Lord of the Fading Lands (32 page)

Kolis sheathed the dagger and tucked it inside his vest. Vadim Maur would be pleased.

"So much for my second lesson with Master Fellows." Ellie forced a weak laugh. She lay on a chaise in Rain's palace suite, her body tense despite the soothing warmth of Marissya's expert healing weave and gentle touch. Even the shock of her stabbing had faded in the face of her fear of the
shei'dalin.

She imagined herself surrounded by a solid, impenetrable wall of stone and steel, her thoughts and emotions safely barricaded within, but shivers still racked her body and her teeth chattered uncontrollably as the warmth of the
shei'dalin's
magic penetrated her flesh. At last the glow surrounding Marissya's hands dissipated and she stepped back.

"Will I live?”

A tired smile curved the
shei'dalin's
lips.
"Aiyah,
I am glad to report that you will.”

Ellysetta's eyes narrowed as magic tingled across her skin and she saw a faintly unfocused look enter both Rain's and Marissya's eyes. "Speak so I can hear," she told them. "As I was the one stabbed, I have a right to hear what you are saying.”

"Sieks'ta,"
Marissya murmured. "I was telling Rain the blade wasn't poisoned but there were remnants of a pain suppressant in your blood. The blade was treated with a numbing agent, which explains why you didn't feel anything even though the boy stabbed so deep he pierced a kidney." She glanced up at Rain. "It was good you stopped the bleeding as quickly as you did.”

"That boy meant to kill me." Even though Rain had warned her of such a possibility, it hadn't seemed real until now.

Rain's lips thinned. "It appears so,
shei'tani.”

A warrior approached. He gave a short, brisk bow and whispered something into Rain's ears. Rain's brows drew together in a sudden scowl. Whatever the news, it wasn't good.

"What is it?" Ellie asked.

"Something has happened,
shei'tani,
and I must go. Ravel and his
cha'kor
will see you safely home. Do not leave your home again today no matter what the reason.”

Irritation flashed. He was shunting her aside as if she were a child to be sent to her room while the grown-ups tended to important matters. "Tell me what's going on, Rain.”

For a moment, she thought he might not answer. And when he did, she almost wished he hadn't. "Bel has been taken into custody by the King's men. The boy who attacked you is dead. A dozen witnesses claim to have seen Bel murder him.”

Ellysetta swung her legs over the edge of the chaise and stood. "I'm coming with you"

"Nei, shei'tani.
Your family is worried, and they need to see for themselves that you are unhurt. Ravel will take you to them while Marissya, Dax, and I deal with this." He raised her face to his and held her gaze steadily. "Go to your family,
ajiana.”

"But Bel—”

"Trust me. I will not allow him to come to harm." Ellysetta searched his gaze and found resolve and reassurance. "I do trust you," she said.

His eyes glowed with sudden emotion. The hand beneath her chin slid round to cup her head and draw her closer. He bent his head and took her lips in a kiss that left her breathless.

"Beylah vo, shei'tani.
Your words bring joy to this Fey's heart" He straightened and met Ravel's gaze, then the gaze of each member of her secondary quintet. "Guard her well, my brothers.”

"With our lives, Rain," Ravel replied.

Rain tracked Dorian down to his council chamber, where he was meeting in private session with the twenty Great Lords who between them governed more than half of Celieria.

News of the would-be assassin's death had traveled through the city faster than magic-fed flames, rousing an astonishing furor. Outside the palace, the Fey reported seeing flurries of inflammatory pamphlets and small mobs of citizens gathering to march on the palace and demand justice for the dead boy, and when one of Dorian's advisors broke the privacy seal on the council chamber as he stepped briefly outside to request a book of legal precedents, Rain overheard at least half a dozen voices within calling for an inquiry and trial—of Bel.

"My Lord Feyreisen!" the council attendant yelped as Rain brushed past. "You cannot go in there! The Council is in session!”

