Dragon War: The Draconic Prophecies - Book Three (18 page)

Aunn closed his eyes and changed. He felt Kelas’s suspicious and scheming thoughts clutching at his mind even as Kelas’s clothes pulled at his body, but he shed them and put on his new face, the proud visage he dared to call by his own name. He was a Royal Eye of Aundair, a servant of the queen—and so was Thuel. There was no reason to mistrust him.

He nodded, shifted his grip to the blade of Thuel’s sword, and handed the weapon back to the Spy Master. “My life is in the service of the queen,” he said. “Let’s get started.”

O
n a cedar bench near the Ruby Chalice, at the edge of the red brick plaza of Chalice Center, Gaven sat gazing into a clear blue sky. The plaza was thick with people—travelers spilling out from the lightning rail station or filing in to board the next coach bound for Passage or Thaliost, as well as visitors and residents enjoying all the trinkets and treats the busy marketplace had to offer. Few people went in or out of the mooring tower at the far end of the square, built to accommodate House Lyrandar’s airships. Gaven hoped to see an airship arrive before it was time to reconvene for dinner, but in the meantime he was enjoying a rare taste of sunshine.

The sun gleamed on metalwork in the distant spires of the palace, baked the tile roofs of government buildings and upscale homes, cast his dark shadow onto the ground in front of him, and warmed the back of his neck and shoulders. He couldn’t remember ever enjoying its touch so thoroughly. It filled him with an eager expectation and made him restless to start his journey.

He scratched at his neck and shoulder, the tender skin where his dragonmark had been. It was healing, he supposed—though his dragonmark had started as an itch. Would it return, blossoming back on his skin like a weed growing back from the remnant of its roots?

If it did, would there then be two Storm Dragons? He rested a hand on the pouch at his belt, felt the smooth hardness of the dragonshard inside, and a tingle of power responded to his touch. The itch on his shoulder flared into pain, and the light of the sun seemed to diminish a shade. He yanked his hand away and rubbed his thumb against his stinging fingertips, scowling.

His dragonmark hadn’t made him the Storm Dragon of the Prophecy. It hadn’t given him the power to defeat Vaskar in the Sky Caves and destroy the Soul Reaver beneath Starcrag Plain. But somehow that power seemed
bound up in the lines of his mark, the lines that spelled out the myriad possibilities of his destiny and wrote him into the Prophecy. His mark said that he was the one who drove the Eye of Siberys through the Soul Reaver’s black heart. He was the one who closed the bridge that linked starry Siberys to Khyber’s depths. But his mark was scribed in a dragon-shard, and it seemed as though someone else had done those things. And whatever the Prophecy said about deeds the Storm Dragon had not yet done—well, anyone might do those things. Anyone who held the dragon-shard or managed to extract the mark from it and wear it on his own flesh.

Had that been part of Kelas’s plan, or Nara’s? Kelas had fulfilled part of the Prophecy by using his mark in the Dragon Forge, the verse Nara had cited: “His storm flies wild, unbound and pure in devastation.”

For her part, Nara had seemed quite distressed at Aunn’s lie, that Gaven had destroyed the shard. She clearly believed that the Storm Dragon had yet to fulfill some verses of the Prophecy, something related to the Blasphemer. Gaven rummaged in a different pouch and brought out the papers he’d brought from Kelas’s office. At the top of the sheaf was the page Aunn had read from: “In the darkest night of the Dragon Below, storm and dragon are reunited, and they break together upon the legions of the Blasphemer.”

Storm and dragon reunited—it sounded like a reference to the Storm Dragon, especially given the separation of Gaven’s dragonmark from his skin. What did the Prophecy say about that separation? Did this verse mean that his mark would be restored to his skin before he confronted the Blasphemer? Which was the storm, and which the dragon? Or did the verse refer to something else entirely?

Gaven pulled his pouch open and peered at the dragonshard inside. It glowed softly, the lines of his mark casting a reddish glow over the inside of the leather pouch. He traced the lines with his eyes, felt them tug at his mind, inviting him to lose himself in their winding paths again, but he resisted. “No,” he whispered.

The Prophecy had spoken of the Storm Dragon crossing the bridge to the sky, becoming a god and leaving the world behind. So how could it account for all that had happened since he faced the Soul Reaver? He had bent the fluid verbs of the Draconic text to chart his own path, choose his own destiny. As far as the Prophecy was concerned, shouldn’t he be finished? The Storm Dragon had done what he was put in the world to do. Perhaps he hadn’t bent the Prophecy at all. Perhaps it accounted for
his choice at Starcrag Plain, his trip to Argonnessen, and everything else he had done. Was he just a player in a scripted drama after all?

