandier was silent for a moment, then he
said, "But you are wrong about my intentions. I do not mean to take you as I
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MARTHA WELLS
took Dubell. Your cooperation is more valuable to me than your body, for the
moment. I don't suppose you will care to give me an answer yet. But I suggest
you come to a decision soon."
Different troopers brought Thomas back to the makeshift cell and replaced his
manacles. Aviler was still there, still relatively unhurt, except for the
lines of strain and fatigue on his face, briefly visible in the light of the
guard's lamp.
When they had gone, the High Minister asked, "What happened?"
Thomas leaned back against the wall. On the walk back, he'd discovered that
the only wound that hadn't yielded to the Bisran sorcerer's unwanted healing
had been the hole the elf-shot had left in his leg. He said, "I was offered a
place in Grandier's glorious revolution."
Aviler considered that, then asked softly, "And where did all the blood come
from?"
"Denzil stabbed me, and Grandier took care of the damage. Denzil intends to
repeat the performance later. I could see him thinking it." Thomas looked
away, glad of the darkness in the cold little room. He hadn't meant to say
quite that much.
Aviler was silent a long moment. Thomas wondered if he was thinking about the
document he was supposed to sign. Then the High Minister said, "An interesting
demonstration of the consequences of refusal. What answer did you give
Grandier?"
"I didn't give him any answer. It's called stalling for time."
"I see."
Kade sat down hard on Knockma's thick grass. She hoped the entire Host had
flung itself into the ring after her, but she knew better than that. She had
connected one cardinal point of the ring to the other, and any of the fay who
followed her into it would find themselves caught in the ring's maelstrom,
flung around and around until the connection broke, which it
THE ELEMENT Of FIRE
339
would do fairly soon. Rings were difficult to tamper with at best, and always
sought to return to their original state.
Boliver was still waiting for her. He had settled on the grass outside the
circle of menhirs and was smoking a white clay pipe. "No more than an hour,"
he said, answering her unspoken question. "Did you discover anything useful?"
Kade stood and stepped out of the ring so she could think without it singing
in her ears and answered, "Yes, but I made a mistake. I should not have gone."
She sat beside him and put her head in her hands. After a moment she said,
"Grandier was waiting for me. He knows that I ... He told me Thomas is alive,
and that I am to stay out of the way." She felt her mouth twist into a sneer.
"He knows it will be difficult for me."
"Yes, you made a grand cock-up," Boliver agreed.
"Your confidence in me is overwhelming."
Boliver sighed. "Is your Thomas that important to you, then? Has he said
anything of the kind to you?"
She looked up and saw he was watching her gravely. She stilled the quick flare
of anger and said, "Yes, he is important to me. And if he is dead I'll never
know what he thinks about me." And / wouldn't care tfhe hated me as long
aslknewhe was alive somewhere . . .
"Then stop rushing about like a daft-headed chicken and do something," Boliver
said suddenly, scattering her thoughts.
"I am not rushing about like a daft-headed anything," she said through gritted
teeth.
"Oh, you're not weeping or fainting, but you're running about in circles,
letting this damned human wizard point you any way he wants you."
"I am not . . ."
"By Puck's pointed ears, woman, you're the Queen of Air and Darkness. Act like
it."
Kade was on her feet and Boliver was scrambling for cover when it occurred to
her that Thomas had said much the same thing to her, on the cool rainy night
on the loggia, when they had listened to Denzil twist Roland's friendship into
slavery.
She supposed she should feel like dying. What she felt was
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MARTHA WELLS
a cold numbness centering around her heart, as if she were already dead. Kade
turned away and started to cross the field toward the castle. Reaching the
edge of the garden, she climbed the steps and entered her turret workroom, and
stood for a moment in the quiet with the sweet smell of herbs and flowers.
Then she saw that the bowl on the table was glowing softly. It was the spell
she had tried to make to reveal the location of the keystone. She had
forgotten it.
Holding her breath, Kade went to the table. The water at the bottom of the
bowl had formed an image: a hazy translucent image of a room. And she
recognized the room.
"Gods above and below take that canny old bastard," she whispered, almost
reverently. "It was there all the time."
Then she had an idea.
THE SUN WAS shining here, too.
Kade and Boliver stood in an open court, bordered on all sides by a low wall
and a sheer drop to the sea. The wide blue vault of the sky stretched over
them, and the stiff breeze had the tang of salt and dead fish. Kade went to
the edge of the ring, which resisted her for a moment before she stepped free
of it. The power swelling it had almost the same force as the Knockma Ring,
but it was far more turbulent. But then, this ring saw a great deal more use.
She went to the wall and looked down. They were atop a pillar of rock that
stood a hundred yards or so above the sea that tore at its base. Leaning out,
she could see the stairs that climbed it, leading up from a bare stone dock,
and the stern of a fantastically painted ship that was moored there.
On the opposite side of the court, two identical fay with golden skin,
red-pupiled eyes, and long amber hair guarded an archway twined with carved
oak leaves that led to a narrow delicate bridge. It led from their pillar over
the channel of gray-green churning water to the cliff tops of a rocky section
of coast. A massive structure grew out of the end of the bridge, with heavy
octagonal towers the warm brown of sandstone from the faraway deserts of
Parsria. Squinting at it in the afternoon sunlight, Kade saw that light
glittered off it at regular points, as if it were adorned with a pattern of
jewels, or small round windows. She looked back at Boliver, who was watching
the bridge guards warily and cleaning out his pipe onto the immaculate
flagstones, and said, "This is the place."
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MARTHA WELLS
She went up to the guards, who were dressed in cloth of gold and glittering
gems and armed with slender swords of silver. They were both watching Kade and
Boliver with disinterested amusement, and one said, "Your name and your
errand, fair lady, before you pass."
The term "fair lady" had no/ doubt been applied facetiously. She answered,
"I'm Kade Carrion, the Queen of Air and Darkness, and I'm here to see Oberon."
The two exchanged an opaque glance that might have concealed more amusement,
or surprise, and the other said, "Then pass gladly, lady."
She walked down the bridge, Boliver padding behind her. Ahead they could see
two large wooden doors surrounded by stonework carved into waves and bubbling
seafoam. Closer, and the sun brought out the faint tint of rose in the brown
stone; closer still, and she saw that the small round windows that studded the
tower were not windows but eyes, with dark iris and blue pupil, and that some
were watching them, others staring off to sea.
Boliver stage-whispered, "We're being watched!"
Kade ignored him.
Another fay guard, identical to the two at the bridge except for the graceful
amber-glazed wings growing out of his back, pulled open one of the heavy doors
for them.
Inside was a high stone gallery, floored with white tile, airy and cool. They
went down it and into the perfect silence of the place. Corridors branched off
at intervals, but they might have been the only living creatures inside.
Thinking over what she had to do—what she was forced to do—Kade was conscious
of a curious numbness that might be shock but mat she was beginning to
recognize as the feeling of anger taken to such a level it was no longer
possible to separate it from any other emotion or thought. In a way, it was a
liberating sensation. The attitude of the fay guards, or what she suspected
was their attitude, would have bothered her very much under any other
circumstances; now it seemed
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
343
the most minor of considerations. Anger this intense defined everything into
the goal, and the obstacles that must be overcome to reach the goal, and it
would make it very easy to make the decisions to dispose of those obstacles.
It was probably quite close to how Urbain Grandier felt when the Bisran
Inquisition had finished with him.
As they neared the end of the hall, they could hear a thread of harp music,
and voices and laughter.
"We're going to be roasted," Boliver said, with gloomy relish. "And eaten."
"Stop snivelling," Kade muttered. Boliver had driven her out of her despair
with arguments that she should do something constructive; now that she had
embarked on a plan, he was arguing against it. Typical fay perversity. "
The hall made an abrupt turn, and stairs spilled down into a large roofless
court that must be at or near the center of the fortress. More of the
amber-skinned guards lined the porticoes, lazy but watchful, armed with
gold-bladed pikes.
Most of the Seelie Court was gathered here.
Lake maidens dripped water and glamour from their gowns like pearls. Beautiful
ladies wore clothes of flowers, gossamer spangled with dew, silvery gauze, or
were covered only by their long hair. There were men of the same ethereal
beauty as the guards, in velvets, fine lace, and gold-shot brocade. Here and
there a wing as delicate as a butterfly's and more beautifully hued rose above
the crowd. The bright sunlight in the open court made so much glamour the air
glowed, and a troupe of gaily dressed fay tumblers performed feats impossible
for humans. Most of those here were shape-changers.
Kade went down the steps and through the crowd.
They parted for her. There was no stink of unwashed flesh under the perfumes,
as there would be in any human gathering. Her faded and dirty smock, her
dragging petticoat lace, her page boy's boots, were violently out of place
here, and she caught many sidelong glances. She could have used glamour
344
MARTHA WELLS
to make herself more pleasing to the eye; several here had done so. But she
didn't need to be told that that would have been a mistake.
Titania lay on a leopard-skin couch under a canopy of ostrich feathers, cool
shade under the bright light. A small woman, smaller than Kade, the fayre
queen wore a mantua heavily laden with pearls and silver embroidery, and her
hair was the color of gold, true gold, and her features were much more
beautiful than even Queen Falaise's. But Falaise's face had been touched by
fear, worry, and care, and Titania's was as perfect as a carved goddess's;
Kade suddenly preferred Falaise, for all that lady's wavering will.
Two fey pages with the appearance of fair young boys waited on the fayre
queen, one holding a wine carafe, the other her fan. They watched Kade with
matched expressions of sly mockery. But seated at her feet was a human boy
with skin the color of chocolate and dark curly hair, whose gaze remained
locked on the tumblers.
Kade did not curtsey to Titania. She was a queen here in her own right.
Titania's shrewd sapphire eyes considered her. She held a silver wine goblet
beaded with moisture, and ran a thoughtful finger over the rim. "Oberon is not
here, my sister." Her voice was like harp strings stirred by the wind.
"But you are." A few days ago Kade would have replied lam not your sister, but
she couldn't afford to be driven now,
Titania laughed. "And what have you come for?"
"A favor." Kade looked down at the human boy, and when his brown eyes met hers
curiously, she asked him, "Do you want to go home?"
There was an almost soundless gasp from the assembled fey, the music ceasing
and the tumblers staggering to a halt.
The boy smiled and shook his head. "No, lady," he said into the silence. His
voice was a little husky, but still a child's.
Kade looked back at Titania, who smiled. "I love him," the queen of fayre
said.
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
345
"The sad thing is," Kade found herself replying, "you probably do."
Titania shook her golden head in irritation and set the goblet down on a low
jade table. "You always ruin our pastimes, Kade."
"Good." She paced a few idle steps away from the bower, to avoid showing her
rabid impatience, to keep Titania from knowing how every passing moment
grated, and saw the smaller sprites at die edge of the crowd back hastily
away. She was hardly surprised; she probably looked like she should be
standing over a battlefield piled with corpses with a raven on one shoulder.
She had been right not to try to put on a pleasing appearance with glamour;
that would have been catering to their whims. She looked like herself, fey and
eldritch even in this company.
Watching her with perfect brows lifted archly, Titania said, "I only tolerate
your interference because of my affection for your mother."
Words, no sentiment. Copied from some human. Kade smiled at her feet. She
couldn't think why she had ever feared Moire, or Titania, when she had spent
much of her early life sparring with Ravenna, who could have effortlessly
handled both fay queens were she blind, deaf, and lame. Kade said, "I am the
Queen of Air and Darkness."
Titania accepted a fen from her page and drew the delicate ivory construction
through her fingers. "You do not know what that means."
"Someday I'll find out." Kade looked up and smiled. "And here you will be."
"And what must I do about that?"
"Make me happy."
Titania laughed again, this time in genuine amusement. Or at least genuine for
her. She waved the two fay pages away, but let the human boy remain. "What do
you want?"
Kade sensed the crowd behind her begin to relax. The clear note of a harp
sounded, and the jugglers began to per-
346
MARTHA WELLS
form again. The boy's eyes strayed in their direction. Boliver was around
somewhere; she could smell his pipe. "The first, the power to shape-change."
"Ah." Titania must know every movement of the Unseelie Court, and she did not
ask why. "Best tell me what else you want, for I cannot give you that."
"You mean, you won't give me that."
"Words. I am not a fool; I can't hand you that much power."
Kade knew it would come to this. "What if I were to offer you a power in
return?"
Titania frowned, consideringly. "You are very desperate."
"Yes. And I am very dangerous, when I am very desperate." That was as close to
a threat as she wanted to come. Threats she did not have time to make good on.
Kade was at a severe disadvantage and knew it. All she had was bluff and
Titania's greed.
"What would you offer?"
Kade felt as if she were about to step off a precipice. After this, there was
no going back. She took a deep breath, and jumped. "Knockma." Somewhere in the
crowd, she heard a thump: Boliver hitting the floor. He had known what she
meant to do, but his sense of the dramatic had gotten the better of him.
Titania stared, honestly shocked. Kade looked at her, waiting, forcing herself
to smile lightly. Then Titania shook her head, her expression of consternation
making her look more human, and, Kade thought, more beautiful. "I cannot do
it, not even for so great a prize. I cannot give you that much power."
Kade sighed. I know. If I were you I wouldn't do it either. But I was hoping
you'd be too blinded by greed to care. So forget the first plan and try the
second. With Knockma dangling before her like a diamond in the sun, Titania
would break down eventually. "We can bargain."
Titania tapped her fan on the fur couch, watching her. "Bargain. Very well.
But why are you doing this?"
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
347
Kade smiled and met Titania's eyes. "For love." The queen of fayre looked
frankly disbelieving, but the human boy grinned up at Kade.
Kade met an anxious Boliver at the portico above the court. "How went it?" he
asked, nervously hopping from foot to foot.
"Not as good as I hoped; not as bad as I feared." Out of her pocket, she drew
one of the concessions she'd wrested from the fayre queen. It looked like a
well-crafted glass ball, only a few bubbles marring its perfection. Boliver
peered at it closely, and she turned it in the light to show the lines of fire
glowing ghostlike within. "It will turn a shape-changed being back to its
original form." She pocketed the powerful little construction carefully, and
they started up the hall toward the entrance.
"Is that all? What will you if it doesn't do its work?"
"What will I? I'll die, that's what will I. Gods below, Boliver, don't ask me
these questions at a time like this." Kade had hoped to get the power to
shape-change at will from Titania, hoped to get it without having to kill
people right and left as Grandier did, but the fayre queen had refused her and
she would just have to do it the hard way. It's the onfy way to get anything
done lately.
"I'm sorry, lass. But one transformation is not much. And you will need that
to get in. You'll be going against all the Host."
"Yes." She hated to lose Knockma, but it was a tie to the past, to her mother,
and to the Seelie Court and all their wrangling. And if the Host did cross
into Knockma, she would never be able to defend it and find Thomas at the same
time. Titania would defend it now, with every resource at her disposal, and
the Unseelie Court would never have it.
It was also the only home she had ever had. Besides the palace, and that had
been taken away. But Knockma had not been taken away, she had given it up, and
the difference was important.
