Bridge of Souls (13 page)

“Cailech and Celimus?” Wyl murmured in disbelief.

She nodded. “It’s a reliable source too.”

“What on earth would they have in common?” Crys said into the tense silence.

“Briavel!” Valentyna banged her fist against the mantelpiece and let out a sound of deep anguish. “They mean to destroy us.”

“Wait, Valentyna!” Wyl cried, forgetting himself and all protocol. “Let me think.” He began to pace.

Anyone who had known Fergys Thirsk, and perhaps his son, would be aware that this was a family trait. It had always amused Magnus to see his general pacing as he formulated battle or peace plans, and if Ylena or Alyd were alive, they would be able to confirm that Wyl was hewn from the same block. Neither of the two people watching Ylena pacing now had known Fergys or Wyl Thirsk that well, but Valentyna had known Romen and she had watched him perform this very action when thinking and plotting. It struck her so resoundingly she felt her breath catch in her throat. Even more disconcerting was the fact that Ylena was pulling at her ear as she paced, a habit Valentyna had teased Romen Koreldy about on several occasions during their short time together. There it was again, the tugging at the right ear, the relentless slow pacing, the face lost in thought.
Shar!
She was going mad. She looked away and reached for her wine, swallowed it in a single draft. The liquor helped steady her but did nothing to alleviate the shock of the news or the bewildering sense of Romen’s presence.

Suddenly she was reminded of Fynch’s strange suggestion that Wyl Thirsk and Romen Koreldy were of one mind. The boy had stopped just short of saying they were one person. How could it be that Wyl’s sister now seemed to reflect similar traits? And then Elspyth’s words blew through her mind:

I believe that some people are reincarnated. Perhaps you should listen more carefully to your friend Fynch. It is to this which he refers, I am sure. And you must promise me that should another person look at you and perhaps touch you emotionally as Romen did, reminding you uncannily of the man you loved, that you will permit it.

Permit them to love me, you mean?
Valentyna remembered saying in amusement, almost teasing.

But Elspyth had nodded seriously and added,
Perhaps even a woman.

Valentyna looked back at Ylena.
Perhaps even a woman.
She gasped, turning away to hide the sound and the frightened
look on her face. What was happening here? What was Shar’s plan? Something else nagged at the edges of her mind, something urging her to recall it. But it remained on the fringe, hovering and niggling, and her anxiety over this latest action of the Morgravian King won the battle and banished the thought. Valentyna had to focus on Celimus and his intentions, not her spiraling emotions and deranged thoughts that Ylena Thirsk was the embodiment of Romen Koreldy!
Fool!
she screamed at herself inwardly.

Crys urged Wyl to speak his thoughts.

Wyl swung around, the swish of his gown annoying him again. How he wished he could at least be Faryl, tall and strong in her masculine clothes. “I know Celimus,” he said, just pulling himself back from blurting out,
I know Cailech too.
“And I have traveled with someone who knows Cailech,” he lied.

“And?” Valentyna prompted, pushing away her own confusing thoughts.

Wyl raised Ylena’s delicate hands. “Celimus despises Cailech. He is quietly obsessed with the Mountain King, your highness, and nothing would prompt him to organize a parley with a sovereign whose realm, I’m sure, he entertains visions of destroying.”

“At least Celimus is consistent in his ambitions,” Valentyna commented bitterly. “Go on.”

“Everything I’ve heard suggests that Cailech hates Morgravia’s new king just as energetically—has more reason to, in fact.” Wyl’s mind was racing. “So in truth, I can’t see either of them making such a move of their own volition. Something has prompted it.”

“As the Queen suggests, then—joining forces against Briavel,” Crys argued.

Wyl shook his head, felt Ylena’s hair bob from side to side, and grimaced to himself. “No. Celimus doesn’t need the Mountain King to overwhelm Briavel. The Legion could crush the Briavellian Guard resoundingly. If he were of a mind to do so, he could take Briavel by force and then combine the armies
to take on Cailech. That’s the more logical scenario—no offense intended, your highness.”

“None taken,” she replied, frowning. There was no doubting it: She felt as if she were being briefed by a soldier. “Why the parley, then?”

“Does the letter say any more?”