Damn the Prophecy, he thought. You’re not part of me any more—I’m not part of you. My destiny is what I choose.

The sun warmed the back of his neck again, and he looked around the plaza. An airship drifted slowly toward the mooring tower. Soon, he thought with a smile, he would be aboard such a ship, sailing for home. With any luck, soon he would find Rienne. Then the rest would fall into place, one way or another.

Gaven saw Cart and Ashara at the door of the Ruby Chalice. It was time. He stood, patted his pouch to make sure the dragonshard was safely in place, and walked slowly, enjoying the sunshine, to meet them.

*  *  *  *  *

“Gaven, look.” Cart thrust a leather folder across the table at him. Gaven took it, noting the embossed cockatrice seal of House Sivis on the cover. Inside was a single sheet of vellum adorned with a sketchy portrait of Cart and a faintly glowing arcane mark.

“It says here you’re twenty-three years old,” Gaven said.

“That’s right. The twenty-second of Zarantyr, in the Year of the Kingdom 976—that’s when the creation forge gave me life.”

“That makes you pretty old for a warforged, doesn’t it?”

“I suppose it does. The first of us were made in 965, but there aren’t too many of that generation still around.”

That meant the first warforged were made only eight years before Gaven was locked in Dreadhold. He had known of them, of course. They were big news at the time. He remembered a parade in Fairhaven where a company of warforged soldiers marched at the back of the battalion, on their way to their first battle. But he had never seen one any closer than that, until Cart lifted him out of his cell.

“And you were born—or made, here? In Fairhaven?”

“I was. It was strange, when we arrived here from the Dragon Forge, right into the Cannith enclave, it was familiar to me. Even though I hadn’t been inside in twenty-three years.”

Gaven looked at the paper again. The sketch was fairly crude, but it gave careful attention to the mark on Cart’s forehead, the signature of the Cannith creation forge. He compared it to the original, trying not to stare too hard at Cart’s face. It was very accurate.

Gaven’s head swam, and for just an instant he thought he saw meaning
in the simple shape of the line, just an echo of Prophecy, some hint of destiny in the stamp of the forge. Then the feeling was gone, fading like a dream. He handed the folder back to Cart.

“Congratulations,” he said. “This is the first time you’ve had papers?”

“Yes,” Cart said. “Thank you.”

Gaven was struck again at the warmth of Ashara’s smile as she gazed at Cart. She was nearly bursting with pride.

“It’s funny,” Gaven said. “I’ve known you all these months now, and I never knew those simple facts about you. Where and when you were born, your service record in the war. I knew you were Haldren’s aide, and that’s all.”

“You were born in Stormhome on the seventh of Rhaan in 939. Your father was Arnoth d’Lyrandar, born on the twenty-first of Rhaan in 902. Your mother was Sheira Laran, born on the nineteenth of Lharvion in 903, died on the eighteenth of Lharvion in 944, giving birth to your brother Thordren.”

“How do you know all that?” Gaven said.

“We were briefed. Before we broke you and Haldren out of—”

“Best not to mention it,” Ashara interjected, glancing around at the nearby tables.

Gaven followed her gaze. No one seemed to be listening, but he cursed himself. He hadn’t been paying attention. Cart had just identified him as a Lyrandar to anyone who might have cared, and had as much as said he was an escaped prisoner. If anyone came looking, here were a number of witnesses who could attest they had seen him.

“Sorry,” Cart said. “I keep doing that.”

“It’s all right,” Gaven said. “So where is Aunn with my papers, I wonder?”

“Good question,” Ashara said, frowning. “He’s late.”

“Again.” Gaven looked around the room. “I hope he didn’t run into more trouble.”

“Gaven, listen.” Cart leaned forward over the table and lowered his voice. “It took me a long time to come around and do what was right, and by then it was too late for me to stop … what they did to you. I’m sorry for that.”

“You have more than made up for it since.”

“No, I don’t think I have. I’m not sure I ever will.”

“I wouldn’t have made it out of there without your help. Both of you,” he added, smiling at Ashara. “You got me out of Phaine’s tent to safety,
and then you went back to the forge with me. You helped me recover what they took from me.”