348
MARTHA WELLS
And if it would help her destroy Grandier and Denzil, then it was well given.
Kade put a hand in her pocket to touch the glass ball. No, losing Knockma she
could live through. It was the next part she had doubts about.
Thomas had worked steadily at loosening the spike in the wall and was rewarded
by feeling it begin to shift a trifle. If it wasn't his imagination; his hands
were numb with cold. "Any luck?" he asked Aviler.
"No." The High Minister left off his own efforts and leaned back against the
wall. "I think you should accept Grandier's offer."
Thomas kept working on the spike, without answering. He supposed he should be
flattered that Aviler had not automatically assumed that he would leap at any
way out.
If he did . . . Grandier would not let him interfere with his plans to start a
war. And once that war was started, Thomas would have no choice but to do his
best to help win it. The old sorcerer was well aware that Thomas would not be
a willing participant, and Grandier had a talent for influencing people,
working his way into their thoughts, bringing them unwillingly over to his
side. It was how he wrested the needed information out of his victims before
he killed them and took their shapes. There was the possibility that after a
year or two of helping Grandier, Thomas would find that he no longer wanted to
oppose him.
And then there was Denzil.
Movement out in the anteroom jolted Thomas out of his thoughts. Aviler looked
up, puzzled, and they both listened. It sounded as if the troopers who were
guarding them were gathering their weapons and leaving. After a long moment of
silence, there was a faint shuffling sound from outside the door, and a low
deep snarl.
Dontane had said he would have to think of something else. Aviler swore
softly, looking around hopelessly for some-
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
349
thing to use as a weapon. Thomas gathered himself to move, watching the
lighted doorway.
The fay appeared in the entrance, the torchlight gleaming from its jaundiced
yellow skin. It was perhaps five feet tall, human shaped but with clawed hands
and long powerful arms dangling almost to its knees. Its mouth had a wide evil
grin revealing far too many sharply pointed teeth, its face distorted by round
red eyes and a nose that was an ugly ragged hole.
It sprang at Thomas too quick for thought. He threw himself sideways as far as
the chains would allow, flinging up an arm to shield his face. He felt the
hard grip on his wrist, the claws tear through the leather of his sleeve, and
a pressure that was about to tear his arm from the socket. Then its hand came
in contact with the iron manacle around his wrist and it shrieked and leapt
away.
He rolled over and looked back. The fay staggered, keening in rage, its hand
dripping burned flesh and the stink of it filling the room. Thomas's shoulder
felt dislocated but as he tried to push himself up off the floor he realized
the chains had far more slack now. The spike holding them to die wall had been
pulled half out by the force of the fay's grip.
It turned on Aviler, snarling, and the High Minister scrambled back against
the wall, using a loop of his chains to swing at it. Thomas stretched and
hooked the brazier with his boot-heel, bringing it closer with a frantic kick
and grabbing the handle. He flung the brazier at the fay's back just as it
leapt again at Aviler.
The iron struck the fay and it staggered.
Thomas got to his feet and leaned his whole weight on the chain in one solid
jerk, and with a spray of wood chips and plaster, the spike came out of the
wall.
He grabbed it just as the fay reached him again. Its claws sank into his
shoulder and it hauled him up and almost off his feet before it felt the tip
of the iron spike in its chest and tried to shove him away. Its other hand
found his throat, and with
350
MARTHA WELLS
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
351
instinct greater than sense, he grabbed its arm and fell against it, driving
the iron spike through its thick skin. It fell backward, dragging him down,
and from the blood on his hands he knew he must have given it a killing blow,
but it still had the strength to snap his neck.
Then Thomas fell against the wooden floor. The fay had vanished. He tried to
sit up, looking around, braced for it to appear somewhere else. Then he
noticed the heavy gray dust that covered the floor, the spike, his hands, and
that even the creature's blood had disappeared. It had vanished, but in death,
dissolving into dust.
His buff coat had protected his shoulder, but his neck was covered with
shallow scratches from its claws; he was lucky it hadn't managed to tear his
throat out. A viler started to speak and Thomas shook his head hastily.
Dontane would not have sent all the guards away, only those not bribed to
silence-After another moment Thomas managed to stand. He gathered the chains
up and quietly moved along the wall to the door and stood beside it, waiting
tensely. Without having to be told, Aviler slumped against the wall, trying to
look like a corpse. In the dim light, and for a few moments only, it would
fool someone; Thomas would not have long to move. Moments crept by, and Thomas
thought, You can't sit out there forever; you have to see what happened. Come
on, damn you. There had to be at least one man out there, to make sure that
the fay had done its work. The difficulty was that the one last guard didn't
have to sit out there forever, only until Dontane came back with
reinforcements.
Then he heard a low scuffling in the anteroom, someone cautiously approaching
the door. Thomas flattened back against the wall and stopped breathing. The
swordpoint came first, and there was a hesitation; the trooper had seen the
spilled and battered brazier, and Aviler's apparently lifeless form. He
stepped inside, and Thomas slipped the loop of chain around his neck.
The trooper made the mistake of dropping his sword to grab onto the chain. He
staggered forward, trying to slam
Thomas against the wall. He held on grimly, feeling the strain in his
shoulder. The man fell to his knees abruptly, dragging Thomas with him, then
he felt something give way tinder the chain and the trooper collapsed. He held
on long enough to make sure the man was dead, then glanced back to check the
anteroom. It was empty and the fire was guttering in the hearth.
He searched the trooper's corpse thoroughly and savagely, keeping one eye on
the door. Besides the rapier, the trooper had a main gauche with a half-shell
guard and a small dagger. He'd be armed again at least. After more searching
he angrily shoved the body away. "It would be the one without the goddamn
keys."
"What now?" Aviler asked.
Thomas took the trooper's narrow-bladed dagger and began working at the lock
of his manacle. It's been a long time since I've done this, he thought. After
a long tense wait, the manacle gave and he shook it off and started on the
other.
The chains holding Aviler were of slightly different make and took longer to
open. After Thomas had worked over the first one for some time unsuccessfully,
the High Minister said grimly, "It's not working. Get out of here before they
come back."
"I," Thomas said through gritted teeth, "do not have time for theatrics."
Aviler stiffened, but didn't voice any more objections.
The manacles came free finally, and Aviler got to his feet in relief.
Thomas slipped the plain leather baldric of the trooper's rapier over his head
and handed the High Minister the main gauche. They passed through the anteroom
quickly, hesitating only to make sure the troopers had left behind no other
weapons.
As Thomas stepped out the doorway onto the landing, he knew he had made a
mistake. He heard Aviler gasp an incoherent warning and dove forward, rolling.
This didn't help any of his various bruises and when he came to his feet, he
stag-
352
MARTHA WELLS
gercd. But Aviler was struggling with the trooper who had waited for them
beside the door, and as Thomas reached them, the High Minister managed to
plunge the main gauche up into the other man's rib cage. The soldier collapsed
with a choked-off gasp and Thomas and Aviler rolled the body back into the
anteroom. Breathing hard, the High Minister explained, "He moved just as you
went out and I saw him. Was he there all along?"
"No, he could have easily taken me when I was strangling the other one.
Probably came looking for him when he didn't come back for the others." Thomas
cast a look back to check the landing, which stretched quietly into darkness
in either direction, doorways leading off of it and the staircase opening
directly in front of them.
Aviler stripped off the soldier's baldric and tossed the extra main gauche to
Thomas. The High Minister slung the baldric over his shoulder and picked up
the trooper's fallen rapier. Something that jingled as it hit the floor fell
from the trooper's baldric and Aviler nudged it with a boot. "This was the one
with the keys," he said with an ironic lift of an eyebrow.
Thomas snorted. "My luck."
They stepped out onto the landing. Hesitating a moment to get his bearings,
Thomas saw the bob of lamplight on the stair below. "This way," he said, and
led Aviler down to another doorway. It opened onto a progression of rooms
that, if Thomas was where he thought he was, would eventually give onto
another staircase. The rooms were as dark as the pit, but they had been meant
to be viewed as a set, so the doors were all in the same position on the
left-hand side of the hearths and were unblocked by furniture, making it
relatively easy to cross them even in almost pitch darkness. They had made it
through the third room when they heard a shout of alarm and running footsteps
from the landing.
They stopped to listen, but no one came in their direction. Aviler whispered,
"I don't suppose they're going to think that thing ate both of us, killed the
two guards, and then wandered off."
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
353
"They could try to tell Denzil that, but I don't think it would be very well
received."
They came to the last room, and through its open door, Thomas could see the
landing of the other stairwell, lit wanly by one candle in the silver and
rock-crystal chandelier hanging above it. Across the threshold was the body of
a young woman, the gray and brown of her skirts marking her as a servant.
Thomas stepped over her without bothering to pause. He was growing used to
seeing dead women and had stopped looking for familiar faces; since it was
likely he would be killed at any moment himself, it hardly seemed to matter.
After a moment he heard Aviler follow him.
Just as they came out onto the landing, the muffled explosion of a pistol shot
destroyed the sUence. They both instinctively dove for the stairs. They
reached the landing below and cut through another dark suite back the way they
had come. The first room was unlit and crowded with dark shapes of furniture.
Soldiers were pounding down the stair behind them and Thomas could not find
the doorway. He stumbled on a low table, then turned and put his back against
the wall. The men coming after them would have oil lamps, and the light would
be momentarily blinding. Then there was a muffled thump and Aviler gasped in
pain, then said harshly, "Over here, a door."
Thomas made his way toward the High Minister's voice and found the edge of a
narrow door. Aviler whispered, "It's a servants' stair." He climbed down a few
steps, and Thomas stepped inside, closing the door after them.
In the unfamiliar room, it was doubtful the Duke's men would find the stair,
which had a door meant to blend into the panelling, but Thomas didn't breathe
easily until he heard them clatter through the room, cursing and knocking
things over, then retreat. After some moments of silence he said lightly, "I
won't comment on your clumsiness since it saved our lives."
"Someone else wasn't so lucky," Aviler replied out of the dark. "There's a
body down here."
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MARTHA WELLS
Yes, there would be fay roaming here. This is not going to get any easier,
Thomas thought, straightening up and feeling for the wall to guide him down.
"He didn't come down here without a lamp," Aviler was muttering. Before Thomas
could point out that he might very well have, the High Minister said, "Yes,
here it is."
After more fumbling, Aviler found the man's tinderbox and managed to light the
lamp. "Good God," the High Minister said softly, standing up and looking down
in disgust at the corpse the wan light revealed. "What could have done that to
his head?. . . No, don't speculate; I'd rather be surprised."
They heard footsteps in the rooms overhead and voices from below and moved a
few steps down the narrow stairs, but the door with its heavy covering of
carved panelling and flocked paper cut much of the noise from outside.
Aviler looked around, lifting the lamp high. The original stone of die wall
was to one side, radiating cold like a block of ice, and the wooden bones of
the lath and plaster facing to the other. The air was stuffy and thick with
dust. This was technically a servants' passage, though it had probably been
installed more with an eye to moving about quickly and unobtrusively in the
event of a palace coup. The years before the reign of Ravenna's father had not
been calm or untroubled.
"We're on the west side of the Old Palace," Aviler said quietly. "We could get
out through the siege wall into the Old Courts . . ."
Thomas sheathed the rapier and drew the shorter main gauche, which would be
more effective in these close surroundings. "If we can get there. The King's
Bastion is probably still sealed off from the other side. Most of the troops
are quartered right below us." He took a soft step down the narrow stairs,
careful of the creaking boards that would betray their presence.
The bogle dropped from above. It landed on Aviler, knocking him forward. He
dropped the candlelamp and the flame guttered wildly, threatening to leave
them in darkness. Aviler had stumbled into Thomas, who caught himself against
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
355
the wall, turning to get a grip on the thing's greasy skin below its neck and
drag it off the other man. It turned on him more swiftly than a cat, claws
flailing, and he stabbed it with the main gauche. It dropped and he saw dial
Aviler had gotten it from behind also, with their late guard's dagger. It
struggled wildly on the steps for a moment, its claws scrabbling on the wood,
a random swipe of one long arm sending Thomas staggering back into die wall.
Then it froze into immobility.
They stared at one another for a moment, breathing hard, then the High
Minister wiped the blood from the scratches on his forehead where the bogle
had caught him. He said softly, "That was rather a noisy episode. Do you think
anyone heard?"
After a moment Thomas shook his head. "No, they'd be hacking through the wall
by now." He leaned back against the stone, considering their options. They
would have to make for one of the rooms along the outside wall. And they could
go no lower than this floor: the levels below had no windows. And what was
Kade doing now? That she was planning something he had no doubts. Fortunately
Grandier would have as little chance to guess what it was as he had. Kade made
her strategy on the run, which was poor planning in a chess game but in real
life tended to make opponents waste time bumbling around wondering what in
hell she was thinking. The only problem was her inclination to the dramatic.
Would Grandier consider that?
He looked up to find Aviler watching him narrowly. At his look of inquiry the
High Minister said, "You haven't yet pointed out that I was wrong about Denzil
and you were right."
"I thought the consequences so obvious that calling further attention to it
was unnecessary."
Aviler snorted and shook his head. "Even though you have saved my life, I
can't seem to bring myself to like you."
"That's probably just as well." Thomas was thinking of ways to rooms with
outside windows, and that the nearest could only be reached by using diis wall
passage to travel
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MARTHA WELLS
directly through the part of the palace Denzil had made his stronghold. And
why not? They won't be searching for us there. And there's less chance of
running into more fay. There was also another possibility in that direction to
be explored. "Did you know about the spyhole near the third-floor council
chambers?"
Aviler's eyes widened. "No, I did not."
"Denzil doesn't either. When Dontane took me to those chambers, they had their
maps laid out, so it must be where they plan their troop movements at the very
least."
He could tell the notion appealed to Aviler. "You think it would be worth it,
for what we might hear?"
"Perhaps not, but it is on our way."
There were voices coming from the direction of the faint glow of light
"Why you?"
It's my plan, Thomas started to say. Instead, he put a properly sardonic note
in his voice and said, "Another noble impulse? You're die only one who has a
chance of convincing Roland of any of this; don't you consider that a little
more important than your pride?"
They were crouching in the narrow darkened wall passage, beside a gap in the
baseboard just large enough for an agile spy. But someone had been through
this servants' passage at some point strewing the floor with iron filings, so
they couldn't afford to waste time here. The hole in the baseboard had an
extra helping of iron sprinkled around it, but there was no sign that its real
purpose had been interpreted.
Aviler glared, and gestured reluctantly. "All right, damn you." As Thomas bent
to scramble under the lintel, the High Minister added, "Eventually that little
tactic is going to fail, then what will you do?"
Thomas grinned to himself. "Hit you over the head."
From inside the cramped spyhole, he could see the gap carefully cut into the
planks below the wall, leading into a narrow crawl space below the first
council room. They were
THt ELEMENT OF FIRE
357
there, right enough. He recognized Dontane's voice, but it was impossible to
distinguish individual words. He'd have to try to get over to the next room.
