The Dagger of Adendigaeth (A Pattern of Shadow & Light) (69 page)

Ean didn’t know what to say. The tragedy of it was beyond words.

“But these are grim thoughts for so joyous a night,” Björn declared, brightening as he turned his gaze back to Ean. “Go now. Be merry. Use your reformed bond to find my sister and enjoy this night of rebirth together. The Solstice must be strictly observed,” he added with a wink, and Ean wondered what other Solstice traditions he might be referring to.

“Thank you, my lord,” Ean said. He felt immensely indebted to him now that he better understood all that he had done—all that he continued to do. For being willing to be hated and feared, for taking on such a staggering responsibility because no one else would have.

Björn smiled, nodded once, a simple acknowledgement that yet conveyed so much.

Overwhelmed with gratitude, Ean bowed and left. To save himself from falling into the despairing hole of guilt he could see looming on his horizon, however, he quickly turned his thoughts to Isabel. No sooner did he think of her than he could feel her, confident in her presence within the pattern that bound them.

Gratefully single-minded on his mission then, Ean headed into the city to blend in with the thousands who celebrated there. Isabel’s presence was a steady pulse drawing him forth, and he never erred in choosing his direction, for he knew instinctively what roads to follow.

Indeed, he walked the jammed streets as Ramu so often did, clearing a path for himself by the force of his intention alone.

He found her by the fountain where Ramu had told him of Trell. She
stood watching a troop of acrobats in a wild display of skill and strength. When Ean arrived at her side, nine men had formed a pyramid standing on each other’s shoulders, most of them juggling flaming torches.

She turned at his arrival, looking joyous and serene, and extended her hand to him. He pressed his lips to her palm and gazed miraculously at her. “My lady, you take my breath away.”

“Tis only fitting since you have my heart.” 

Ean shook his head and wondered what he could’ve done to so please the gods that Isabel became his reward. “Where is Dagmar?” he murmured after a moment, for he realized the man had left her side.

“There.” She pointed to the acrobats. Ean followed her finger to find Dagmar at the base of the pyramid of men, himself helping to balance three others. “He couldn’t resist,” Isabel explained with an endearing smile aimed at the Nodefinder.

A crowd of revelers rushed behind them suddenly, knocking Ean against Isabel, who clung closely to him as she laughed. Overhead the stars glowed brightly, and all around the world seemed in motion.

“My lord, my lady!” A girl rushed up to them holding two candles. “Tis almost the hour!” She pushed the candles into their hands and then ran back to her partner, a large man who carried a tray of small tin buckets jammed with candlesticks.

Isabel pressed closer to Ean and turned her face to the candles in their hands. Both wicks suddenly flamed to life. She lifted her head as if to gaze deeply into his eyes, and Ean imagined he could see her adoring expression as she whispered, “To reunion.”

He touched his candle to hers, too blissful to speak. The onlookers burst into applause as the acrobats finished their act. They were just in time, for across the entire city, bells began ringing, resounding through streets, echoing off towers and spires and in the hearts of all who heard them.

The crowd erupted into cheering, and Isabel looked up at Ean, expectant of his kiss. He captured her mouth with his own and pulled her against him, drinking in the feel of her in his arms as the people shouted and the bells rang and the city resounded with celebration.

The chanting began shortly thereafter, sounding in time with the bells.

Epiphany show us the way!

Cephrael show us the way!

Ean reluctantly released Isabel from his kiss. She turned in his arms and leaned back against him, letting her head rest upon his chest while he enfolded her, her own gaze lifted to the heavens where Cephrael’s Hand glowed brightly.

Epiphany show us the way!

Cephrael show us the way!

On and on, the chanting continued, growing in volume until the Alabaster City reverberated with voice.

Knowing only of Isabel in his arms, Ean gazed at Cephrael’s constellation and murmured in her ear, “
Are
they with us still? Epiphany and Cephrael?”