Rain didn't spare the man a glance. He threw open the doors to the council chamber and swept inside. Dax and Marissya followed close behind him. The great round marble chamber, its raised tiers filled with enough velvet-upholstered chairs to seat the two hundred lords of Celieria's noble houses, was mostly empty. Only the gold and silver thrones of the king and queen and the semicircle of twenty lesser thrones belonging to the heads of the Great Houses were currently occupied.

Dorian and his Great Lords regarded Rain with a mix of shock and affront as he strode towards them across the chamber's gleaming marble floor. Annoura narrowed her eyes.

"My Lord Feyreisen"—the king's chief advisor jumped to his feet from his chair behind the king's throne and rushed forward to block Rain's advance—"this is highly irregular. I'm afraid I must ask you to leave. This Council is in private session.”

Rain waved an arm, silencing the man and nudging him aside with a single, swift weave. "King Dorian, you are holding the
chatokkai—
the First General—of the Fading Lands. I have come to demand his release.”

"How dare you burst into this chamber and issue demands!" One of the lords in the blue-velvet-upholstered lesser thrones surged to his feet.

Rain did not recognize the man, but the coldness in his brown eyes and the arrogance etched into every line of his face were not strangers to him. The man's heavy, well- defined musculature, emphasized rather than hidden by the tailored cut of his expensive garments, bespoke a long familiarity with the arts of mortal warfare.

«Lord Sebourne,»
Dax informed Rain.
«A lord of the northern march. His family took over Wellsley's land three centuries ago after the Great Plague.»

"You do not rule here, Tairen Soul!" Lord Sebourne continued. "And this is not one of the remote villages in the northern provinces where Fey crimes go unwitnessed and unpunished!" He jabbed a finger in Rain's direction. "Your general murdered an unarmed Celierian citizen—a child, no less! He will be held accountable for his actions!”

Several of the Twenty nodded in agreement.
"Fey
crimes?" Rain drew himself up to his full height. "My truemate—
my
queen—"
he emphasized, casting a hard glance Annoura's way, "was stabbed by that Celierian citizen you call an `unarmed child.' Be grateful I haven't burned this city to ash around your ears!”

Annoura sat up straight in her throne. "Are you
threatening
us, Feyreisen?”

"Annoura!" Dorian snapped. His queen glared but fell silent, and he turned back to Rain and Sebourne to say in a more conciliatory tone, "Gentlemen, please, hot tempers and threats are no way to solve anything." He rose from his throne and gestured for the Fey to approach. "My Lord Feyreisen, Lord Dax, Lady Marissya, a private word please?”

Grudgingly, with a hard look for Sebourne and Celieria's too-proud queen, Rain followed Dorian into a small adjoining antechamber.

"There are witnesses," Dorian informed them as soon as the door closed; "dozens of them, all who claim the child was an innocent bystander.”

"That boy was no innocent," Rain replied. "He joined Ellysetta and me in a game of Stones for the express purpose of stabbing her.”

"He could have killed her, Dorian," Marissya added, "and would have if Rain had not been there to stop the blood loss.”

Dorian eyed both of them. "I have to ask … is there any possibility Ser vel Jelani made a mistake? Could he have slain the wrong child by accident?”

"Nei,"
Rain said without hesitation. "Bel is the most experienced warrior in the Fading Lands. He would not have been so careless. But even so, he didn't kill the boy. Kieran tells me someone else wove death on the child the moment he was trapped—to keep him from revealing who hired him, no doubt.”

The Celierian king rubbed a hand over his face and sighed wearily. "I have no wish to prosecute Ser vel Jelani, but Sebourne and several others who are already concerned about the recent
dahl'reisen
murders see this as yet more proof of Fey magic run amok. Sebourne is demanding a full-blown inquiry and trial, and he's got four of the Twenty agreeing with him.”

Rain's eyes narrowed. "If someone means harm to Ellysetta, stripping Bel from her
cha'kor
could be part of a plan to make her more vulnerable to attack. I cannot allow you to endanger her that way.”

"And I've just explained why I cannot simply pardon Ser vel Jelani out of hand.”

"Then don't." Rain swept an arm towards Marissya. "We have a Truthspeaker. Have Bel swear a Fey oath, under
shei'dalin
touch, that he did not kill this boy."