The crawl space was perhaps two feet high, the bottom made of planks supported
by the thick wooden rafters of the room below, lit by soft candlelight finding
its way through the cracks in the floorboards above. On the far side, where
the wall of the second council room had been erected, another hole had been
torn in the baseboards, allowing access to the crawl space below the next
room. That was where the voices were coming from. Well, it would be, Thomas
thought. He sat back, pulling off and laying aside the baldric and rapier,
which would be far more trouble than it was worth in the narrow space. He
hesitated over the main gauche, which would be equally unhandy at his back
where it could catch on things or in the front of his sash poking him
determinedly in the stomach. He settled for wedging it down into his boot,
though he knew if he encountered anything more hostile than a rat, he was a
dead man.
He worked his way slowly across the crawl space, trying to keep from choking
on the dust, gasping in pain when his bruised ribs encountered the sharp
comers of a rafter.
About halfway across, something sharp bit through the leather of his glove and
he jerked his hand back. It was only a nail loose on the planks, then he took
a closer look and saw the boards of the crawl space were sprinkled with them
also. They must have fallen down through the cracks from above. Denzil did not
trust his fay allies at all.
He edged closer to the gap. The voices were distinctly louder here. And
louder. Damn them, he thought; they're coming in here. There was no time to
move as a door squeaked open nearly overhead. He froze as heavy footsteps
sounded on the floorboards of the room above and Denzil's voice said, "God,
you're such a fool."
"I didn't have to tell you," Dontane replied, his tone surly.
You prick, you've been so splendidly stupid, why did you have to ruin it by
thinking? Thomas had counted on Dontane
358
MARTHA WELLS
being fool enough to try to hide their escape from the Duke as well as from
Grandier.
"You did if you wanted to live. You idiot, I would have gotten rid of him in
time." Footsteps paced overhead, a long winter cloak brushed the floor. Thomas
winced as Denzil came to stand by a dark area that must be a cabinet or other
large piece of furniture, the Duke's boots almost directly over his hiding
place. He was cramped and his shoulders were aching, but he dared not adjust
his position.
"They can't escape," Dontane protested.
"Of course they can. Boniface knows the palace very well; he's been spying on
everyone in it for years."
"I'm not a fool, damn you, I was . . ."
"It doesn't matter, not at this point." There was a hesitation, then Denzil
asked softly, "What position do you want when I take the throne? Court
Sorcerer?"
Ah. I should have known Denzil would contrive to sell everyone to everyone
else, Thomas thought. He's lured Dontane away from Grandier, that was why our
mercenary friend was so a/raid.
"Will the nobles accept me?" Dontane spoke slowly, diverted by visions of the
future.
"They will if I order it."
They might at that Anything to keep Denzil away from home and family.
The door opened again, and a young man's voice shy with hero worship said, "My
lord, there's a message."
"Thank you." Denzil's voice warmed, probably out of habit. He would keep no
one close to him who was not his absolute slave. How it must gall him that
Grandier remained his own man. Dontane had probably been an easy conquest.
Paper crackled, then with a smile in his voice Denzil said, "Villon has
reached Bel Garde."
Thomas caught his breath.
"No." Dontane sounded horror-stricken. "The cavalry.. ."
"The siege engine cavalry," Denzil corrected gently.
"How could he get here so quickly?"
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
359
"If the messages went to the Granges yesterday, if Villon left his Train of
Ordnance behind and travelled through the night, it could be done easily."
"Without Grandier's help I couldn't possibly hold him off."
"Yes, if Evadne hadn't failed I'd have Roland by now." Denzil was silent for a
moment, possibly calculating the time as Thomas was. It would have been
impossible to conceal the cavalry's movement up the plain to Bel Garde; they
would have been spotted easily from the city wall. But it would have taken
time to send the message through the dangerous snow-choked streets. And Villon
was a cautious general, preferring maneuver and siegecraft to pitched battle.
He had taken Bel Garde as a base from which to stage his attack.
Denzil said, "It's unfortunate. If I can't keep Bisra from attacking us in
what they will perceive as our weakness, Lord General Villon would be useful.
But he won't deal with me. I hope he has more amenable officers. You'll have
to send the Host against him."
"Grandier won't allow it. He's counting on Villon to help lead the attack
against Bisra."
"And counting on me to convince Villon to support my claim to the throne. But
I can't... I won't do that. He is an old friend of Ravenna's, you see."
Denzil was not going to allow a war with Bisra. He wouldn't want a kingdom
locked in struggle, war torn and poor. And he really didn't need a war to put
him on the throne; he only needed the threat of it. He's going to hold Bisra
off somehow. If he can. If he gets past Grandier.
"I want you to speak to your friends in the Host and persuade them to attack
Villon tonight."
"I'll go now, but. . ."
"Don't go now; wait until dusk. I don't want Grandier to learn of it. We can
scarcely ask him to arrange the cloudcover for us, so they will have to wait
until dark anyway." Footsteps crossed the floor to pause near Dontane. "Take
care. Everything depends on you."
Does it? Thomas thought. Does it realty?
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MARTHA WELLS
He heard them move toward the door, and as soon as it dosed he rolled away
from his painful position over the rafter and began to work his way back
toward the hole in the baseboard, half-formed plans turning in his head. He
had almost reached it when there was the thump of a chair pushed aside,
hurried steps crossed the floor, and the door banged open.
Thomas swore and scrambled through the opening into the spyhole. Dontane and
Denzil had departed, but he had never heard the messenger boy leave. He
grabbed up his sword and baldric and ducked under the lintel back into the
passage.
"Well?" Aviler asked.
"Move. Someone heard me."
They made their way through the twists and turns of the passage and up a
narrow flight of rickety stairs. "Villon's reached Bel Garde," Thomas said.
"Thank God. The court got through."
"It's not over yet. Denzil's sending the Host against him tonight—despite
Grandier's orders to the contrary. Villon will have to be warned."
They came to a door with a thin line of chill daylight leaking under it.
Thomas listened a moment at it, then carefully prized it open. The room
outside was a long formal dining room lit by slanting gray morning sunlight
Jrom tall windows that opened onto a portico. It was undisturbed except for a
little snow that had blown in through a window left carelessly open, and the
scene had the strange still quality of a painting.
Thomas crossed the room and opened the window further, stepping out onto the
portico. The tiled floor was heavily laden with ice, and he held carefully to
the light railing and looked out on a view of the garden courts and the siege
wall and the bastion rising up beyond. To the north was the open land of the
park, and cut off from sight by the side of the Gallery Wing would be the
Postem Gate. The ground was two stories down from the bottom of the portico.
He stepped back
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
361
through the window to lift a heavy velvet drapery cord and say to Aviler,
"Think you could make it?"
"Of course."
They started to tear down the drapes, pulling loose the cords and discarding
the ones that had gotten wet from the open window and had stiffened with ice.
Aviler tied off a section and tested it, then said, "We can secure it to the
table. It's heavy enough to support a dozen men, so . . ."
"It won't have to. Just you. I'm staying here."
"What do you mean?"
"There's barely enough time for you to make it across the city to Bel Garde by
nightfall on a good day. I'm going to try to stop them here."
"How?"
"I don't know," Thomas snapped. He didn't want to give Aviler the chance to
talk him out of this. He controlled himself with effort and said more calmly,
"Apparently Dontane's the only one who can talk to the Host besides Grandier.
If I can stop him . . ."
"That would help immeasurably, of course, but Villon is hardly going to be
unprepared for an attack by night. That he's here now means he knows what's
happened. He will realize the danger."
"And with Ravenna dead you're the only one who knows for certain that Denzil
is a danger. Even if the attack on Villon fails, all Denzil has to do is ride
up to Bel Garde tomorrow and ask to speak to Roland alone."
Aviler hesitated. Thomas could see him turning over that idea and not liking
what he saw. But the High Minister shook his head. "Outright assassination
would hardly serve his purpose . . ."
"It wouldn't have to be that. But it's hardly politic to allow the man who's
near destroyed a city so he can usurp the throne unlimited access to the
King."
"All right, all right. I'll go on. But I think you're only going to succeed in
killing yourself."
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MARTHA WELLS
"Probably."
They finished the makeshift rope and tied it off, and Thomas told Aviler the
way over the canal and through the Postern Gate that he and Kade had used.
They secured the rope to the table, and with Thomas to hold it steady, Aviler
started to climb. The High Minister disappeared over the portico with no more
than a whispered "good luck" and Thomas was grateful, loath to countenance any
attempt at sentimentality at this point. When Aviler had reached the snowy
ground and vanished into the shelter of the garden walls and frozen hedges
below, Thomas pulled the makeshift rope up and bundled it into the bottom
cabinet of one of the sideboards. With luck the tangled draperies would look
like an aborted attempt at looting. He closed the window and slipped quietly
out of the room.
ROLAND COULD NOT stop shivering. He sat near the fire in a windowless interior
chamber at Bel Garde. A salon meant for entertaining, its walls were softened
by cloth-of-gold draperies and the overmantel and borders delicately painted
with black grotesques on gilt backgrounds. Fretfully looking around the room,
Roland's eyes lit on a silver and gold filigreed perfume burner he had given
Denzil some months ago, and it occurred to Roland just how isolated he had
become from the others in his court. He had no other dose confidant or advisor
but Denzil; most of those who had surrounded him were his cousin's companions,
not his, and he had no wish to see any of them.
Lord General Villon had arrived with his men not long ago, and the walls of
the little fortress had almost trembled from the cheers of the other guards.
After Ravenna's death their situation had seemed hopeless, and now for the
first time there was a chance for revenge and victory. Roland had been just as
glad as the others to see them, but he was nervous of Villon, knowing the
General's opinion of him was not a high one. And having to greet the old
warrior with news of the Dowager Queen's death . . .
Behind Roland in the center of the room, Villon and his officers, their cloaks
still steaming from melting snow, met with Renier and the Queen's Guard
lieutenant who had brought Falaise. They were talking intently, pointing to
the maps laid out on the round table, making some plan. Roland
364
MARTHA WELLS
had no wish to join in their council. They all thought him a coward, or a
fool, and perhaps they were right.
A new voice made Roland look up, and he saw that Elaine had been brought in
again. The hem of her skirt was torn and dirty, and her face was a pale oval
in die candlelight. Her only companion was an Albon knight standing at her
elbow as if she were a prisoner, and Roland wondered if she had been left to
sit in some cold anteroom, without even a maid to accompany her. Such
treatment suddenly reminded him of one of Fulstan's more subtle tricks, when
Roland had been left alone in a bare room to contemplate his fate for hours,
only to discover later that the King had left the palace and that there would
be no punishment after an.
"Hasn't anyone even sent for a lady to care for her?" Roland interrupted. All
heads turned toward him, and he wished they would stop looking at him as if he
were mad, or had just grown an extra limb. "God, just let her alone. Your
damned questions are worthless."
"At once, m'lord," someone said. Roland found himself meeting General Villon's
expressionless gaze and quickly looked away. Elaine still stood shivering in
the center of the room and he motioned her to come over by the fire. She came
obediently, taking a low cushioned stool near his chair, moving stiffly as if
the cold and shock had solidified her muscles. Roland felt more at ease in her
presence. Here, at least, was someone who knew he could not have disobeyed his
mother's order, who did not think him a coward. If he had stayed in the tower
he would be dead as well, or Bel Garde overrun by fay and they would all be
prisoners. But he wondered if he would have had the courage to order his own
son or daughter to safety while he met death. / will never know, because
tve'tt all die here and I witt never tive to have a son or daughter, . .
There was more quiet talk, but the council seemed to be over. Roland stared
into the fire, trying not to see images it hurt to think about. Since hearing
Falaise's tale, he had sunk deeper into grief and pain, and he felt powerless
to help
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
365
himself. He heard Renier move up behind his chair, and he said the words he
had been living on since that moment in the tower. "He will explain himself.
There will be some reason."
"Yes, my lord," a soft voice said. "But if he meant to betray you, wouldn't he
also have a reason, a clever lie?"
Roland looked down at Elaine, startled, and heard Renier gasp. He glanced up
and saw that his Preceptor looked as shocked as if a pet cat had spoken. But
Roland knew that his mother would not have had women close to her who were
fools; they had been at the focal point of the court with her.
Renier stepped forward to take Elaine's arm and Roland motioned him away,
irritated at the interruption. He wanted to talk, and the young woman's eyes
were red and bruised from crying and the expression in them anything but
cruel. "If he loved me how could he betray me?" he asked, hearing the tears in
his own voice.
"If he loved you, he couldn't," she whispered.
Roland hesitated. If his mother had asked it of her, this woman would have
flung herself off the roof of the highest tower in the city. She would believe
whatever Ravenna had told her to believe. But Ravenna was not here to tell her
what to say now. If Elaine was repeating his mother's views, it was only
because she believed in them herself.
"You were close as boys," Elaine persisted. "I remember it. But didn't he
change?"
Didn 't he? Roland asked himself. Had the teasing turned to mockery? / know he
has a cruel streak. God, he could hardfy hide it. "That was because . . . ,"
Roland began, and thought, because after I tried to die, he knew how much I
needed him, and he thought me pathetic, and it made him feel powerful. He felt
anger stir in him, old tired anger. "Yes, he changed."
They sat in silence for a time, until a matron who had been one of Ravenna's
gentlewomen came for Elaine. She let the older woman lead her away, but
reluctantly, with a worried glance back at Roland.
The young King stared into the fire alone, conjuring up memories of DenziTs
scorn, his disdain, the moments when
366
MARTHA WELLS
his carefully buried envy had come too near the surface. But without Elaine's
gentle persuasion Roland's thoughts began to go round in the same tired path.
But I don't know what the truth is. God, if I could only talk to him . . .
The frigid wind tore at Kade's hair, blowing it into her face, and she shook
it away irritatedly. "You'll be ready?"
The gold and amber fay leaned on his pikestaff and looked down at her with a
smile. "If you can flush the birds, my lady, we can chase them."
It was late afternoon, the sky a low solid gray like the polished surface of
an ancient shield, the housetops around them still sheathed in ice and snow.
Kade had left Boliver at Knockma, to help the others pack what was necessary
and to take them through the ring to Chariot, another of her mother's
enchanted castles. She hadn't been to it for years, so it would not occur to
the Host to search for her there. She had little memory of what it was like,
except that it was big and old, and hidden rather prosaically in the hills of
Monbeaudreux, a province in the south. It was protected from the Bisran border
by steadily rising mountains that were too high and rugged to cross except on
foot. The summer and spring lasted longer there, and they grew olive trees. At
the moment it sounded like heaven.
The fay from the Seelie Court, with his white blond hair, delicate features,
and the embroidered satin of his doublet and cloak, was unreal in this world
of gray and white. "Chase them far," Kade told him. "I don't want them turning
back on us. I've paid enough for it."
"To the ends of the earth, and that will be a pleasure." The fay swept a bow
to her, and suddenly a golden hawk glittered in the air beside her, and with a
powerful sweep of its wings, it shot toward the sky.