Isabel sighed contentedly in his arms. “Is this a question for the woman Isabel or for Epiphany’s Prophet?” 

“I think this is most assuredly for Epiphany’s Prophet.”

“Mmm,” she said, turning her head up to him with a shadowy smile. “Then Epiphany’s Prophet would like to point out that she would be out of a job if they were not.”

Ean wrapped his arms tighter around her, hugging her close. He loved her so desperately that he couldn’t be near enough to her—he wouldn’t be until even their bodies no longer separated them, until their very souls were united. “And Cephrael?” he asked. “What does Epiphany’s Prophet say of him?”

“Cephrael…” Isabel murmured with a quiet smile. “Well, I can tell you this much, my lord. If Cephrael were here, he would have his hand in this game.”

“Violent hatred of one’s neighbors gives a man a permanent sense of purpose.”

- The Nodefinder Niko van Amstel

The Karakurt
sat behind her screen listening to the conversation in the room beyond, the argument heated and brewing naught but conjecture. She though it unlikely that her spies would discover anything new about the destruction of Rethynnea’s Temple of the Vestals, no matter how many survivors they questioned. Raine D’Lacourte had been involved in that catastrophe—that much the Karakurt had ascertained from the survivors—and involvement of the Fourth Vestal usually signaled truth-bindings that even she could not unwork.

Especially now
… 

It came as an unwelcome thought, bitter with the vitriol of hindsight. The Karakurt shifted in her chair, and the tiny bells on her headdress jingled with her malcontent. She found it hard to focus on the rough deliberations of Pearl and the other men beyond her screen, for her mind was troubled by a prickling disquiet that waxed as her confidence waned.

The Karakurt was no stranger to the workings of
elae.
Rumors about her origins abounded, and this suited her, for anonymity was her greatest ally. Yet she’d studied at Agasan’s famous Sormitáge. She’d even gained her first truthreader’s ring—that much-admired accolade that announced an Adept had attained a new level of mastery at their craft. It was untrue, the popular rumor that only the van Gelderan line spawned female truthreaders. The Karakurt was proof of this.

Only…

Pressing two fingers to the bridge of her nose, she exhaled a long breath and pushed away swarming fears, reminders of a truth she no longer dared avoid. When one’s entire existence involved the bartering of deceptions—patterned, layered, shallow or vast—it did not suit to attempt to deceive oneself in the bargain.

Oh…she’d known from the beginning that taking up with the Lord Abanachtran was dangerous—
incredibly
dangerous,
yes
, but also immensely intriguing! Everything her spies had learned of him warned that dealing with him would either be disastrous or remunerative beyond compare. But there was always risk in any game, and the game of espionage was the riskiest of all. She had not masterminded a network infiltrating multiple kingdoms by taking no chances.

Still…upon reflection, the price of working with the Lord Abanachtran was greater even than she had envisioned.

Her talent was dying.

At first it had manifested in little things—a missed falsehood, a violent thought that seemed somehow…blurred—but soon she realized something was amiss. Finally, after recurring episodes, she’d recognized the terrible truth: every time she came into contact with the Lord Abanachtran, a small part of her talent died. A deep part of her most elemental self was withering—she could sense it if not understand it—and as the pestilence the Lord Abanachtran had implanted within her spread, her life pattern had begun to waste away.

In the intervening weeks since she’d first recognized something was wrong, she’d grown increasingly less able to sense
elae,
and now…now she suspected with miserable foreboding that her talent was failing entirely.

She could hold out yet, she supposed, for such moments were intermittent, the nuisance of a recurring headache that came and went. But she dared not try any working that required too much handling of the lifeforce; and she dared no working openly for fear of others witnessing one of those untimely moments of disruption.

So she didn’t interrupt the conversation beyond her screen, and she did not attempt to unwork the patterns that truth-bound those mercenaries of the Fourth Vestal’s recent employ who they’d managed to round up for interrogation. The catastrophe at the temple no longer interested her.

Her thoughts tr
aveled instead to the man called Işak Getirmek.