"You want us to trust
her?"
Lord Sebourne cried when Dorian announced his intentions. "Your Majesty, this is an outrage. How could we possibly trust the Fey Truthspeaker to tell us the truth if the man is guilty? She's one of them!”

Rain grabbed Dax before the man pulled steel in the council chamber to defend his truemate's honor. What had the world come to that a Great Lord of Celieria would cast doubt on the integrity of Marissya v'En Solande?

"Do not push us too far, mortal," Rain warned. "Were Queen Annoura attacked on foreign soil, this Council would howl for war. The Fey have not done so. But be warned, we will not meekly accept insult atop an already grievous injury.”

King Dorian cleared his throat, the sound drawing all eyes to him. "Lord Sebourne's holdings have suffered considerable loss of life in the recent
dahl'reisen
raids. Those losses have obviously affected his normally sound judgment.”

"Your Majesty!" Sebourne protested.

Dorian didn't spare a glance for the angry border lord but kept his gaze firmly fixed on Rain. "Of course, the Lady Marissya's honesty stands above reproach. She has served with honor and integrity on every Supreme Council we have convened for the past thousand years. No clear-thinking lord of Celieria would cast her centuries of service in doubt.”

Now he did level a steady, steely-eyed look on Sebourne and held it until the nobleman subsided and sat down.

"We are grateful for her gracious counsel and her service, and we hold her in the highest regard," Dorian continued, allowing his gaze to sweep the council chamber, making eye contact with each lord of the Twenty. "The witnesses are being brought to the palace. As soon as they arrive, we will hear their testimony and that of Ser vel Jelani, and we will accept the Lady Marissya's Truthspeaking to determine Ser vel Jelani's guilt or innocence."

Ravel vel Arras, leader of Ellie's secondary quintet, and the rest of her Fey guard hustled Ellie through the city streets towards her family home. More than once they encountered small mobs of people who watched them with accusatory glares. Ellie couldn't understand it. She could practically feel the fear and loathing emanating from them in waves.

Scraps of paper littered the roads like fallen leaves, and on several street corners, shabby pamphleteers' boys shouted, "Fey murders unarmed Celierian child!" and handed out their leaflets as fast as their little fists could collect coin. Pamphleteers were always quick to print and disseminate their "news," but this was fast even for them. They must have run straight from the scene of Bel's confrontation with her young attacker to their presses.

Ellie bent to pick up one of the abandoned sheets and gasped at the awful, hate-filled accusations printed in lurid detail and presented as fact.
Innocent Child Burned Alive by Savage Fey,
the headline screamed. The text below was worse. Reading the vile words actually made her stomach clench and her chest feel tight, as if a cold, heavy weight were pressing against her heart. The headache that had savaged her yesterday began to throb anew.

"Ravel," she murmured in concern, handing him the sheet. He scanned the paper with grim eyes, then crumpled it and threw it in the gutter. "Do not worry, Feyreisa. These accusations are groundless. Rain will not let Bel come to harm."

For a full bell, Rain sat grimly silent in Dorian's council chamber as witness after witness testified they'd seen Bel burn a helpless, unarmed Celierian boy to death. Afterwards, only years of hard-won discipline kept Rain's face expressionless as he listened to Lord Sebourne and several of his fellow pompous noble windbags howl about the Fey's blatant disregard for Celierian lives. As if a single one of them would not have seen the boy hanged for pinching a dinner roll from their supper tables.

The Tairen Soul's mate—his queen—had been stabbed, in public, on Celierian soil by a Celierian citizen, and these honorless
rultsharts
squealed as if
they
were the injured party.

"I have listened to the charges and accusations of your countrymen as you insisted," Rain interjected when the current speaker paused to take a breath. "I do not dispute that they believe what they saw, but that does not mean what they think they saw is what truly happened. Now bring Belliard forth. Ask him to swear an oath of honor that he did not murder this boy.”

Dorian nodded. Near the back of the room, a door swung inward and Bel entered, bound in chains and surrounded by the King's Guards.