Kade watched him until he disappeared into the clouds. She couldn't afford
mistakes, and she wasn't at all sure of herself. She had been lax over the
last few years, using what she could of the swift instinctive fay magic,
depending on
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
367
glamour and illusion. Swift, and in the end ineffective against the sorcery
that was practiced so painstakingly, using as poor a tool as letters from a
dead language's alphabet to symbolize concepts that passed understanding. With
fay magic it was impossible to attempt something beyond one's skill; with
sorcery it was all too possible, and all too deadly.
Kade hugged herself and shivered. She hadn't given sorcery the long hours of
study it needed. Her efforts seemed so ungainly compared to the elegant and
involved work of sorcerers like Galen Dubell and Dr. Surete. Both of whom are
dead now, she thought, savagely, and at least I'm alive. But it all came home
to rest in the end, and she had taken the easy way out far too often, in her
magic and in her life.
Kade knew she should have returned to make up with Roland at once after their
father had died. She would not have had to stay long, and it might have made
the difference in so many things. If she went to him now to tell him about
Denzil, he would never believe her.
The glass ball Titania had traded her was in a deep pocket of her smock, and
when it brushed against her she could feel the warmth radiating out of it even
through all her layers of clothing. God, I hope it's contained, she thought. /
hope it's not sapping my strength or power, or leaking something into the
ether that's going to interfere with the spell. She was not at all sure that
what she was attempting would work. She had bought the Seelie Court's help
with Knockma, and they would hound the Host from the city, but she would have
to stir the creatures out of the palace herself.
Kade heard something at the edge of the roof, then saw a small fay with ugly
wizened features and cornflower blue hair peering at her over the edge. Its
narrow eyes widened at her, and she snarled, "Bugger off." It vanished, and
she stretched, easing the tension in her tight shoulders. She was a little
shocked to realize it was not the cold that was making her tremble. It's going
to work, she told herself. It's not going to work, a little voice answered.
I'm going to die.
She took out a pinch of the gascoign powder and rubbed
368
MARTHA WELLS
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
369
it into her eyes. Looking toward the palace's towers, she could ; now see the
corona of shifting light that played over them, colors touching and fading
into one another. There should still | be gaps between the wards high in the
air above the palace; j there had not been time for them to draw all the way
together, i and the higher they were in the air, the slower they would , move.
Here I go, she thought, and flung herself into the sky. ,
Kade had wings, and for a moment only, an unfamiliar • instinct told her to
use them. Colors changed; blurred outlines \ in the distance became sharp and
clear. Her vision was incred- j ible. Shadows had edges like razors, and her
eyes found } movement—the flutter of a curtain's edge through a broken j
window, the slight rustle of a frost-covered tree's branches in j a garden
court—that she would never detect with human 1 sight. i
Kade realized she was gliding in a circle over the High ! Minister's house,
then she realized she was flying. For a mo- i ment human thought and hawk
instinct clashed, and her ; wings flapped frantically and she dropped like a
stone. Kade i forced herself to let go, to let the unfamiliar senses guide
her, ! and her wings made the correct angle and she caught the wind > again.
;
She thought she had the trick of it now. One had to exer-      \ cise enough
control to keep one's memory and purpose, but had to give the hawk enough rein
to control the body. She      ;. made a slow circle to face toward the palace,
watching the      \ ground rush by below in such fine detail and trying not to
think about what her wings were doing.    :
Kade had not taken this form lightly. She knew that hawks,      \ who could
dive from hundreds of feet in the air and pluck a mouse off a forest floor,
would have good eyesight and that      j with the gascoign powder she would
have a chance of finding      ! the gap in the wards. The smaller body would
make slipping through easier as well. Also, if she failed, this wasn't a bad
way to spend one's last hour. But she had chosen better than she      ' could
have guessed. She could see the wards as fine shadings      ! of gray mist
moving almost imperceptibly above the walls.
And Just a moment ago I thought gray a dull color indeed, she mused. Who had
known that one bland color would have so many distinctions?
A few powerful strokes of her wings took her higher and she flew toward the
palace, astonished again at the power and strength of such a small form. She
had risen above the wards and almost overshot the palace before she caught
herself and turned back. It was no wonder human sorcerers lost themselves when
they changed shape. If her sense of urgency hadn't been so strong, it would
have been easy to play on these wind currents until she forgot who she was. Is
that what happened to att the human sorcerers who tried the shape-changing
experiment? Did they keep saying, "I'll just stay out a little longer," until
all the words faded from their minds? If only she could afford that kind of
self-indulgence.
Kade found the gap close to the high point where the edges of the wards met
above the palace. It was an irregularly shaped hole, a bare four feet wide at
its largest... And closing fast. Hawk instinct seized her and pushed on by her
fear she dove for the gap. She had forgotten how fast she could move if she
tried, and found herself safely through and frantically cupping her wings to
slow herself as the sloped roof of the Queen's Tower rushed upward at her.
Elated, Kade controlled her dive and slipped sideways, catching the wind
current around the tower and letting it steer her toward the North Bastion.
She hadn't felt a thing when she had rushed past the wards, and now she knew
she was going to beat that Bisran bastard at his own game.
Kade made one slow circle above the King's Bastion for curiosity's sake. Along
the top level, she could see the staining on the stones above the windows
where smoke had poured out from the sporadic fires there the night of the
attack. Then a play of light over the dark tiles of the multipitched roof
caught her attention. It looked almost like a ward.
Yes, it is a ward. She didn't think it was a new one of Grandier's design; it
lay on the roof like a discarded scarf. Kade circled again, losing altitude in
her effort to see it more
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MARTHA WELLS
dearly. It could be Ableon-Indis, the ward she had called to route the Host in
the Old Hall. Her spell might have pulled it out of the etheric structure
entirely and that was why it was still here instead of with the other wards
above. It might not have been affected by Grandier's conversion of the other
wards at all.
Kade saw the black shape out of the comer of her eye, and her hawk's body
twisted away, reacting before her human mind had grasped the danger.
It was a black spraggat, its leathery wings stretched above her, its daws
raking. She dove again, slipping in and out of the currents, but it followed
her, its stronger wings overpowering the wind and forcing itself doser to her.
Kade slipped sideways and it overshot with a scream of rage. She flapped her
wings frantically, trying to gain height and take advantage of its mistake,
then she heard its screaming turn from anger to pain. She risked a look and
saw it was rolling and scrabbling across the roof of the King's Bastion, its
leathery wings smoking and bursts of flame appearing over its dark body. It
had fallen into Ableon-Indis. I'm right, she thought with great satisfaction.
But it's much weaker than it was without its keystone, or it would have burnt
that thing up at once. She had one ward on her side, and she would have to
think carefully about the best way to use it
She turned, making for the North Bastion. Then daws raked her back, and the
force of the blow sent her tumbling, her wings frantically beating the air.
The second black spraggat dove toward her again and struck at her, and she
wheeled and turned desperately to escape. The wall of the North Bastion seemed
to spin, all the while rushing closer and doser.
The instincts Kade had fought off earlier took over in force, letting her
right herself and fight her way toward the flat mountain looming in front of
her. Her daws grasped stone, and there was a rush of air behind her as the
spraggat stooped for the kill. For a long moment she felt herself fumbling,
trying to remember what she had to do now, her thoughts overwhelmed by the
hawk's fear and its terrible desire to turn and
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throw itself at the spraggat in a hopeless attack. With the last bit of
herself, she stretched out with her mind and touched the spark of light within
her feathers that in another existence was a fayre queen's glass ball. She
shattered it.
Then her fingers were digging into the chinks in the stone face, her boots
slipping on the ledge. The spraggat screamed its confusion, suddenly
confronted with a human larger than itself and the bright painful backwash of
a powerful spell. It swung away in fright, and half sobbing with exhaustion,
Kade dung to the stone and kicked at the catch of the window. Once, twice,
then it sprang open and she fell through.
She lay on the wooden floor of a cold empty room for a moment, gasping, then
reached into her pocket. Titania's glass ball was in shards, still faintly
warm with the force of the contained spell. Well, I'm not doing that again
soon, she thought, sitting up awkwardly. The fay's daws had torn through her
coat, leaving two long tears in her back that sluggishly leaked blood. Her
shirt and smock hadn't been torn, only snagged aside, and distractedly she
searched her pockets for a pin to pull the fabric of the coat back together.
Then Kade saw where she was: the walls covered with gilt-trimraed bookshelves,
the large windows, the beautifully carved partners desk still piled with
paper, more books, and an upset inkwell.
hi her confusion Kade had all but forgotten which room she was making for.
She'd meant to approach cautiously and make sure the rooms were empty first.
She climbed to her feet, inwardly cursing herself and listening hard for any
sign of occupation. Stupid, stupid, have you ruined it all now? Is he still
using these rooms? Did you go through all that just to be caught?
She steadied herself against the wall because her legs were trembling still,
and crept to the door. But the next room, a small parlor with furniture buried
under more books, was cold and unoccupied as well. She ventured through the
rest of the suite, feeling her heartbeat begin to steady. She could hear
nothing but the wind against the windows, and the rooms
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were cold, the candles and healths unlit. Grandier had not come back here,
then.
Kade returned to the study and started her frantic search. The simplest hiding
places were the best. It seemed like a year ago, but the morning that she had
stood on the windows!!! and spoken to him, he had been planning to let the
Host in that very night. It wasnt Galen who betrayed you, she reminded
herself. It was Urbain Grandier the murderer.
She went to the desk and opened all the drawers and looked through the first
layer of papers, but they were covered with crabbed half-completed
calculations, none of which she could follow for more than a few steps. The
books on the desk were Theater of Terrestrial Alchemy and The Black Keys;
nothing illuminating there.
She moved around the room, scanning the shelves, shifting books, and looking
under chair cushions, then turned to the leatherbound chest on the floor. It
had books stacked atop it but not much dust compared with the rest of the
room, and she remembered that he had just finished putting something in it
when she had come to the window the first time.
Kade kneeled beside the chest and lifted the books from the top. It wasn't
even locked. She opened it and was disappointed by the sight of perfectly
ordinary folded linens and fustian blankets.
Then she moved the top layer aside. It lay on a bed of cloth, a stone from the
bottom of some streambed, rounded and smoothed by water, small enough to fit
comfortably in her two cupped hands. The keystone was inert and silent now.
She picked it up and turned it, marvelling at the symbols, letters, and
equations incised into its surface. They started out blocky and large enough
to read, then shrank as they wound around the stone, some obviously formed by
different hands, becoming so tiny they might have been carved with a jeweler's
knife, ultimately shrinking until they disappeared from sight. Kade blinked
and shook her head, dizzied. She could follow the sense of it for no more than
a few turns of the stone, if that.
Well, Kade thought, rolling it from one hand to the other.
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SoI'vegotit. Now find Thomas, and take this down to its place in the cellar.
She bundled the keystone up in the bag she'd brought in a pocket and tied it
securely around her waist, then headed out of the suite.
Kade listened at the heavy wooden door a moment, hearing no betraying sounds,
then opened it cautiously. The next room was dark, but she had expected that.
There was the smell of must and dampness and, far away and barely detectable
in the frozen air, of death.
Kade hesitated, one hand on the doorframe. The hackles on the back of her neck
lifted.
If the black spraggat outside had been a guard, there would be a guard inside,
as well.
She crossed the anteroom in three light-footed leaps and reached the opposite
door. Let whatever it was come for her then; she had found the keystone. She
could do anything.
Stretching before her was a suite of rooms, filled with silent shapes,
distorted by shadows.
Kade slipped through the first room, sweat freezing on her back, the heavy
lump of the keystone bumping her familiarly in the leg. In the second room she
stopped. The cold had changed consistency. She felt it moving over her like a
mist, clinging to her face and hair, her clothes.
There is something here. She touched the wall to keep her orientation,
straining her eyes in the darkness and slipping the bronze knife out of the
scabbard at her belt. Then something moved. She couldn't tell if she was
seeing it with her eyes or inside her head.
Kade eased back against the wall. Whatever it was would attack her in a
moment. She didn't want to give it an advantage by bolting out of the room
screaming.
The whisper almost made her jump out of her skin. It came from across the
room, and she tightened her grip on her knife. The voice was low and harsh,
and she couldn't make out the words.
Kade hesitated, aware of precious time passing. Sweat was
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freezing on her forehead and she didn't know whether to be afraid or angry, to
try to push her way past the thing or retreat. Maybe that was its purpose, to
keep her here while something else . . .
The voice was getting louder, and though she still couldn't make out the
words, it trembled on the edge of her memory, recognition barely a breath
away.
Then she remembered that The Black Keys contained spells for necromancy.
Her father's voice said, "Little bastard, why did your bitch of a mother
bother to drop you? She didn't have to leave you to devil me."
Kade didn't remember running; she wasn't aware of anything until she was
slamming the door of Grandier's study behind her and leaning against it
shuddering. Her knees hurt and one of her gloves was tipped, and the burn in
her palm had torn open. She must have gone over or through a piece of
furniture, though she didn't remember it.
Kade went to the desk, picked up the book on necromancy, and slung it through
the window. It hit the open casement and smashed the glass, then tumbled out
of sight. It was the first time in her life she had ever mishandled a book.
She paced the room because the liquid fire of fear and anger was in her veins
and it hurt to stand still. She smashed an astrolabe and turned over the
globe, and dug her fingernails into the open wound on her hand until she
stopped sobbing and her thoughts became coherent. Then she asked all the old
pagan spirits to visit their curses on Grandier, and the Church God to strike
him down.
Kade stopped in the middle of the room finally, pressed her hands together,
and thought. It was a test, a trick, a challenge. Grandier meant her to fail.
Had he set the ghost here outside these rooms, or had it wandered the palace,
to be drawn to her presence if she won a way inside?
The latter made more sense. But then ... But then it could come in here. Kade
was at the window in a moment.
She climbed out onto the sill, then stepped to the broad
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
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ledge. The black spraggat was no longer in sight though it might come back at
any moment- She was in a poor position to defend herself.
The frigid wind tore at her, tearing the air out of her lungs. Kade edged her
way along, fingers clinging tightly to the chinks in the stone. She hadn't
pinned her coat together again and the cold air poured down her back. She
would have to cross the siege wall to get to the Old Palace anyway. Can I do
it from the outside? Another laborious ten feet and Kade saw that she
couldn't, not without falling to her death. She would have to enter the North
Bastion to reach the walkway along the top of the wall.
Finally Kade could stand the cold no more. She reached a set of windows she
could push open, then almost fell through them onto the floor of a small
bedchamber. Sitting up on the rug that was stiff with frost, she realized she
had not even bothered to glance in first to see if the room was unoccupied.
She could have landed headfirst among a whole tribe of sprig-gans, or a troop
of Alsene soldiers.
She buried her head in her hands. He Has you on the run. You're playing into
his hands again.