Valentyna scanned it quickly again. “No, just the name of the man who brought the original message out of the Razors and delivered it to Celimus’s people.”

“Who was it?” Wyl said. No doubt someone reliable like Myrt, he reckoned.

Valentyna squinted at the page. “Dreadful writing,” she murmured. “I think it says his name is Farrow. Yes, Aremys Farrow.”

U
SING FRESH HORSES AT INTERVALS
, K
ING
C
ELIMUS HAD SWEPT THROUGH THE GATES OF
T
ENTERDYN EARLIER THAN HE
’
D EXPECTED
. H
E WAS IMPRESSED BY THE SPRAWLING
estate of Felrawthy’s duke and delighted to see that the manor itself was exceptionally well appointed. For a provincial family, the Donals had not lived without creature comforts. Freshly bathed and changed now, and having taken ownership of Jeryb’s magnificent study with its view over the heather-laden moors, Celimus nodded at his chancellor. “Bring him before me.”

Jessom entered the small antechamber where Aremys Far
row had been asked to wait. “I trust there are no tricks up your sleeve, my friend,” he cautioned the mercenary.

Aremys eyed the hook-nosed Chancellor. “Just earning my living, Jessom,” he replied. “Lead on.”

The man turned and showed Aremys into the main chamber.

“Farrow,” Celimus said from the window where he had been admiring the vista.

“Your highness,” Aremys returned, dropping a low bow.

“You are quite a surprise.”

“That is not my intention, sire,” the mercenary replied, straightening.

“Will you tell me how it comes about that you are working for my enemy?”

“Your highness, I am a man available for hire by anyone with coin to pay. I am always loyal to my employer, as your chancellor would know. You must not fear that I have shared any secrets with Cailech, just as he need not fear I will share any of his with you,” Aremys said smoothly.

“So you admit he has secrets?” Celimus said, moving in his fluid, elegant manner to sit on the corner of Jeryb’s old desk.

“We all have secrets, your majesty,” Aremys said carefully. “It does not mean they necessarily impact on one another.”

“Farrow, I would know how you came to be in the Razors when you were on paid business for the Crown of Morgravia,” Celimus replied testily, tiring of the banter.

Aremys was prepared for this question. “Your majesty, I was following the trail of Ylena Thirsk, as instructed.”

“Did you meet up with Leyen?” the King interrupted.

“No, sire. But I believe she may have discovered that our prey had visited this very house.”

“Is that so?” Celimus said, olive eyes narrowing.

Aremys moved into the critical area of his fabricated story. He would have to be convincing. “I don’t know what happened to Leyen. I presume she must have given up her pursuit because I haven’t found any trace of her since Tenterdyn. Perhaps she had other tasks to perform?” he prompted carefully,
and pretended not to see the glance between Chancellor and King.

“I gathered Ylena Thirsk had already left Tenterdyn before Leyen’s arrival,” Aremys continued, “and found myself giving chase to the eldest son of Felrawthy and the Thirsk woman, who seemed to be heading north to the very rim of the Razors before veering east.”

Celimus nodded. “Into Briavel.”

Aremys hesitated, a question in his expression. Perhaps the King knew something he did not.

“We have heard reports that Crys Donal is at Briavel’s palace. Perhaps Ylena is with him.”

Aremys wondered how in Shar’s name the heir to Felrawthy had found himself in Werryl, although having heard with horror of the slaughter of Jeryb’s clan, he wasn’t terribly surprised that the young man had fled Morgravia. “Not necessarily, your highness,” he said into the lengthening silence.

“What do you mean?” Celimus queried.

“Your spies have not reported a sighting of Ylena Thirsk, have they?”

“Not yet, no.”

“Hmm,” Aremys said, quietly theatrical, as though thinking through something complex.

“Farrow, you still haven’t explained how you come to be with Cailech’s people,” Jessom prompted.

Aremys understood now why Wyl had disliked Jessom so deeply. He felt his own hackles rise at the interruption.

“I was getting to that, Chancellor. I overnighted in a border village, preparing to cross into Briavel the next morning to see if I could pick up the trail of Ylena Thirsk. There was no inn, just a shorrock house, and perhaps I had one too many, I don’t know. I suspect my nip was spiked with something in order to make it easier for thieves to set upon me later. It seems I wandered away from the main village in a stupor, and I do remember stumbling onto a track which I presumed would lead me into the Razors proper. I was very cold, I recall, and desperate to lie down. I remember men following me from the vil
lage, which is what drove me toward the mountains. But I’m afraid I remember very little else, sire.”

