Battle: The House War: Book Five (4 page)

“If the demons want her dead—”

Duvari lifted a hand. “The Kings have taken that into consideration. They are willing—barely—to wait. I infer, from the words of the Exalted of Cormaris that time, should we wish to remove the Terafin, is of the essence. She does not yet understand the power she wields.”

“No more do the gods!”

“They understand it better than the magi or the Kings,” Duvari said, voice the cold of ice. “And she
will
grow to understand it. She altered the architecture of the Kings’ Palace without once leaving her own backyard. She did so without obvious intent.”

“She saved the lives of the—”

“I
understand
what she did. Were it not for that, the Kings would have made the only wise decision immediately upon arriving in the Palace.”

Birgide cleared her throat, and the two men turned. Duvari was unamused. “I wish an introduction to the Terafin Master Gardener.”

“I did not summon you from the Western Kingdoms. Nor did I request your expertise at this time. If you hope to infiltrate the Terafin manse, you have now made that clear to Devon ATerafin.”

She smiled. “I am aware of Devon. There is no way of gaining entrance to the House that would avoid his detection. I have not been briefed about the architectural changes, but such a briefing was obviously not considered germane.

“But I may be of assistance. I may be necessary.”

Devon did not argue. He did not point out that both he and Gregori were ATerafin; nor did he claim that they could easily assassinate the Terafin although, were she any other head of a House, he might have.

“What, exactly, do you desire of House Terafin?”

“I am a botanist, Duvari. I wish to study her grounds, her trees, and her rumored forest. Not more, not less.”

“I will consider it.” He turned his attention to Devon. “Do not cross me.”

“If you wish me to revoke the Terafin name, only ask. I serve the Kings, Duvari. I do not believe that the Terafin’s death is in their best interests.”

“You are not impartial. What you feel is immaterial.”

18th of Henden, 427 A.A. Araven Estates, Averalaan Aramarelas

Hectore of Araven hated no color on earth so much as black.

This had not always been the case; in his feckless, brash youth he barely noticed it, and in his errant first attempt at adulthood, he had considered it a bold fashion statement. Now? It was a public emblem of loss: Black, white, and gold—but black, in this case, the predominant color. His daughter wore mourning white, as the mother, although she wore a black veil; her husband, the white and black; the whole of the Household Staff of the Borden Estate in the seventeenth holding employed were likewise attired.

Even Hugh, the oldest of Rachele’s children, was somber and colorless as he stood beside his parents in the long hall that led to the single, modest public gallery, and from there to the grounds in which Sharann, Hectore’s beloved grandchild, would be laid to rest. Rachele, the youngest of his daughters, had been coddled, according to Hectore’s wife and his many friends; she had not learned that life was a constant test. It was not success that defined a man or a woman—it was their grace and their continued ability to maneuver in the face of inevitable failure. His daughter held her head high, but even through the veil her swollen lips and eyes could be seen.

She had shed nothing but tears for weeks now. She had traveled, when she could bear it, to the Houses of Healing at Hectore’s side; she had sat by her youngest child’s bed, and dribbled water and broth into her daughter’s mouth. She had watched—as Hectore had watched—as Sharann dwindled in weight; at seven years of age, she had weighed well under thirty pounds in the last few days of her life.

She had woken four times on her own, and a handful of times with intervention, but she had eaten so little; toward the end, when she woke, her eyes were dull and she could barely remember how to speak. Hectore had visited daily, absent the usual merchant emergencies; he resented each and every one of them bitterly, now.

Sharann was not the only person to die of the sleeping sickness, as it was colloquially called in hushed whispers throughout the hundred holdings; she was not even the only child. But she was the only one whose death Hectore of Araven took personally.

He hugged his daughter tightly and wordlessly; after a few seconds, she wrapped her arms around his neck and the whole of her body trembled. He didn’t much care that other visitants were waiting to speak a few words to the bereaved; they could damn well wait. He didn’t care about their time, their convenience, or their much smaller sense of loss. There were only two things he cared about today: his daughter and his grandson. He went to his grandson after he forced himself to relinquish his hold on his daughter.

“Hugh,” he said, offering the boy an open hand. Hugh, mindful of his father, took the hand; mindful of his mother, he stepped closer to his grandfather. He was, in Hectore’s opinion, just a shade too young to fully understand what death meant. He was not, however, too young to understand his mother’s pain. He was, in Hectore’s admittedly biased opinion, a good child. “You’ll have to take care of my daughter,” he said, bending in, speaking softly as if attempting to conspire.

“Da takes care of her,” was the quiet reply. “She doesn’t want my help.”

He glanced at Rachele and then back to his grandson. “She doesn’t know how to ask, yet. She doesn’t know that she wants help. It’s not that her world is over—but she’ll never see Sharann again, and that’s hard.”

And you’ll never see her again either, but that’s not quite real to you yet.
He took his leave of his family, and accompanied by Andrei, made his way out to the gardens. “Well?”

Andrei glanced at the grounds. They were almost impeccable, and they were certainly larger than the grounds Hectore’s gardeners maintained; Borden was situated in the hundred, and Araven’s main house, upon the Isle. Land on the Isle was at a premium.

“There are no easy answers. There are no answers within the Order of Knowledge that my sources were willing to divulge; the Exalted are involved.” He paused and added, “The
Astari
are involved.”

Hectore rolled his eyes. “I have no designs upon the Kings; they were not materially involved in my grandchild’s death.”

“No.”

“But I feel that something was, Andrei, and I will know what it is.”