After a moment Kade stood and went through the doorway to the next room. It
was a beautifully arranged parlor, wallpaper and upholstery colored rose and
gold. She didn't know who this suite had belonged to or where she was, except
that she was near the corner and would have to find the stairs that let out
onto the siege wall. The light from the window in the bedchamber made no
inroads on the shadows in the corners. The next room would be dark as pitch.
Kade dug in her pockets and finally came up with a tinder-box. She would light
one of the candles in here and take it with her. She'd have to do that anyway
if she didn't want to be running into walls and stepping on bogles. Coward,
she thought as she fumbled with the flint. Bloody coward.
It refused to catch, and she pried the candle out of the lamp, sat down on the
floor with it, and tried to light it with a spell. Her heart was pounding too
fast, distracting her, but
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finally the wick began to glow gently with spell light. It was beginning to
yellow to real flame when it went out, as if invisible fingers had snuffed it.
"What?" ghe said aloud, and looked up.
It was there, in the darkest comer, looking at her. She could feel its gaze
with the inner eye of her own sorcery. Her skin turned to ice and sweat
dropped into her eyes. Then it whispered, "I could have you killed tomorrow
and no one would notice. Perhaps I will . . ."
Kade was through the bedchamber, slamming the door behind her, and poised on
the windowsill like a bird about to take flight before her wits caught up to
her. She made herself stop, grinding her injured hand against the frozen metal
of the casement, forcing herself to think. She could climb out and enter
through another window, go around it. But it had taken so little time to find
her. It would just follow her again. How could she find Thomas with the damn
thing following her and freezing her blood . . .
Had it gone after Thomas too? He had helped Ravenna kill Fulstan. But Thomas
had never been particularly impressed with Fulstan when the old king was
alive; Kade thought it unlikely that he would be concerned about him now that
Fulstan was dead.
It was coming after her because it could make her afraid.
Kade hesitated, considering the idea. Fulstan had been nothing in life and was
even less in death. Thomas and Ravenna had disposed of him with less regret
than a peasant would feel when putting down a mad dog. Kade nodded to herself.
That was the key to it.
She had not let the old bastard stop her from living her life. She was not
going to let him stop her from finding Thomas.
Kade pushed away from the windowsill and crossed the cold room to the door.
Her legs were trembling; her hand on the doorknob trembled. That was all
right. She could shake, cry, scream, as long as she didn't break and run.
There was no one who mattered here to see her.
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
377
Outside the door she could hear the muttering of the voice. She opened it and
stood there.
Light from the room behind her fell only a short distance, then seemed to hit
a wall of blackness and stop. The voice rose, ranting at her, words of
darkness forming all the old terrible nightmares she remembered. "Little lying
bitch, my punishment from God for my sins."
Anything to stop that. She said, "You're nothing."
It had no effect. The voice rose in volume. "Do you think your pathetic little
brother could help you? He'd kill you himself if I ordered it..."
Roland do something you ordered? Kade found herself thinking. "Who's the liar
now?" she said. "He hates you more than I do." And suddenly the words were
just words. They hurt, but not with the sting of truth. They were the same
words Fulstan had always flung at her, but she was not a child now and no
longer believed them. Perhaps she had not needed to return to the city of her
birth to face her brother. Perhaps she had needed to return to face this. Her
voice gaining strength, she shouted, "You're nothing. Galen Dubell was more a
father to me than you ever were. Thomas is more a husband to Ravenna than you
ever were." The voice went on, louder, and Kade's voice rose to a shriek,
drowning out the other voice, all thought of concealment forgotten. "You were
nothing to her, you're nothing to me. She killed you because you got in her
way and she wouldn't put up with your stupidity anymore. Roland's King now and
he curses your memory whether he admits it or not. You're nothing and you
always were!"
On the last word she stalked forward—not running, not blundering in the
dark—until she barked her shin on a chair. Cursing the pain, she fell against
the other door, opened it, and stumbled through into the next room.
It had an open door leading into the stairwell, and wan yellow candlelight
came down through it from somewhere above. The silence was complete.
She looked back and could see the gray daylight from windows of the bedchamber
through the open door of the
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salon. It was just a room, cloaked in shadow, no colder than the stairwell.
"And don't come back," Kade muttered, leaning against the doorframe. Then she
heard heavy footsteps from the floor above, and she started hastily down the
stairs. If there had been anyone or anything in the bastion, her idiot
screaming would bring it running.
In the next hour Grandier or the Host or Denzil could kill her. But Kade had
never felt more free in her life.
SOMEWHERE IN THE passage
below something clanked, as if hollow metal struck stone, and Thomas paused on
the edge of the gap in the floor and thoughtfully fingered the hilt of his
rapier. He'd seen Dontane come down the stairs from the council rooms, and
he'd taken the chance on going ahead into the lower passages and catching him
here.
The large passage Grandier had taken him down yesterday was the only unblocked
way to the cellar where the Unseelie Court had established itself. Thomas had
found a spot where a weak place in the ceiling had partly given way, spilling
some debris down onto the floor and creating a hole into the space above.
Climbing up through the gap, he'd found another narrow corridor which was
blocked on one end by a collapse of its own. It led only to more disused rooms
and a now-rickety stairway up to the floor above.
A dim light fell down the stairs, slightly alleviating the darkness. Moving
silently, Thomas poised on the edge of the gap, listening as the faint noise
below became the footsteps of at least two men. Then Dontane passed below,
with two Alsene troopers trailing reluctantly behind him, and Thomas felt a
rush of both relief and tension; he hadn't been certain until now that he
would have his chance. Dontane could have brought twenty troopers with him,
but the need to conceal his activities from Grandier must have won out over
caution.
Thomas quietly stepped down to a fallen rafter half blocking the gap, then
leapt onto the back of the second trooper.
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His weight slammed the man into the hard stone floor. He rolled off the inert
form and came to his feet against the opposite wall, ducking the flailing
sword of the other trooper. Thomas parried the second wild blow, feinted, and
put his point through the man's neck. The trooper sunk back against the wall,
clawing at the wound and gasping, then slid to the floor.
Dontane had turned, whipping his sword free of the scabbard. He recognized
Thomas and stopped, eyes widening in disbelief. "You still here . . ."
Thomas moved toward him, making it look like a casual stroll. He doubted he
could catch Dontane if the sorcerer bolted toward the cellar. "Afraid of
Villon? Things not going quite according to plan?"
He saw the realization of where those things had been said pass over Dontane's
frozen expression, and an awareness of just what else had been said. "So that
was you. I thought the boy dreaming when he said something had moved in the
floor."
_ The sorcerer rushed forward. Thomas started to bring up his sword to parry
but saw the blue flame of spell fire flickering down Dontane's blade. Instead
of locking their weapons together he swept his sword around, deflecting the
deadly blade and disengaging. Even then the shock of contact with that power
was enough to send a jolt of pain down his arm.
Dontane laughed, but sweat was running down his face and he held his sword en
garde, not pressing the attack immediately. Thomas steadied himself against
the wall. Damn, he thought, this could finish me. It had taken a moment or so
for the blast of power to travel down the long rapier blade to his hand, long
enough for him to parry and break contact. If he'd connected with the shorter
blade of a main gauche he would have a useless arm now. Stupid not to realize
that the young sorcerer would have an arcane defense against attack. But
Dontane had seen the battle at Aviler's house and knew he was outclassed in
swordplay at least; Thomas could -almost smell the fear on him.
Thomas eased away from the wall. "I hope that isn't all you've got," he said
softly. "It's not going to be enough." He circled to the side, trying to get
between Dontane and the cellar.
The sorcerer backed away, preventing him from blocking the passage. Thomas
lunged, pulling the tip of his sword up and over Dontane's parry, nicking him
in the opposite shoulder. The sorcerer cried out and his blade swung wide, die
flat of it catching Thomas's sword arm. The force of the spell fire cloaking
the blade sent Thomas staggering. Dontane stumbled back and lost his grip on
his sword. Pressing a hand to his wounded shoulder, he turned and bolted down
the passage,
Cursing at the pain and forcing his almost-numb fingers to hold onto his
swordhilt, Thomas ran after him.
Around the comer he could see the gap in the cellar wall. The unearthly light
of die Host had faded, leaving a well of darkness in the old cellar. With the
waning daylight outside, the Host must still be quiescent, but Dontane was
just disappearing down the stairway and would have every intention of waking
them.
Thomas plunged down after him. The sorcerer was moving more slowly, still
holding one hand pressed to his bleeding, shoulder. He turned as Thomas
reached the landing and swung a fist at him, and they grappled, struggling
across the narrow landing. His sword arm pinned, Thomas forced Dontane toward
the edge, then felt the stone give way under his boot, and the next instant
they were both falling.
Kade had found enough glamour to make it difficult for human eyes to focus on
her and had made her way silently through the cold dark rooms to the Old
Palace. Now she crouched in the concealing shadows beneath one of the grand
staircases, watching the Alsene troops rush about. Most carried lamps and all
seemed to be shouting at each other. They had sprinkled more of the cursed
iron filings around the areas on the third and fourth floors where they seemed
to have
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MARTHA WELLS
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made their main encampment. It was the place where Thomas was most likely
being held, but Kade's glamour wouldn't last there, not in such close quarters
with the lights and so many wary men.
Torn between staying here to look for Thomas and continuing on her way to
replace the keystone, Kade gnawed on her thumbnail and tried to consider her
options rationally.
Spells might alert Grandier or some member of the Host. The ether was
disturbed enough as it was; Kade didn't want to stir it up further and give
them the idea that she was about somewhere. She couldn't afford to be caught
until she had at least replaced the keystone and driven the Host out of the
palace to the waiting Seelie Court.
A page boy in a slashed doublet and heavy fur cloak came down the stairs and
stopped a few feet from her hiding place. He rested one small hand on the
newel post and watched the frantic activity of the other men.
Kade's ears pricked. She needed information. Here was someone to get it from
who was small enough for her to overpower.
For a moment the landing was almost empty. She waited for the last trooper to
step through an arch into the next room and then darted forward.
Kade wrapped her wiry forearm around the page's throat and dragged him back
into the shelter of the darkened stairwell. His choked cry broke off as she
put the tip of her bronze knife below his jaw and hissed, "Be quiet."
She pulled him further into the shadow and said, "Quietly now. Grandier has a
prisoner, the Captain of the Queen's Guard. Where is he?"
She eased the pressure off the boy's windpipe enough to allow him to talk. He
drew breath to scream and she pressed the knife down just enough to draw a
bead of blood. After a moment the boy whispered, "The prisoners escaped."
Well, that's just fine, Kade thought in irritation. How am I going to find him
now? "When?"
"Earlier today, sometime, I don't know exactly . . ." His
voice was rising, and she prodded him with the knife again to remind him to be
quiet.
There was no way to tell if Thomas had left the palace yet or was still
trapped inside. Kade decided she would just have to replace the keystone and
improvise the rest.
The page was trembling under her arm, but Kade sensed he was angry enough to
try to come at her when she released him, instead of the far more sensible act
of running away and shouting for help. She shoved him away from her and as he
turned back toward her she threw a handful of glamour into his eyes. He gasped
and stumbled to a halt, staring at her, his eyes widening until they were
almost all pupil. She said, "You had a dream. A confusing dream. A jumble of
images."
He was still staring straight ahead when Kade slipped around him and started
down the stairs. That should confuse his story long enough for her to
accomplish her goal. It would only take a few moments to replace the keystone
anyway.
Thomas lay facedown, cold gritty stone against his cheek. He levered himself
up a little and shook his head, too stunned to think, and caught his breath at
the unexpected pain of a hundred new bruises. Then memory penetrated. He was
on the flagstone floor of the cellar. He had fallen down the last flight of
stairs.
Thomas rolled over and sat up. His sword was near his hand; he must have held
onto it in instinctive reflex until he struck the pavement. Dontane lay
sprawled perhaps twenty paces away.
And the Host was stirring around them.
Thomas looked back to the stairs and saw that a dark winged fay with a sleek
narrow dog's head had alit on the landing and was looking down at them with
brilliant red eyes. The soft light grew brighter as corpse-lights climbed the
walls. Creatures slunk from under the piles of discarded wood and trash or
seemed to rise out of the floor. All were uniformly hideous but no two were
alike, with grotesquely distorted heads, jagged teeth, long clawed hands,
ratlike tails, or bat's
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385
wings. One of the columns looked as if it had grown fur, and he realized it
was covered with a troop of brown and dun-colored spriggans. The smell of the
place was as foul as the bottom of a bog, and the creatures were still coming
out of hiding.
Three misshapen bogles leapt to the ground between him and Dontane, drawn by
the smell of blood about the sorcerer. Thomas looked for cover, or something
else to use as a weapon, and to his right he saw a long heap of broken wood,
an old scaling tower lying on its side. While its supports and platforms had
been made of wooden beams, the pulleys and chains that extended them and the
plates that had protected the troops manning it were of iron, and there were
no fay near it. While their attention was on Dontane, Thomas picked up his
sword and ran to the broken tower. He crouched next to it, his back against a
large rusted iron plate propped up by the rotting wood.
As title fay gathered about, the growling mutter of dieir talk growing louder,
he scraped up die bolts and metal scraps scattered nearby into a handy pile.
Most of the creatures were moving toward Dontane, drawn by the blood and
possibly by the young sorcerer's magic, but one small fay covered with fiery
red scales and straggling hak crept toward Thomas. He waited until it was
close enough, then used the tip of his sword to flip it back.
Incredibly light, the creature sailed back a good twenty feet before bouncing
against the flagstones. It leapt up and yelled, "Hey, 'e saw me."
Hell, now they know, Thomas thought. The Host could conceal themselves from
him now that they knew he could see through glamour. Idiot. It was the second
time he had betrayed himself that way.
But the fay were distracted again as Dontane stirred. The sorcerer rolled
over, moaning, and the Host began to draw around him. A chorus of hags, their
emaciated bodies barely recognizable as female with strands of grizzled hair
clinging to
their skulls and skin the greenish hue of old corpses, laughed at Dontane's
efforts to stand.
The sorcerer staggered to his feet and looked around him, realizing he was
trapped. He had lost his sword in die corridor above, and Thomas could tell
from the way the blood drained from his face that he knew his danger. But with
more bravery than Thomas would have given him credit for, Dontane said
hoarsely, "Listen to me! We have more mortals for you."
The stubborn bastard still means to send them after Villon. Thomas knew his
chances of reaching Dontane now were poor at best. Still he had to try. He
gathered himself to move.
The assembled fay seemed to be listening to the sorcerer, or at least they
hadn't attacked him yet. Dontane pivoted, watching them warily. He licked his
lips and said, "An army is outside the city gates . . ."
There was a screeching from up in the ceiling that drowned out Dontane's
voice. Thomas looked up as with a clatter and bang several fay tumbled out of
one of the air shafts. They drifted or cartwheeled to the floor, one landing
on the far side of the cellar with a fatal-sounding splat. The odor of burning
meat and peat moss descended with them.
One of the drifting forms reached the floor, landed lightly, and strode toward
Dontane. Its tall body had a human shape but that was where the resemblance
ended. Its skin was black and rough and as it moved closer Thomas could see
that it had been burned and still carried raw red wounds in its flesh.