The King shook his head. “So what occurred next, Farrow?”

“I’ve pieced together that the thieves did attack me but were fended off by some men from the Razors, obviously using the track to enter Morgravia. They dealt with the villagers swiftly, by which time I was unconscious, and then decided to take me with them.”

“Why?” Celimus demanded.

“I don’t know, sire. Perhaps they knew I would die in the cold if they didn’t. They could see I was drugged and had been set upon by bandits. They felt obliged.” He shrugged.

“Obliged!” Celimus roared. “To help a Morgravian?”

Aremys was determined not to be intimidated. He kept his voice low. “They are not all murderers and thieves, your highness. The people of the Razors have scruples, families, a desire for peace—”

“Ah, you sympathize with the Mountain horde, Farrow?” the King interrupted, a definite barb in his tone.

“My king, I am a Grenadyne, so my soul is of the north. I like the notion that realms may prosper in peace rather than conquering one another through war.”

“Is that what this is all about, then?”

“Yes, your highness.”

“Cailech is holding out the olive branch to Morgravia?” Disbelief was thick in the King’s voice.

Aremys nodded slowly. “You would like him, your majesty, if you’d agree to meet with him.”

“This is rich beyond words, Farrow. When did the leap from drugged captive to King’s counsel take place, might I ask?”

“King Cailech naturally wished to meet the stranger who had been picked up lurking on the fringe of the Razors. He learned that I was from the north, working as a mercenary in the south, and on business for the Crown of Morgravia. He does not know the details of my task for you, your highness. When the King interviewed me our conversation led us to
ward discussing the future of the Mountain People. When he said it was his greatest desire to create peace in the region, I asked him what was stopping him from discussing the same with the King of Morgravia. I mentioned that you were preparing for your wedding, sire, and that the two great realms of Morgravia and Briavel would soon be joined in peace. It fired his imagination, I think. He asked me to set up this meeting.”

“That’s it?” Jessom posed. “You are merely a go-between?”

Aremys did not look at the Chancellor but addressed Celimus. “Yes, sire, that is precisely what I am. Because I had been employed directly by you, Cailech thought it would be easier for me to seek an audience and set up this parley. He believed you were more likely to trust me than him.”

“I don’t trust anyone, Farrow, least of all mercenaries who have no loyalties.”

Aremys said nothing but he did not shrink under the hard gaze of the King. He understood that Celimus was used to staring down others.
He must practice it in his mirror,
Wyl had once commented caustically. Aremys remembered that now and had to stop himself from smiling.

“King Celimus, I sell my services, not my soul,” he finally replied, determined to stand his ground. “Cailech certainly does not own me—no one does. I am here to respectfully suggest that you, the reigning sovereign of a powerful kingdom, might consider it worthwhile to listen to what your northern neighbor has to say. Far more can be achieved around the dinner table, sire, than on the battlefield.”

“So now you’re a philospher and peacemaker, Farrow? I could have you killed for your insolence.”

“Yes, you could, sire,” Aremys said in a tone that made it clear he knew that worse had happened to innocents around this man. “But I ask your forgiveness if I have given the impression of presumptuousness. What you need to understand is that my own life is at stake, sire.”

That seemed to win the King’s attention. He gestured for Jessom to pour some wine. “Carry on,” he told Aremys.

Jessom offered Aremys a cup of wine and the mercenary was relieved by the gesture. Perhaps he would make it out of this meeting alive after all.

“Thank you,” he said before continuing. “I give the impression of being a free man, sire, but I am in fact Cailech’s prisoner. I have bought my freedom with the promise that I would attempt to set up this meeting. No money will exchange hands.”

Celimus held his cup up toward Aremys in an ironic toast. “You play with your life freely, mercenary.”

“It is mine to give, although I’m not sure I had any choice, your majesty.”

“And did you think I’d just say yes?”

“I could only hope so, sire.”

“In order to save your life?” Celimus mocked.