“Patris Araven—”

“Do not sling titles at me; there are no eavesdroppers.” Hectore’s hand was cupped firmly around a stone of silence, in his pocket for just such a conversation. “Had you met me before I was required to depart, things would be simpler. My daughter will be in tears for the whole of this wretched day, and I would be there to offer her comfort.”

“Your daughter accepts the death, Hectore.”

“She’s no other choice.”

“She has.” Andrei raised a brow.

“Give me the information you’ve managed to obtain.”

Andrei nodded. “It is, as I suggested, scant. It is therefore not reliable.”

“But?”

“Hectore—”

“Out with it.”

“It involves House Terafin.”

House Terafin. First among The Ten, although not by such a wide margin now as it had once enjoyed. Hectore had some dealings with Terafin, although to be fair, he had dealings with all of The Ten in one form or the other. His merchant holdings were not small, and they were not passive. He frowned. “House Terafin. It’s where the healer boy lives.”

“It is.”

“Andrei, your expression could sour wine.”

“The boy is not, as you well know, the most significant aspect of Terafin at the moment. You attended the previous Terafin’s funeral.”

Hectore nodded, lifting a hand to his chin as he began to stroll past the violets. He found them a little on the pale side, but Rachele had always preferred what she called “soft” colors. “I did. It was interesting, and not the norm for such affairs.”

“Did you note the young woman?”

Hectore nodded. He didn’t need to ask which young woman Andrei referred to; from the moment he was granted entry into the grounds and the outdoor reception, there had only
been
one woman of note. She wore a dress that Hectore could still remember if he paused to close his eyes: a thing that suggested all possible variants of the shade white, mixed with gold and the delicate black of mourning. It had not been particularly daring—and yet, it had. “Jewel ATerafin. She is Terafin now.”

The dress, oddly enough, had seemed more significant than the very large, very white winged cat that had sat, like a statue—a talkative one—by her side. Hectore knew he had seen the creature—but his memory would not conjure a concrete image; the woman in the dress, however, haunted his vision, like an afterimage burned there by unwary sight of the sun.

“Yes. In the weeks since she was acclaimed, she has survived no less than four attempts on her life.”

Hectore shrugged. House succession was always a tricky affair, especially if the House was one of The Ten.

“Not all of her assassins were reputed to be human.”

This, Hectore had not heard. “Why did you not inform me of this fact earlier?”

“It was barely possible to ascertain that it was, indeed, fact. The stories that have sprung up around that girl almost beggar the imagination—and a rational man would assume most lacked substance.”

“You, of course, being the definition of rational.”

“Indeed.”

“Andrei, I cannot run my life without you. You are aware of this, even if your modesty forbids open acknowledgment of that fact. If you do not, however, speak plainly, I will strangle you and consign myself to a life absent your competence.”

“The stories are true.”

“Pardon?”

“The stories are true, Hectore. She owns giant, winged cats—”

“If I recall correctly, the cats are not suitable as either guards or servants; far too cheeky.”

Andrei did not roll his eyes, but this clearly took effort. “—she rides a large, white stag that appears—and disappears—at whim.”

“Her whim?”

“Apparently so. She is served by someone the magi deem an immortal—a Hunter.”

“Hunter?”

“The Wild Hunt.”

“Andrei—please. I know you do not drink when you are on duty.”

Andrei inspected the roses; he liked them. Hectore did not care for roses, or any flowers that came with thorns. “It is said she stopped the rains on the first day of the Terafin’s funeral—and that, Hectore, you must believe.”

Hectore shrugged.

“But she did more—and this is
not
rumored, for reasons which will become obvious. She altered the structure of
Avantari
.”

“Impossible.” Hectore’s eyes narrowed as he turned to confront his most loyal and most necessary servant. What he saw in Andrei’s face stemmed the tide of his careless words, and left him only with the careful ones. Andrei was not—and had never been—a fool; his was a skepticism and cynicism that even Hectore found difficult at times. Hectore was not certain what it would take to convince Andrei of the truth of a rumor of that magnitude—but clearly, Andrei believed it.

“Were any of the assassins sent against her
Astari
?”

“Hectore, that is beneath you.”

“I am serious, Andrei. If what you have just said is true in any measure, the Kings cannot afford to let the girl live.”

“And yet, she does.”

“Why, in your opinion?”

Andrei’s silence took on a different quality as he considered the man he had served for much of his life. “She is,” he finally said, “The Terafin. The death of a reigning member of The Ten is always destabilizing. The fact that her predecessor’s death occurred at the hands of a demon adds to the danger. Recent attacks on the current Terafin are also demonic, which makes clear that the demons consider her a primary—possibly
the
primary—threat.

“It can safely be assumed that what demons want and what the Kings want are not the same.”

Hectore had made the Araven fortunes by relying on a mixture of instinct and natural shrewdness. And by, admittedly, a certain brash arrogance and a willingness to take risks to get what he wanted. The problem with many of his opponents was that their definition of what Hectore wanted was so parochial and so narrow. Many of the visitants to this particular funeral were such men—and women. They were here to show their devotion to Araven and its merchant trading wealth. They would not believe that Hectore was distraught over the death of a granddaughter, as he had so many of them.

They would certainly never believe that Hectore might choose to take this one death personally.

“You are not telling me what you know, Andrei.”

“I am telling you what I know.”

“You are not telling me all of it. I will have the rest. I will have it now.”

Andrei, to Hectore’s surprise, hesitated. “It has been very, very difficult,” he finally said.

“It is unlike you to offer excuses in place of information.”