As it neared Dontane a smaller fay with a flattened head and legs and amis
with too many joints hopped out of the watching crowd to greet it. The little
creature danced around the large wounded fay, singing in a piping, clearly
audible voice, "He's here, we told! The human wizard! He's here!"
The tall fay watched this performance for a moment, then leaned down and
slapped the little creature out of the way.
Dontane took a few stumbling steps backward as the fay came toward him. It
looked down and said in a harsh croak, "You don't know me? Surely you must.
I'm Evadne."
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MARTHA WELLS
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387
"But..." Dontane stared up at it, growing fear in his eyes. "The others said
you didn't come back, there was an explosion in the tower . . ."
"Yes, I saw the explosion. I saw it from the inside. I have only just returned
with these few, for it took us this long to drag our poor selves back." The
hissing voice rose to a shriek. "Your master sent me to my death, you lying
human fool!"
"No, he couldn't have, he knew Denzil wanted to take the King prisoner . . .
," Dontane said, taking another step back, but halting in confusion when he
realized the other dark fay were creeping closer to him.
He sees it now, Thomas thought. Grandier hadn't trusted Dontane and Denzil
either.
Evadne moved nearer to the sorcerer, and Dontane begged, "Watt . . ."
The fay prince paused, staring down at the sorcerer with burning eyes in a
ruined face. The others had gone silent in anticipation.
Dontane hesitated, then with fatal desperation in his voice, said, "I didn't
know . . ."
"You admit it," Evadne snarled, and Dontane dapped his hands together,
shouting something. A blue glow of sorcery grew over his head just as Evadne
threw himself forward.
One long clawed hand caught the front of the sorcerer's doublet and jerked him
up off the floor. The sorcery evaporated harmlessly as Dontane panicked,
struggling to break the creature's grip.
Evadne threw the young sorcerer down, slamming him into the hard stone floor.
Thomas started at the dearly audible crack of breaking bone.
Dontane twitched once, then lay like an unstrung puppet.
Evadne stared down in satisfaction at the silent form, then slowly lifted his
head. My turn, Thomas thought, and shifted his grip on his swordhilt. Evadne's
hot eyes found him and the fay grinned. "You are human as well, but you see
through glamour. What are you?"
"Does it matter?" Thomas answered. He heard something
move behind the heap of wreckage and gathered the bare handful of iron scraps
he'd collected.
"Perhaps not." Evadne shrugged, strolling toward him.
The dark fay were gathering again, drawn by this new promise of entertainment.
This is not going to be pretty, Thomas thought. Then something slammed into
the rotten wood of the tower behind him. Before the heavy mass could come down
on top of him he rolled forward, and then he was in the midst of them. Thomas
flung the handful of bolts at the dosest, momentarily clearing himself a path.
He made it almost ten paces toward the stairway before a pack of bogles
blocked his way. The others closed around him again and he swept his sword
around, scattering them back.
A squat troll creature leapt at him wildly and he lunged at it without
thinking. It fell on his sword, ripping the weapon out of his grip. He was
struck from behind and he staggered forward, caught himself, and turned
around, waiting to die.
Kade had arrived at the top of the stairway down into the cellar in time to
watch the burned fay kill Dontane. She hadn't recognized Evadne until he spoke
and his appearance startled her. What happened to him? I hope it hurts as
terribly as it looks. Then she saw Thomas trapped against the broken siege
tower and started forward to the steps, about to plunge down into the cellar.
She caught herself, one hand on the wall, and forced herself to think. This
was no time for mistakes. The Host was in force here and it would be a fight
to the death she could not win.
Kade knelt on the cold stone of the passage floor, ripped a piece of fabric
from her skirt, and shook out the handful of ash she had collected from one of
the fireplaces, thinking, / onfy need a little time, just a little time; don't
get yourself killed. She had already gotten the candle lit before coming down
here, thinking the cellar would be dark, and that saved precious moments.
Dripping the wax onto the fabric and ash, she whispered the powerful words and
begged Ableon-Indis to listen.
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MARTHA WELIS
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
389
She completed the spell and hesitated. If Ableon-Jndis had drifted farther
away or dissipated . . . There was no time for that. Kade leapt to her feet
and went out onto the stairs, shouting "Evadne!" at the top of her lungs.
All attention went to her as the various voices of the Host stopped their
singing and howling and all eyes turned to her. They had forcedThomas away
from cover and surrounded him, but he was still on his feet. He had looked
toward her with the others but she bit her lip and didn't betray any sign that
she had seen him. If Evadne had any idea she meant to help him, then they were
both dead and that was that. She reached the first landing, and the large
flighted fay that squatted there edged away from her and angled its narrow
head to watch her surreptitiously. She ignored it, and from below Evadne
called out, "What are you doing here, sister? Have you come to join us?"
"I . . ." She spoke slowly, and wondered if it was as obvious as it seemed
that she had no idea what to say. Inspiration struck and she finished, "I lost
Knockma to Titania, and I want your help to get it back." She started down the
last flight of steps, holding the scrap of spell-patterned fabric behind her
back. The creature on the landing could see it, but it would have no idea that
it was anything but a rag.
Evadne turned suddenly to look down at Thomas and said, "It wouldn't be
because of this human, would it'"
"No." Kade sounded shocked that he would even think such a thing. Her heart
wasn't pounding quite so hard now, and it was a little easier to think.
"That isn't what I was told," the fay prince said slyly.
"Told by whom?" Kade pounced on the admission. "By Grandier? By Dontane?"
Evadne hesitated, his eyes bright in the dusky cellar, contemptuous of her but
growing doubtful.
"Do you think that was the only lie they told you?" Kade persisted.
"I don't think it is the only lie you told me."
She was almost to the bottom of the steps. Where is the
damn thing!' she thought. The sweat from her hands was soaking into the scrap
of fabric. Why is it taking so long? She had to get closer to Evadne. "But you
expect that from me. I never pretended anything else. I never sent you off to
your death with a false promise." / am, however, about to destroy you now if I
can just get this damned ward to ...
Behind her the fay who had guarded the stairs shrieked in agony. Kade turned
as if she were as surprised as the others and saw the creature staggering and
trying to leap into the air, its flesh melting away like hot wax.
Ableon-Indis had finally arrived.
The ward was much weaker than it had been, and she thought her spell would
only hold it for a few moments before it drifted back up from the cellar. More
of the Host screamed and fled as the ward fell among them. A burst of hot air
from the motion of their wings struck her and Kade stumbled and sat down hard
on the bottom step. As the nearest gang of bogles burst into flame, a roar of
mingled disbelief and fear from the assembled creatures deafened her. Kade
clapped her hands over her ears. The fay remembered the battle in the Old Hall
too, and now they realized what she had done. Evadne charged toward her, his
mouth open in a silent scream, but he was swept away by the rush of his
fleeing companions.
Kade got to her feet and ran into the chaos.
Thomas took advantage of the confusion to recover the rapier from the body of
the troll that had taken it. He turned around as Kade reached him. She
shouted, "Are you all right'"
"I'm better," he said. One of the flighted creatures flew low over their
heads, howling, and Thomas caught Kade around the waist and pulled her to him.
She had never stopped talking. "I found it! The keystone. Look." She struggled
to unwrap a round stone covered with delicate carving. "It was right there in
his rooms."
By God, now me have a chance, Thomas thought. He saw that Evadne was fighting
his way free of the milling fay,
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MARTHA WELLS
coming toward them. He said, "I'll distract him, and you put it back in its
place."
Kade shook her head, adamant. "No, you have to do it. You couldn't hold him
off long enough and I can."
He stared down at her. Other fay were joining Evadne, and there was no knowing
whether the fay prince realized that they had the crucial keystone or was only
coming after them in a blind rage. Kade shrieked, "There's no time. Go on. I'd
do it for you."
She was right. He said "Damn you," took the keystone out of her hand, kissed
her hard on the mouth, and ran.
Thomas ducked around the milling groups of creatures that were still panicked
by the ward, forcing himself not to look back. He found the right pillar in
moments and saw that the clay seal a foot or so above its base had been
recently replaced. He reached down just as something struck him from behind.
Claws dug into his back, parting the leather of his buff coat, and he spun
around and slammed the creature and his full weight into the stone pillar. Its
hold loosened and Thomas wrenched away. Turning, he stabbed the dazed spriggan
and shoved it out of the way.
Dropping to his knees, Thomas broke the clay seal with the heel of his hand.
He dug into the soft dirt and his fingers found the stone buried within, but
it seemed to slip away as he tried to get a grip on it. He swore, and shifted
against the pillar to reach deeper into the niche. Finally he caught the stone
and pulled it out. Flinging it away, he shoved the old keystone into the
niche, wondering if it was going to struggle to escape too. But it seemed to
slide out of his hand and into the proper spot of its own volition. Thomas sat
back and became aware that the entire room was silent.
He looked up. In that whole great chamber it seemed that not a single fay was
moving. All were arrested in midaction by a sound or a sight only they could
hear. All except one.
Evadne was coming toward him, shoving his motionless companions out of the
way.
Thomas picked up his rapier and stood.
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
391
Kade had led Evadne and the others in a chase toward the opposite end of the
cellar, stopping only when she could put one of the pillars at her back. She
had felt Ableon-Indis's withdrawal and knew she hadn't much time. She threw a
handful of glamour at the nearest snarling bogle to give herself room, then
whispered a spell of blinding. The sorcery had greater effect on the creatures
of Fayre than it did on humans, and the nearest of the Host screeched and
stumbled away as the mist of sightlessness settled over them. The mist
dispersed rapidly, and as a large and hideous water-fay bore down on her, she
thought frantically for another spell.
Then her ears popped and she felt the ether tremble around her. The nearest
fay were staring at her, the others gazing about in astonishment. He did ft,
she thought. The old keystone was regaining control of the wards, and the Host
could feel the enmity in the etheric structure re-forming around the palace.
To those nearest her Kade said, "You'd better leave, before you're trapped
here forever. If you aren't already."
The dark fay erupted into sound and motion as one, plunging away from her,
taking to the air, running screaming across the floor toward the steps. Kade
leaned against one of the pillars, weak from relief, then realized Evadne was
nowhere to be seen.
The Host was dispersing in panic. Some charged up the stairs while the
flighted fay rose into the air, running into the pillars and each other in
their confusion.
Thomas couldn't see Kade anymore. He put his back against the pillar. If
Evadne tore the keystone out it would be all undone.
Evadne broke through the milling fay and charged at him, his long arms
reaching. Thomas ducked and swept his sword up. The fay was too quick and
dodged back, aiming a fist at him.
The blow caught Thomas in the shoulder and knocked
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MARTHA WELLS
him sprawling into the pavement. He rolled over, tasting blood, dazed for a
moment. Evadne was standing over him, and the fay's burned flesh hung in
ribbons and the death's-head grimace of his mouth below the childishly
petulant eyes was terrible. The fay was hesitating, obviously torn between the
desire to kill Thomas immediately and the need to rip the keystone out of its
niche. Thomas struggled to stand and got no farther than his knees.
Something distracted Evadne. He cocked his ruined head, then turned in a
crouch. Urbain Grandier stood at the bottom of the steps. Thomas had not seen
him come down either; the old man might have materialized out of the air.
Evadne straightened his tall frame slowly and said, "You betrayed me,
sorcerer."
Grandier began to come toward them, his steps unhurried. "Did I?"
"But I betrayed you."
Grandier stopped. His expression had not changed, but something in the very
stillness in which he stood there was daunting.
Evadne's grin was terrible. "I bargained with your creature Dontane to destroy
you. The human prince you sought to put on the throne would have given me
everything I wanted."
Grandier sighed. "That hardly surprises me."
Evadne's look of disappointment would have been comical on any creature less
maimed and ruined. Thomas crawled back to the pillar and leaned against the
niche concealing the keystone. Grandier would have no difficulty in killing
him and taking it away, but he meant to keep it in place as long as he could.
If Kade hadn't managed to kill herself for him, it would give her more time to
escape. The fay wheeling around in the air overhead were moving with purpose
now. At the far end of the great cellar they were whipping themselves into
some kind of frenzy, flying in a great circle around one of the pillars. A
wind was rising out of nowhere in the chamber.
Grandier shook his head, his features twisting for a moment in disgust. He
said, "And what has your scheming gotten
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
393
you?" His voice rose. "There is an army at the gates! A human army with iron
and sorcerers to destroy you, and an army of the Seelie Court waits for you in
the air."
Thomas realized it was the first time he had ever seen Grandier show anger.
Evadne snarled, "They cannot destroy ..." He stopped as the pillar the fay
were circling on the far side of the chamber suddenly shattered into dust.
More fay were joining the circle and others on the floor below were being
swept up into it. And disappearing. The Host was forming a ring, Thomas
realized, and remembered the broken foundation in the Grand Gallery. They were
going to bring the ceiling down.
"Command your Host then; gather your court!" Grandier gestured contemptuously
at the fleeing creatures, at the ring forming in the air. "Could you not
control your greed for a few days? Could you not have waited until we won to
betray me?" He turned his back, as if he were unable to look at the product of
his own folly anymore.
He's speaking to Denzil, Thomas thought. Denzil, who was very good at causing
chaos but not so practiced at bringing order out of it. Grandier had betrayed
Evadne as well, or tried to: he must know he had no right to expect loyalty
from a prince of the Unseelie Court. It was the defection of his human allies
that maddened him. And if Thomas was correctly interpreting the expression on
the fay's ruined face, Evadne did not understand one word in three.
Evadne shook his head, "lies again. I made you, sorcerer." His voice dripped
contempt. "And I'll destroy you."
Evadne started forward. Grandier turned, his hand moving suddenly, throwing
something. Evadne started back, raising his arms to protect his face in
surprised anger. Yes, Grandier still kept his pocket of iron filings.
Then the sorcerer raised his hands, speaking softly.
Evadne shook his head and raked a hand across his face, leaving bloody streaks
where the filings had touched him. He said, "And what do you intend to do to
me, old man?"
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MARTHA WELLS
This creature has no sense of self-preservation, Thomas thought in wonder.
"I'm going to turn your blood to iron," Grandier told him, and his voice held
no anger. "It's a spell I prepared for just such an occasion as this, a
derivative of a common alchemical process, which you would know if you studied
sorcery."
"I gave you your power," Evadne said. He smiled at the old man. "Destroy me
and you will lose it. You will be trapped in this shape forever."
Grandier hesitated, watching the fay prince, then he made a sharp gesture and
Evadne froze just as he made to move forward. The sorcerer walked to him, and
as he moved past the silent fay he pushed him. The corpse fell and broke into
dust as it struck the floor.
The Host was disappearing rapidly now, the ring a wild circle of airborne
stones, splintered wood, mangled fay bodies, and other debris. Thomas leaned
back against the pillar and looked up at Grandier as the sorcerer reached him.
"Well," he said, "What now?"