“No, my lord. To save Morgravia from war. I presume you’d like your marriage to be conducted in peace.”

Celimus arched a perfectly shaped eyebrow. “So the Mountain upstart believes he can wage war on Morgravia—is that right?”

Aremys was tired of this but knew he was treading a fine line. Celimus walked his own knife edge of madness and would just as easily snuff out a person’s life as swat at a fly. He needed to be careful. “No, your majesty. I think he believes he can achieve peace between his realm and yours.”

Celimus smiled slyly and walked around Jeryb’s desk to sit down. As he did so, Aremys had time to notice a child’s engraving in the wood of the desk. The letters carved clumsily into the timber said
ALYD
and the mercenary was reminded of how that young man had been treated by this very King—his life taken on a whim, in front of his new wife and his closest childhood friend. That same friend who was now considered friend by Aremys. The mercenary felt a charge of anger as he considered that the two great families of Morgravia—the Donals of the north and the Thirsks to the south—had been all but wiped out on the command of the cruel man before him.

He watched Celimus lean back in Jeryb’s handsome chair
and sip from Jeryb’s cup what was presumably a refreshment from Jeryb’s cellar. Anger settled in his gut. He joined Wyl in hating Celimus more than any other man, alive or dead, and determined to bring about his demise.

“Farrow,” the King began in a voice filled with tedium, as though explaining something obvious to someone stupid, “you know full well that I will not risk myself by going into the Razors to meet with your cowardly captor, a man who sends one of my own people—if I dare call you that—to do his dealings for him.”

“I realize that, your highness.”

“So I must presume that he is prepared to risk coming here alone, for I will not brook his men setting foot on Morgravian soil.”

“They would set up camp at the border,” Aremys replied, as though he and Cailech had already anticipated as much from Celimus. He felt relieved that the Captain had not reported that Aremys had been escorted into Morgravia by men of the mountains. Aremys inwardly saluted Bukanan’s foresight at not risking anything that might turn this situation ugly. Presumably the man knew how vicious his king could be and that an opportunity to make an example of Cailech’s men would prove irresistible.

“I see. So that means Cailech is perfectly comfortable about coming to meet me, in Morgravia, with no protection other than the sword of a Grenadyne mercenary who is in my employ and presently under my guard?” Celimus’s tone was filled with ironic amusement.

“I am not his protector, sire. I am purely his emissary.”

“Excellent. The situation is even more precarious, then, for Cailech is all alone and on Morgravian soil. What is to stop me from simply killing him?”

“Your desire for peace, sire,” Aremys offered as reasonably as he could. “The men of the Razors can be damnably elusive and they do not forgive, my lord. I am guessing they would wage systematic attacks on your borders until their last man fell…the last woman, even.”

“That does not scare me, Farrow,” the King replied, lazily twirling his goblet. “Frankly, I’d prefer his head on a spike at Stoneheart to holding talks in my court.”

“Of course he does have some insurance, sire.”

Celimus laughed, genuine enjoyment spicing the mirth. “Of course he does! Now what could Cailech possibly offer me that I don’t have and could possibly want?”

Aremys felt a tremor of fear pass through him. He was about to weave his most audacious lie yet, the only trump card he could produce from up his sleeve, and to a king who would have his throat slit from ear to ear this very second if he even suspected the ruse. “I believe there is one item you desire more than anything else, sire.”

“I didn’t know you possessed such magical insight into my desires, Farrow. Perhaps I should have you tortured and burned as a warlock?”

“No enchantments, sire,” Aremys replied calmly. “Simple logic tells me what you covet at present.”

“And that is?” Celimus said, a sarcastic sneer on his face.

“Ylena Thirsk, your highness.”

The sneer vanished instantly, as did the casual posture. The King sat forward, suddenly alert. “You have her?”

“I will deliver her, your majesty, on the promise that both Cailech’s life and my own are ensured your complete protection. We will come to Morgravia for the parley and you will allow him an escort of his men. Your two best captains, including Bukanan, who I gather is currently indispensable in the north, will stay at the border with the Mountain warriors. When the parley is complete, we will be escorted safely to the border of the Razors and permitted to depart into the mountains. When this promise is in writing and announced publicly to your people, I will arrange for Ylena Thirsk to be delivered to you.”