He was a fascinating enigma.

The Lord Abanachtran had sent word ahead of Işak’s arrival requiring her to assist the man to the limits of her skill. Being that their purposes were aligned toward capturing Ean val Lorian, who had proven far too resilient against her efforts alone, and being that the Lord Abanachtran’s punishment for failure was severe, the Karakurt was not unwilling to collaborate. When the man arrived, however, she found a new enigma to occupy her considerable mental talents, for the mystery of Işak’s origins and background intrigued her greatly.

Işak Getirmek was not his real name—
no,
this she knew, for she spoke the desert tongue and understood his name to mean ‘light-bringer.’ 
Ironic,
she thought, for there was a darkness clouding his mind which she had rarely witnessed outside of the Prophet’s horrific Marquiin.

Oh, she well knew the signs of compulsion patterns laid upon a man—certainly she was no stranger to their use—and the symptoms of compulsion were especial
ly evident when a man, such as Işak, attempted to fight the pattern’s domination.

But in the several chances she’d had to explore Işak’s mind—tentatively, gently, so as not to rouse his awareness of her probing—she had seen strangenesses even she did not
understand.

The Karakurt had a keen sense of people. Much of this, she admitted, was drawn from her nature as a truthreader, which gave her an innate perception of a multitude of human conditions. A truthreader’s early training was more about honing innate instincts and perceptions than ever it was about learning the Truths or working Tellings. The Karakurt could sit within a room of hundreds and read each individual man’s mind—providing their thoughts were loud enough, and what
na’turna
ever learned to guard his thoughts?

Yet Işak was
na’turna
and a wielder—a rare combination. She would know more of his training, but the man guarded his thoughts as rigorously as if he harbored the map to the Kandori fortune within his ken. This secrecy intrigued her immensely.

Too, he was nothing like the cold-eyed leader of the Saldarian mercenaries who accompanied him, a man named
Raliax
, whom she trusted not at all. Which is not to say she wouldn’t have hired Raliax—and might still, if he lived through the coming conflict—for he was an efficient and merciless killer who harbored no illusions about honor or his motivations. Such men were a boon to the Karakurt, for they negotiated easily enough and had no qualms about dealing death to the innoc
ent.

But Işak was not Raliax. Whereas the latter had clearly never known a shadow of nobility, she perceived that Işak had somehow
fallen from grace—
no
,
not fallen
, she corrected herself.
Rather…it is as though grace has been stripped from him
.

She wondered who Işak had been before he became
Işak’getirmek,
before he drew swords within the ranks of the Lord Abanachtran…for everyone came away changed by the Lord Abanachtran’s touch, a part of them permanently lost from the light.

Upon this thought, the Karak
urt closed her eyes and exhaled a fluttering sigh. She knew too well that beneath the Lord Abanachtran’s burning gaze, even the halest of souls shriveled like weeds in the relentless Avataren sun. Yet for all the lord’s fierce intensity, the man left her feeling cold inside.
So very, very cold
. Oft times after he left her company, she would lie before a roaring fire letting the flames sear her bare skin and still feel naught but the chill of his touch worming eternally within.

She caught sight of Işak passing suddenly outside her window, sparing her more dire musings. Her colorless eyes followed him as he walked the long balcony of her borrowed manse in Rethynnea’s exclusive hills. He had just returned from a task in the city, o
ne of many such expeditions he took upon himself without seeking counsel or assistance. The man was a lone wolf among a pack of hyenas whom he sought neither to lead nor to dominate, yet who followed him all the same.

Seeing Işak, a thought occurred suddenly, a moment’s inspiration. Just that morning she’d received interesting news. Now she would put it to brilliant use. The Karakurt removed her headdress and veil and rose to join Işak on the balcony.

Işak Getirmek was a handsome man despite the scar that marred his cheek and the slight limp that bespoke of hardship in a foreign land, or possibly at sea…some place Healers were scarce. There was a story behind these tarnishments, and the Karakurt wished to have that tale—indeed, she craved Işak’s story more than any other in recent months.