"I still have no regrets." Grandier smiled. His seamed face showed all the
weight of his own years as well as Galen Dubell's. "Except perhaps my choice
of allies."
"And your choice of enemies?" Kade was leaning next to the pillar at Thomas's
side. He hadn't seen her approach and felt a surge of relief so intense it was
painful. Grandier watched her a moment, then smiled and said, "Yes, that as
well."
"So Villon's troop is here," Thomas said. Trying to keep his attention on
Grandier, he didn't look up at Kade.
"Yes." Grandier nodded. "Denzil thought the General would hold Bel Garde and
attack from there. He did not. He entered the city late this afternoon and is
now attempting to force St. Anne's Gate."
Avilergot through, and Villon decided to risk an assault rather than be
trapped in Bel Garde, Thomas thought. And you think he's forcing St. Anne's
Gate, butAviler can tell him that with the Gate House unmanned, the Postern is
indefensi-
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
395
ble. Raising his voice to be heard over the howling wind, he said, "Why aren't
you trying to stop him?"
"I came to stop Kade from replacing the keystone, and to summon the Host."
Grandier could still take the keystone, but he made no move to do so. The wind
was tearing at their hair, taking their breath away. Grandier squinted into
it, then shook his head regretfully. "I fear you and the High Minister were
correct. Despite all my experience with violence and treachery, I am still
politically naive."
Thomas couldn't see Galen Dubell in that lined and weary face anymore, as if
it were no longer a disguise, as if Grandier himself was actually completely
present in that shell for the first time.
Kade said, "You killed one of my only friends, and I'll never forgive you."
Grandier's calm eyes went to her. "I cannot argue with that sentiment."
Thomas asked, "What will you do now?"
Grandier looked startled. Then his knees buckled and he started to collapse,
his thin form giving way like an empty sack. Thomas caught him as the old man
sagged against the flagstones, and as Grandier slumped over forward he saw the
bloody gaping hole in his back.
He looked up, automatically tracing the line of fire, and saw Denzil on the
second tier of steps, handing a smoking musket to an Alsene trooper. They had
heard nothing; the musket's blast had been carried away in the wind caused by
the ring and the Host's departure.
Kade was crouching beside Thomas, her face white and drawn in the rapidly
shifting light. The trooper was handing Denzil another loaded musket. Thomas
pushed Grandier's body aside and stood, dragging Kade with him, and put the
pillar between them and DenziTs line of fire. "They'll come down here after
us. We have to . . ."
Kade shook her head. "It's too late." He could barely hear her over the
growing roar of the wind.
There was a crash that reverberated through the stone
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MARTHA WELLS
beneath them. The swirling mass of the ring seemed to lose its structure as
the last of the Host winked out of existence, and it flung out a deadly hail
of rocks and splintered wood. Then it drifted crazily, moving sideways toward
them across the large chamber. The troopers on the stairway panicked, bolting
back up to the entrance. Looking back around the pillar Thomas saw Denzil
hesitate a moment, cradling the fresh musket, before the rain of debris moved
nearer and he too retreated up the stairs.
They couldn't escape that way without being felled by the flying rubble. Even
the keystone pillar was no longer providing decent cover, and Thomas winced as
a stinging deluge of splinters struck them. He pulled Kade closer and felt her
arm go around his waist.
A section of the ceiling collapsed almost above them, fell into the ring, and
was pulverized into dust instantly. The pillars shuddered as the ring brushed
against them, the forces that drove it pressing outward at the stone, and
chunks began to fall out of the far wall. The ring tilted on its axis, falling
toward the cellar floor, directly over their heads.
Then they were in the empty cold silence of the Grand Gallery. Thomas stumbled
and caught himself on one of the broken boulders. He would never get used to
this form of travel. He let Kade steady him, and they made their way to the
edge of the ring and climbed out onto the cold dirty tiles.
Kade sat down abruptly, as if her legs had suddenly given out, and after a
moment Thomas did too. Out the broken windows of the terrace they could see
Alsene troops running awkwardly in the deep snow across the park. There was a
burst of pistol fire and two of them spun and fell, roses of blood growing
around them in the snow.
Thomas looked at Kade, sitting so close, with her hair in wild disarray, and
wondered what it would be like to kiss her when he didn't think he was going
to die. So he took her chin gently and turned her face toward him and did.
He had started to draw back when her hand in his hair stopped him and her
mouth stopped his chuckle.
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
397
There were shouts and musket fire from somewhere inside the Gallery Wing now.
Kade jumped to her feet. "Come with me."
Thomas looked involuntarily toward the silent fayre ring in the Grand
Gallery's floor and decided that with sufficient motivation he could grow used
to anything. Then he noticed that his hands were still speckled with
Grandier's blood and thought of Denzil, and Ravenna. Not now, he thought. For
a moment the words stuck in his throat, then he said, "I can't."
He hadn't expected her to react like anyone else, and she didn't disappoint
him. She smiled. "It's not that easy." And she stepped back into the ring and
disappeared.
THE WIND HAD changed direction and emptied the night sky of clouds; stars were
visible for the first time in days.
Lord General Villon had set up a command post on the siege wall of St. Anne's
Gate, under the light of lamps and torches placed all along the high
crenelated battlement. Thomas leaned on an embrasure and watched as the old
General paced up and down and consulted with his officers through the couriers
who were continuously reporting in. The snow and ice were melting rapidly and
it was warmer now than it had been at twilight.
Villon had wanted to bring Roland back into the city as soon as possible. His
men were clearing the palace of any remaining fay and Alsene troops, with the
help of the sorcerers from Lodun who had arrived at nightfall just after
Villon. It was Grandier's manipulation of the weather that had drawn their
attention and brought them to investigate. Lodun had never received any of the
messages Ravenna had sent out before the attack.
Thomas didn't know where Roland was and hadn't asked. He knew the young King
had been taken to some secured place inside the city wall. Falaise was at the
Bishop's Palace; he had approved Gideon's suggestion that she be taken there a
few hours ago. Some of the court at least had returned, and the rest of his
own men and the Albon Knights were here helping to hunt down the last of the
Alsene troops.
Fire occasionally blossomed in the dark canyons that were
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
399
the streets of the city below: the lamps and torches of patrols or of
townspeople hesitantly venturing out. They expected reinforcement in the form
of the royal garrison at Portier to arrive sometime in the morning. Villon had
learned that frantic messengers from the mayor of a village on the trade road
had been sent there and to the Granges, bearing confused tidings of a massive
attack.
Thomas had deliberately removed himself from the action. He had been with
Villon for the past few hours, answering questions and directing them to the
areas where Denzil's men might be concealed. Now he was merely waiting.
Recently he had noticed that time seemed to be passing in short stretches
bordered by periods of less-than-coherent thought, and that his only support
was the rough stone of the battlement. At one point he noticed that Berham was
standing next to him, and had apparently been there for some time.
There was a new flurry of activity along the wall as Villon's cornet officer
arrived with Conadine, one of the Lodun sorcerers. After a long consultation
with them, Villon turned and came toward him. The General was a small man,
half a head shorter than Thomas, with graying dark hair. He had been one of
Ravenna's oldest friends, having grown up with her on her father's country
residence. Villon said, "They've taken our good Duke of Alsene. He's confessed
to Aviler."
Thomas was not so far gone that he misinterpreted the General's expression.
"And?"
"He's embellished somewhat, trying to make it look as though it were a
misunderstanding—that's to be expected. But he also says he killed the
sorcerer Urbain Grandier. Conadine truth-tested him, and he's not lying."
Thomas looked away at the night-shrouded city that was slowly creeping out of
hiding. "I know."
Villon nodded. "Of course, we look at it and say he's cutting his losses. It's
only sense for a man to dispose of his confederates when a plot like this goes
wrong. But the boy won't see it that way."
Roland had always been "the boy" to Villon. Still looking
400
MARTHA WELLS
out at the city Thomas said, "Denzil sent the Unseelie Court to take Roland
prisoner and kill Ravenna."
"No, Grandier did." Villon was not arguing the point, but stating the facts as
Roland would see them. "But he made a mistake in not killing Aviler. There's
no getting around the point that Denzil brought a private troop into the city
for the purpose of forcibly removing a High Minister from his home, killing a
number of city guardsmen engaged in dieir rightful duty, not to mention a
great lot of folk who were driven out into the street and killed by those
demon creatures. And he didn't put that troop at the King's disposal, but used
it for his own business which involved imprisoning warranted officers of the
crown." Villon shook his head. "If Ravenna were alive I'd order the scaffold
built. As it is ... There was only one hope, but too many people saw us take
him alive. He made sure of that."
Thomas felt Villon expected a response, so he said, "He would."
The General's gaze went to the city. "You can't help us anymore tonight. Go
back to the Guard House."
After a moment, Thomas smiled. "You're bringing Roland back to the palace and
you want me out of the way."
"She taught you everything she ever knew, didn't she? Everything the boy
should have learned." Villon sighed. "Do you think you can control your desire
for martyrdom and let me manage this?"
Desire for martyrdom? Thomas thought. "I don't have to be here, you know. I
had two better offers."
"That's not an answer."
"Of course it is." Thomas pushed away from the wall and turned to leave.
"The boy won't think so," Villon called after him.
Thomas decided to walk along the wall as far as he could before going down to
the courts below. The sky was beautiful. Berham was following him, and Thomas
noted the servant still had the two pistols he had given him the night of the
first
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
401
attack. When they had walked awhile Thomas said, "I'm going to send you and
Phaistus over to Renier."
"Respectfully, Sir, I'm a forgetful man, and I don't think I could remember
that I was Lord Renier's servant after all the years of being yours, so if I
were asked..." Berham shrugged. "I would just have to speak my mind."
"That was a very gentle threat." Thomas smiled to himself.
"I don't know what you mean, Captain."
The wind picked up, cool but without the frozen edge that took the breath
away. They walked along in silence for a time, then Thomas suggested, "You
could get yourself up as a highwayman and terrorize the trade road."
Berham chuckled. "There's a thought; there's a thought indeed."
Even though the Old Courts had been taken over by the Host shortly after the
evacuation, the Queen's Guard House had not been much disturbed. Thomas
wondered if the sigils Kade had put on the cornerposts had been more effective
than she had realized. As he came into the entryway, he could see that the
lamps were lit in the practice hall, and there were Queen's and a few of the
remaining Cisternan guards there. Out of the original hundred and twenty men
in the Queen's Guard, over seventy had survived, and that was more than he had
expected. Deciding to avoid the occupied areas of the house, Thomas trudged
wearily up the side stairs.
Phaistus was in the anteroom, building up a fire in the hearth there. The
bedchamber beyond was musty and cold. Thomas stripped off his buff coat and
what was left of the doublet beneath, left them in a ragged bloodstained pile,
and sat down on the bed. After a moment he fell over backward and stared at
the underside of the tester.
He fell into a kind of half-conscious doze, only dimly aware of Berham and
Phaistus rustling familiarly around the room and laying a fire in the hearth.
He said "ouch" quite distinctly when Berham pulled his
402
MARTHA WELLS
boots off. The servant leaned over him a moment, then said, "Is there
something you want us to see to?"
Thomas shook his head. He heard the door shut as the two servants left, and in
moments he was asleep.
It must have been hours later when he opened his eyes and Kade was kneeling on
the bed, leaning over him. She grinned and said, "Surprise."
Eventually Thomas brushed a tendril of hair back from her forehead and said,
"It's a long time since I've been with a woman who giggles."
Despite the awkwardness of mutual bruises, cuts, and claw-marks, they were
good together. There wasn't any other woman he would have felt comfortable
making love to in this condition, but there wasn't any other woman who would
have pounced on him like that either. He had been trying to decide what would
be worse: a taste of what the next twenty years could have been like, or never
knowing at all. He was glad she had taken the decision out of his hands.
"Don't brag," Kade said, smiling. "I know there have been hundreds of others."
"Not quite hundreds."
There was a scratch at the door and Berham's voice whispered harshly,
"Captain, there's a couple of Albons downstairs. They were sent to tell you
the King's giving an audience and he wants you there."
Couldn't he have waited one damn day? was Thomas's first thought. Reluctantly,
he rolled off the bed, found his clothes, and started to dress.
Kade sat up and pulled her smock on over her head, then watched him quietly.
When he sat down on the bed to get his boots on she said, "Leave with me."
One boot halfway on, Thomas stopped. The words "all right" were on the tip of
his tongue. "I can't."
"Ravenna's gone. There's nothing left for you here."
"I have that lovely offer from Falaise."
"Listen to yourself. You know she's afraid of you."
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
403
He finished pulling his boots on. "That makes the situation perfect then,
doesn't it."
"That's not what you want."
He couldn't ask her how she knew what he wanted, when it was all too obvious
that she did know.
After a moment, Kade said, "I don't know exactly what I'm going to do, after
giving up Knockma. I have other places and my household—well, you met Boliver;
they're all mostly like that, except some of them are human. We argue
sometimes but we never try to kill each other and no one's terribly ambitious,
which is why they live with me, I suppose. What I'm trying to say is it
wouldn't be like here at all, if you're as sick of this place as I think you
are, and I hope you are, because I think I'm going to have some difficulty
living without you."
"I'm not going to make any promises I can't keep." There was a muffled crash
from the next room. Thomas grabbed the scabbarded rapier hanging over the
bedpost and went to the door. He opened it a crack and saw Berham and Phaistus
looking out the far door onto the landing. Thomas stepped out. "What is it'"
"Nothing, nothing." Berham looked back. "One of the Albons thought he should
deliver his message in person, Sir, but some of the men pointed out that he
was mistaken."
"Did they throw him down the stairs?"
"A tittle, yes."
Thomas shook his head, and stepped back into the bedroom. Kade was gone, and
one of the high windows was open, the morning breeze stirring the curtains.
The court was held in a hall on the ground floor of the King's Bastion. It was
relatively undamaged, except for marks of smoke and water where the walls
joined the high sculpted ceiling. Massive panelled paintings hung on the
walls, views of the canal city of Chaire. Standing in the center of the room
was like standing on the Mont Chappelle and looking down at the beautiful
ancient city.
The audience was small: Villon's officers, and men from
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the city troops that had come out of hiding, the courtiers who had returned
from Bel Garde with Roland. Thomas was glad to see the Count of Duncanny in
attendance. His party had not been able to make it out of the city but had
taken refuge in one of the fortresslike great houses and survived almost
intact.
Albon knights lined the walls and were posted next to the doors. Thomas went
to join Villon. Without looking at him the old General said, "Don't expect
much."
A worn and haggard Aviler was pacing in front of the chair prepared for
Roland. Falaise was already present, seated in an armchair near the front of
the room but to one side, so the focus was on the tapestry-draped chair
waiting for the King. That was Avtter's touch, Thomas was sure. Renter would
not have thought of it.
Gideon and Martin and several other Queen's guards stood around the Queen's
chair. He knew from the way Gideon kept trying to catch his eye that they were
wondering why he didn't join them, but he was not going to unless Falaise
ordered it.