“Gaven,” Ashara said, looking at the table, “I carry far more blame than Cart for what happened. I know it doesn’t mean anything, but I’m sorry as well. The Dragon Forge, the whole thing was largely my work. Kelas might have operated it, but I built it—I took your mark from you.”

Gaven didn’t know how to answer. He had been furious at the forge, when they first met—only a few days ago, but it seemed so much longer. But, as Cart had pointed out then, she had saved his life, tending his wounds after their narrow escape from Phaine and the dragon-king. She seemed committed to goals that he and Cart shared, now, perhaps trying to make restitution for the wrongs she had done.

“Can you restore it?” he said.

Ashara’s eyes met his and widened in surprise. “I … I don’t know.” She frowned and looked away. “I can imagine another device, like the Dragon Forge, built to undo its work.”

“Powered by dragonfire?”

“I said I could imagine it. There’s no way I could build it alone. But maybe a simpler item …” She trailed off, eyes closed in concentration. “What?”

“It’s possible I could mount the shard in a staff or rod, to let you access its power by holding the haft.”

“I can access its power by just holding the shard.”

“Oh. Of course. It is still your mark, clearly.”

“So you’re saying that such an item would let anybody access its power, not just me? The way the Dragon Forge let Kelas call that storm and send it to Varna?”

“Yes, although the Dragon Forge was designed to amplify the effect of the mark.”

“This would just let anybody wield the power of the Siberys Mark of Storm,” Gaven said. “Have you ever known a Siberys heir in your own House, Ashara? Is there a Siberys Mark of Making loose in the world right now?”

“There was, a few years ago. She came from Zorlan’s branch of the family, in Karrnath, but she turned rogue.”

“You mean she refused to let the House keep her on a short leash in Korth.”

“Right.”

“And what happened to her?”

“First, Jorlanna and Merrix tried to bring her under their thumbs. When that failed, all three branches of the House worked together to eliminate her.”

“If there’s one thing that can make the three Cannith barons work together …”

Ashara finished his thought. “It’s the threat of a Siberys heir loose in the world.”

“So imagine House Lyrandar’s reaction if they even learn that this dragonshard exists. The Siberys Mark of Storm, not just scribed on the skin of an excoriate criminal like me, but loose, so anyone could pick it up and use it. In Jorlanna’s hands, or Phaine’s?”

“I hope you haven’t been showing it around,” Cart said.

“Of course n—”

A voice behind him cut Gaven off. “Good evening, Ashara.”

Gaven turned in his seat. It was a human man, with the Mark of Making on one temple, right beside a shock of white hair. The man glanced at Gaven as he turned, then looked back at Ashara.

“Hello, Harkin.” Ashara’s voice was cold and flat, and her eyes went to Cart.

Harkin’s eyes followed hers, and he grinned. “And … Barrow, wasn’t it? Carrying the dying from the field of battle?”

“Cart,” the warforged said.

“Of course. And I don’t believe I’ve had the pleasure.” He looked at Gaven.

Gaven stood, putting his eyes at a level with Harkin’s. “I’m Keven,” he said, taking Harkin’s extended hand.

“Harkin d’Cannith.” He gripped Gaven’s hand firmly and gave it a cursory shake.

“Don’t you mean ir’Cannith?” Ashara said. “We’re a noble house now.”

“Of course,” Harkin said. His eyes ranged over Gaven’s face and arms, and Gaven realized he was looking for a dragonmark. “Are you part of the family, Keven?”

“No,” Gaven said. He hadn’t given any thought to a family name for “Keven,” but making himself a Cannith—either with a dragonmarked d’ or a noble ir’—seemed like a bad idea.

“Yet I’ve seen you before, haven’t I?”

Gaven frowned. He had the same feeling, a nagging sense of familiarity, but he couldn’t find a specific memory. It seemed like something in a dream.

“Yes, I have,” Harkin said. His eyes narrowed. “In the enclave, last night. With Ashara and ir’Darren—he called you their prisoner, and the warforged led you out like a helpless child. Jorlanna seemed particularly furious when I told her about you. I wonder why.”

None of what Harkin said sounded familiar, but Gaven’s pulse quickened. If Harkin recognized him as a prisoner, there could be trouble.

“Listen, Harkin,” Ashara said. She stood and took Harkin’s arm, lowering her voice to a whisper. “This isn’t the time or place to explain all this. I’m willing to help you with the family matter we discussed, so the Baron certainly doesn’t need to know anything about this meeting, right?”