For she collected men’s stories as her own sort of jewels. Within each man’s story was a key, the secret to manipulating him, shaping him to her will. This was a specific talent of hers—discovering and then catering to a man’s deepest desires, twisting his objectives to align with her own ends. It was her particular strand of unique poison, and she had yet to confront a man immune to it.

Her namesake, the actual karakurt, was a desert spider in her homeland; bulbous, spindly-legged, noxious, capable of killing a camel with a single bite. She fashioned herself more potent still.

She and Işak had spoken but few times since his arrival to her borrowed mansion, and never in private, for often wherever Işak stood, Raliax hovered. N
ow it was but the two of them alone, a flawless opportunity.

The Karakurt flowed toward Işak in diaphanous crimson silks, her thick black hair bound in golden bands. Her womanly curves were undeniably attractive, and she took great pleasure in knowing how few men might resist her charms. So also was it a great privilege to gaze upon her face without her headdress and veil. This much she suspected Işak understood.

As she approached, he was resting muscled forearms on the limestone balustrade and gazing out toward the bay. His long fingers were occupied with a length of string, absently tying it into elaborate knots.

“
Işak’getirmek,” she murmured in her low, husky voice as she neared
.

“Madam,” he replied without turning his gaze from the view, his voice dis
tant and cold.

She leaned back against the railing to better look upon his face, upon his wavy black hair sweeping back from a wide brow—at his piercing eyes that shifted between blue and grey. The scar that marred his cheek had been neither stitched nor Healed but rather left alone to become a constant pale flame of reminder. He might’ve grown a beard to hide it, but apparently he chose to ignore its existence, shaving instead whenever the fancy struck him. It had not for many days, for a dark scruff shadowed his jaw.

“What do you want?” he asked when she said nothing more, merely watched him with the ghost of a smile hinting upon her lips.

A great many things...
she thought as she considered him appreciatively, but she replied, “How proceeds your hunt for the prince?”

His eyes flicked to her and away again, and she inwardly smiled. How could he know that she might read so much in a glance?

“I know no more than you at present.” 

Nothing in his manner invited further questioning—indeed, each answer seemed to
conclude the conversation with brusque finality. It was a manner oft adopted by princes and kings, though she perceived that Işak used it instinctively to widen the moat between himself and any who might seek to know his mind. Yet she sensed no fear of her within him, no matter that she was a truthreader. This, also, told her much.

Who are you really,
Işak’getirmek, and what truth do you hide so desperately from the world?

She turned and joined him in gazing out across the mansion grounds toward the Bay o
f Jewels in the far distance, a brilliant expanse of azure gleaming in the strong sunlight. “Ean val Lorian,” she said then, musingly, allowing her voice to reveal the smallest hint of her own annoyance that they might bond in sharing this mutual frustration. “He is but a boy, for all I have heard of him, barely twenty years. It should be a simple thing to find such a one.”

“I hear he is a wielder.”

“One hears many things. Certainly he has the help of wielders.”

This drew his eye to her—fierce eyes, pale-blue just then in the bright sunlight. “You do not think it so? He broke the bond between the Prophet and one of his Marquiin. How was this done if not with the lifeforce?”

“A particularly intriguing question,” she noted agreeably. Her gaze drifted across his shoulder into the room where her servant Pearl deliberated with Raliax. She did not think their ideas of value. “You are a wielder, yourself,” she said to Işak, arching an ebony brow in challenge. “Surely you have no fears of facing this northern prince. He cannot have been trained except in the most basic of patterns, but you…” and here she gave him a smile suggestive of admiration, “you have trained for many years.”

He gave her another piercing look at this. “You know nothing of me.” 

“I would know more, to be certain,” she admitted. “The Lord Abanachtran informed me I am to work with you.” She let a small, derisive laugh escape her as she added, “I work alone.”

“As do I,” he growled.