The door at the front of the room opened and Roland and Renier entered,
followed by more Albons. Thomas was surprised to see Ravenna's gentlewoman
Elaine in the King's entourage, but only for a moment. She had learned
survival from the best.
As Roland took his seat Aviler stepped back to the side, waiting with folded
arms. At the King's nod, he motioned to one of the knights.
Roland's eyes were dark hollows in his white, drawn face. He held his cloak
pulled around him tightly, though the hall was almost warm.
There was a stirring at the back of the room, then the crowd parted for a
group of Albons and Thomas felt his nerves go taut.
The knights were escorting Denzil, of course.
They crossed the room in silence except for the click of their boots on the
parquet floor and stopped before Roland's chair. The Duke of Alsene wore a
court doublet in somber
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405
colors, and his arm was no longer in a sling. He looked less weary than
Roland, but then, after his capture, Denzil had probably been able to sleep
through the night.
Surprisingly, the King spoke first. He said, "It was all true." His voice was
soft, but clearly audible in the room so silent a loud heartbeat could have
been heard.
Denzil said, "My lord . . ."
"I did not give you permission to speak."
Denzil waited, watching Roland.
"You plotted with the sorcerer Urbain Grandier." Roland closed his eyes.
"Against me."
The gesture might have looked like a theatrical one, to someone who didn't
know the actors. Roland was in real pain. The young King looked up suddenly
and said, "My mother was killed."
For the first time there was a response from the crowd, a low whisper of
comment that was hardly more audible than a wind stirring summer leaves.
Thomas knew they were thinking that it had broken Roland. Aviler swayed as if
to move forward, then stopped himself. It was a curiously moving gesture of
restraint; the High Minister was going to trust that Roland hadn't gone mad,
and would not attempt to control what the King said in an open audience.
Roland fingered the carved chair arm, and his eyes went to Denzil. "Many
people were killed. Someone should die for that."
Thomas realized he was holding his breath.
Denzil was as still as a statue, and almost as pale, but he didn't look away
from the young King's hollow eyes. Thomas knew that people were remembering
the two had grown up together, though Denzil was older.
Roland shifted in his chair suddenly, looking away. "The sorcerer Grandier is
dead. Most of the traitors are dead. The charter of the troop of the Duchy of
Alsene is to be torn up, the survivors disbanded, their arms taken, and they
will not be allowed to form again under those colors on pain of death. The men
who hold Officers' commissions in the Troop of
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MARTHA WELLS
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407
Alsene will be ordered executed as traitors, for the act of treason against
the crown and the Ministry. Any of the lords of Alsene found in the palace
taking part in the conspiracy will be ordered executed as traitors, on the
same charge. Denzil Fontainon Alsene, Duke of Alsene, is ... is ordered . . ."
Roland did not look at Denzil, or anyone else. His gaze was locked on the
pastel haze in a painting of a harbor skyline. The silence stretched, but no
one in the crowd made the slightest sound of inattention. The King closed his
eyes to shut out some vision other than die painting, and said, "Is ordered
banished from our borders . . ," He hesitated again, as if he heard himself
speaking and wondered at it. Then he continued, "Forever. On pain of death."
Thomas realized that Villon had moved to his other side and was now
companionably holding his sword arm. It wasn't necessary. He didn't move.
Roland stood and left the room in a flurry of robes, his attendants closing in
around him. The crowd began to talk and mill around, speaking softly at first
and then more loudly as tension began to ease. Villon said, "For a moment I
thought . . ." He shook his head, wry bitterness in his eyes. "My days of
service won't last much longer, and I can't say that I'm sorry."
The General had let go of Thomas's arm, so he started making his way up toward
the front of the hall. Halfway there Aviler met him. The High Minister looked
haggard but also energized. He had probably done more of his lifers work in
the past day than he ever had since first taking office. He said, "Denzil has
three days to leave the city. That's not much time. We need to talk."
"No," Thomas said.
Aviler looked blank. "You mean, not here?"
"I mean, not at all." Before he could move on, he saw Renier coming toward
them, using his bulk to part the milling crowd.
He reached them and said, "The King wants a private audience with you,
Thomas."
"Good." He followed Renier to the front of the room, conscious of Aviler and
Villon watching him.
The door at the back of the hall led to a short maze of old council rooms, all
crowded wiui Albon knights, servants, and court functionaries. Thomas
recognized no one, conscious of them only as blurs of color and noise.
Eventually they reached a chamber with wide double-panel doors standing open
and another contingent of knights guarding it.
Thomas followed Renier inside and saw it was a large parlor with arabesque
wallpapers, thick carpets, and heavy brocaded furniture. There was a fire in a
hearth with a mantel supported by two carved-marble nymphs, and all the
candles were lit. Roland sat in one of the armchairs, staring unseeing at the
far wall.
Renter said, "My lord . . ."
Roland looked up, his eyes focusing, and said, "Thank you. Everyone else go."
Some of the knights stepped out immediately, but the others lingered, looking
to Renier for direction. Thomas knew they were not easy with the idea of
leaving him alone with Roland, and was almost amused to see that Renier
apparently shared their opinion. What surprised him was that Roland realized
it as well.
As Renier started to speak, Roland stood suddenly and shouted, "Get out!"
The other men moved reluctantly, and Roland crossed the room and flung the
heavy carved doors shut after them. The sudden movement seemed to almost
exhaust him then, and he dropped into the nearest chair and buried his face in
his hands.
Thomas simply stood there, not discomfited by the display, and waited for
Roland to recover himself. He looked around the room and was startled to
notice a portrait of Ful-stan in the far comer. It was a good likeness of
Roland's father in his early middle age, and it had probably been moved from
some other more prominent location and buried away here, as
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MARTHA WELLS
all the portraits of Fulstan were eventually buried away somewhere.
Roland had looked up and noticed what had caught his attention. He looked at
the portrait for a long moment himself, then said, "He hated you."
"He hated everyone," Thomas answered.
Roland sat very still for a time, then looked away. He said, "My Queen has
given me to know that she wishes you to remain as Captain of her guard. I
agree."
Roland would allow Denzil to return. Not today, or this month, but perhaps
before the year was out. If Denzil had killed Ravenna with his own hands, if
Roland had actually seen him casually ordering the destruction of Villon's
troops, then it might have been different. But the ties between them were too
strong, Denzil was too seasoned a manipulator, and Roland was still too
enmeshed in self-hatred to break the link for good. The boy had proved that to
himself and everyone else in the audience hall. But now he knew what his
lifelong Mend was capable of, and in time he might manage to break free.
But Roland was a King, and could not be allowed the time.
"That won't be necessary, Your Majesty," Thomas said. "I'm resigning my
commission."
Roland's head jerked up. His hands trembling on the arms of the chair, he
asked sharply, "Why?"
Thomas needed to get away now, before Roland changed his mind. He said, "Your
mother would have wanted it this way," bowed, and went out, closing the door
behind him. Roland made no attempt to call him back.
Thomas passed Renter without speaking and made his way back through the
passages. Roland already knew what was going to happen. The only one who
thankfully hadn't realized it was Kade. She had been away from court too long
and must have believed that Denzil would die for his crimes. And so he will,
Thomas thought. So he will.
Denzil was still in the hall. The knights were grouped
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409
loosely around him, and he was watching the crowd with folded arms, smiling
faintly.
Thomas went up to him, ignoring the knights who tensed watchfully and the
stares from the others in the room. He said, "We have a long-delayed
appointment." All Denzil had to do was refuse. Refuse and walk away alive,
free to use all the persuasive powers at his command on an oversensitive
boy-king who had lost his only companion and his mother in one blow, to trade
on old love and loyalty to work his way back into Roland's trust. But he has
always been greedy, Thomas thought, and he wants me badfy.
Denzil hesitated, watching him, weighing chances, opportunities, desires. If
Roland could have seen that look in the eyes of a man who should be nearly
broken by the sentence of banishment from a childhood friend . . . But that
was something Denzil would be far too clever to allow. He nodded. "Is that how
it is?" he asked lightly. "Do you want to challenge me or should I challenge
you?"
The room was silent now. "It doesn't matter," Thomas said, and thought, Now
I've either gotten what I wanted or handed him the pleasure of kitting me on
top of all his other victories.
"Very well then. Now, no seconds, and out in the court."
"Agreed."
Thomas started for the double doors at the end of the room without waiting to
see what Denzil did. There was a rising murmur of comment among the people
still in the hall. Gideon caught up with him on the steps and said, "Captain,
what's . , ."
Thomas interrupted, "The Queen will give you the appointment You know as much
as I can teach you now; the rest you'll do on your own. Just be careful and
don't trust anyone, especially Falaise."
He went out into the wide paved court between the bastion and the Mews. The
clouds had drawn over the sky again
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and it was raining a light drizzle that slicked the paving stones and covered
everything with a fine coating of moisture.
The Duke and his escort came out into the court, but they still had to wait
while DenziTs swords were sent for. Thomas paced to keep bruised and strained
muscles loose and felt a tense excitement building in him despite, or perhaps
because of, the prospect of imminent death.
He thought of Roland sitting alone in that beautiful unused room, waiting for
the news. The young King would not stop the duel but if Thomas won, and that
outcome was much in doubt, he would not forgive him for it either. Burn the
bridges after you cross them, not before, Ravenna would say. He had lied to
Roland: he didn't know if Ravenna would have wanted it this way or not. To the
end, she had always been capable of surprising him. But with Kade or without
her, he couldn't live with himself if Denzil survived this.
A crowd was gathering of Albons, Villon's men, Queen's guards, the servants
and courtiers who had returned with Roland and Falaise. A servant brought the
Duke's weapons finally, a swept-hilt rapier and main gauche. Both were
utilitarian dueling weapons, with silver-chased hilts and no ornamentation.
Thomas wailed while the Duke examined the blades, then drew his own weapons
and moved out into the open area of the court. Denzil wore a tight smile; he
had nothing to lose by this and he knew it.
They circled each other. The first exchange of blows was light, testing.
Denzil was strong and quick, and he had excellent instincts.
And excellent training. Thomas countered a feint and lunge that should have
punctured his shoulder and left his sword arm useless. Wanting to see if
something unorthodox would rattle the younger man, Thomas parried the next
thrust with a broad sweep of his rapier and stepped in to attack with his main
gauche. It surprised Denzil but he recovered in time to parry with his own
offhand weapon.
They were both more careful after that, and in the steady
THE ELEMENT OF FIRE
411
exchange of blows that followed, Thomas felt the duel taking on a rhythm. They
were evenly matched, but he was feeling the fatigue of the past four days, and
the knot of scar tissue the elf-shot had left behind in his leg was starting
its persistent ache. If Denzil felt any lingering effects from the pistol
wound in his shoulder that Grandier had healed, he didn't reveal it
Denzil made a hard lunge and Thomas struck the blade away. He realized an
instant later that the parry had not been strong enough as he felt the steel
slip past his right side. Denzil whipped the forte of the blade against
Thomas's ribs and pulled sharply back. Thomas felt the cut opening in his side
even as he stepped away from it and brought his sword up in a thrust.
hi his eagerness Denzil had overbalanced himself and stumbled, his parry
turning into a desperate block with the hilt. The tip of Thomas's rapier
caught in the bars of the swept hilt and was trapped for an instant. Thomas
slipped on die wet cobblestones and fell as Denzil wrenched the hilt free.
Denzil recovered first and lunged at Thomas's chest as he was trying to stand,
but Thomas twisted away and the point struck the ground behind his back. He
rolled back onto the blade, jerking it out of Denzil's grip, his weight
snapping it.
Thomas rolled to his feet. Denzil backed away, wiping his face with his
sleeve, then he looked at the watching crowd and yelled, "Another sword." His
glove was torn and his hand bled from where the point had caught him.
Thomas picked up his own rapier and saw that the tip was broken off. He walked
back toward the crowd, shaking the rain-soaked hair out of his face, trying
not to press a hand to his side where he could feel the blood soaking through
his shirt. The blade hadn't bitten too deeply, but it was more than enough to
slow him down.
He handed the broken weapon to Berham and took the cup-hilted rapier Gideon
was holding out to him. Their stricken expressions said it all.
There was some movement in the crowd, someone pushing through the group of
anxiously watching guards, then
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suddenly Kade was standing in front of him. She was barefoot again, and with
her ragged dress and disarrayed hair, she could have been some wilder variety
of nymph. Except her gray eyes were too human, angry and afraid at the same
time. Thomas said, "I thought you'd gone."
She said, "I'm half fay, but I'm not a fool. I've been up on the roof of the
Guard House. I was going to wait you out, but Phaistus came and told me."
Thomas glanced up in time to see the young servant quickly retreating behind
Gideon. He looked back down at Kade.
Almost pleading, she said, "Can't you just let me kill him, or have someone
shoot him, and then we could go?"
"No. 1 have to do this,"
"But I could . . ."
He put a finger over her lips. "No. It has to be this way. You said you'd do
it for rne, remember?"
She shook her head, anger temporarily winning out. "Fine. If I'd known you
were going to do something like this, I'd have let you stand there and take on
all the Unseelie Court and be killed."
"Fine. But if he wins, I want you to hurt him very badly before you kill him."
"I will. Very badly."
He turned and walked back to the center of the open area. Denzil was waiting
for him with an unguarded expression of grim rage. Good, Thomas thought. He's
angry; that'll help. He was only exhausted and bleeding. Denzil had probably
never faced an opponent in a serious duel who was as good or better than he
was, and the young Duke was responding to it with anger. Falaise had come out
onto the steps of the bastion and was watching with her ladies and some of,
her guards around her. She lifted a hand to him, and Thomas saluted her with
his sword, then turned back to the waiting Duke.
Denzil came at him furiously, but was not foolish enough to leave himself
open. For a time Thomas was aware of nodi-ing but his screaming muscles, of
the flickering danger of the
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413
blades, of the blood pounding in his ears. He could see that Denzil's face was
white and strained, that he was tiring too. The rain was coming down harder
now and they were both slipping on the wet stones, and Thomas knew another
fall would finish him.
Then they both lunged at the same moment. Thomas disengaged and circled his
rapier around Denzil's blade, twisting his wrist as he sent the point home
with his remaining strength. He felt the point of tine other rapier graze his
arm even as he moved, felt it open a line of fire across his biceps as it went
toward his chest; then it dropped away. It wasn't until he stumbled back and
felt the resistance on his own blade before it came free that he realized what
had happened.
Denzil was on his knees, one hand pressed to his chest with blood spreading
between his fingers. Thomas stepped back, waiting.
It had been a clean blow, right to the heart. Denzil tried once to lake a
breath, his cold eyes fixed on nothing and already going blank, then he
slumped forward onto the wet pavement.
Thomas dropped his sword and walked back to where Kade and the others waited.
He stopped in front of her, trembling with exhaustion and feeling cold and
empty. She shook her head, ran a hand through her tangled hair, and looked up
at him. Meeting her eyes, the feeling of emptiness fled.
Impatient, her voice weak with relief, Kade said, "Now can we go?"
"Yes, now we can go."