Nightlord: Orb (79 page)

“I don’t know.  Sometimes there isn’t much difference.”

“I love these little talks.  You always make me feel so much better.”

“At least I don’t lie to you.”

“Sometimes—in certain situations—I wish you would.”

“Are you sure?  I could, if you really want me to.”

“No, on second thought, I’ll settle for brutal honesty.  I’ve been lied to enough I know how much trouble it causes.”

“As you wish.”

“So, with that in mind, be honest.  Is this going to sting?”

“I beg your pardon?”

“It’s another temple.  Holy ground.  Remember?”

“Ah.  No, I don’t think it will be a problem—at least, not while you’re with me.  If it is a problem, Amber can probably intervene.”

“Okay.  But if I ruin these boots because me feet catch fire, I’m going to be upset.”

“Duly noted.”

We dismounted.  Bronze snorted to tell me she would keep an eye on Clomper.  I pushed open the doors.

The light was from Amber.  She lounged on a central stage, like a central fireplace.  This was surrounded by benches in eight concentric circles.  The flames around her were magical.  T’yl’s work?  Or Tianna’s?

“Dad!” she exclaimed, brightening in delight.  “You made it.”

“I did.”  I moved forward to the central dais and she floated down from it.  She held out her fiery arms to me and I hugged her without hesitation—she knew what she was doing, and the last time I touched her, she didn’t burn me.  This time was no different.  I felt her warmth, but nothing combusted.  She was opaque, solid-seeming, but felt strangely soft, as though she had no bones.  There was a firmness to her fiery flesh without any feeling of rigidity.  I could probably have reached through her with only a little effort, but knew better than to test it.

“I’m pleased to see you,” she breathed into my ear, “despite the fur on your face.  Although it does look better now that it is properly trimmed.”

“It’s starting to grow on me,” I replied.  She winced.  Dad jokes.  I’m her father; I’m allowed.  “How have you been?”  She drifted back from the embrace with a glowing smile.

“I am well, as always.”

“You’ve met indirectly,” I continued, “but, Amber, this is Mary.  Mary, this is Amber.”

“Good evening to you, Amber of the Mother,” Mary said, in Rethven.

“Good evening to you, Mary,” Amber replied.  “I would offer you both refreshments…”

“Don’t put yourself to any trouble,” I advised.  “I know hospitality has its limits, no matter how you’re related.  We’re not exactly the usual sort of guests.”

“True.  Please, be seated.”

“Um,” Mary started, “I’d rather stand.  My feet feel awfully warm.”

I glanced at Amber.  Amber wore a puzzled expression.

“Holy ground and she’s a nightlady,” I pointed out.  Amber frowned, brows drawing together in thought.  Then her face cleared as she got the reference.

“I’m so sorry,” she apologized.  “Be blessed in your comings and goings, and be welcome in the House of Fire.”

Mary visibly relaxed.  She stomped her feet, paused to consider, and nodded.

“You are supposed to say, ‘I come to this House to stand in the warmth of the Fire’,” Amber prompted.  Mary dutifully recited the response and Amber beamed at her.

We picked out a bench by the stage and parked ourselves—gingerly, in Mary’s case.  Once settled on the bench, she relaxed.  Amber half-hopped, half-floated back into her central fireplace.

“Told you so,” I told her.

“Sort of,” she admitted.  Amber swung her gaze back and forth between us with an inquiring expression.  I turned to her.

“So, tell me what you know about Tort and T’yl,” I suggested.

“Do you not wish to know about Zirafel and Karvalen?”

“Yes, but I have my own priorities.  Right now, I only want to deal with the mystery of the missing magicians.  Have you heard from T’yl?”

“Still no word.”

“I don’t suppose you know where Tort is?”

“I do not.  I thought she might have gone with you through the gate, until you told me otherwise.”

“So, Tort is still vanished and now T’yl has, too?”

“I understand T’yl has been living in the palace of Karvalen—the one in the mountaintop.  Now Tianna can no longer reach him, so I do not know what has become of him or of Tort.”

“Any idea why T’yl has disappeared?  Or where to?  Or why?”

“None at all.”

“Damn.”

I turned to Mary.

“Are you following okay?”

“I’m getting the gist of it,” she said, in English.  “I think.”

“Just checking.”

“If it’s all the same to you,” she added, “I’d like a translation spell if you’re going to be discussing significant stuff.  I don’t want to miss details.”

In answer, I cast the spell for her.  I turned to Amber again.

“All right.  I’ve got nine years of demonic tyranny to understand.  Hit me with the highlights.”

“As you wish.  However, let me point out I do not know all the details, myself.  I was not a core member of the conspiracy.  I was not much involved in the early days—the conquest of Rethven—either.”

“See, that’s the kind of thing I need to know.  What conspiracy?  The conspiracy to overthrow the Demon King and get me free?”

“Give me a moment, please,” Amber requested, and settled herself, thinking.

“In the beginning,” she told us, “it was Bronze.  It is my understanding Bronze sought out Tort.  Tort found a way to understand her, and the two of them shared the secret—the King of Karvalen was possessed by a demon.  Or, not exactly a demon.  A dark thing made of all that was terrible and evil within the King was in control.  You were the King, yes, but it was originally believed that, somehow, all that was good and noble within you was destroyed.

“For a long time, those two were the only ones who knew.  Bronze remained hidden from you while Tort hid her knowledge.  She did terrible things for her angel, Father.”  Amber paused, the blue flames of her eyes flickering sadly.  “Terrible things,” she repeated, softly.  “You may find it difficult to forgive her.”

“We’ll can those kippers when we come to them,” I told her.  “Go on.”

“I do not know the specifics, but she somehow recruited the Dragonsword into the conspiracy.”

I do.

“Okay, what happened?” I asked.

She opened up a communications spell one day and said, basically, “Hey, did you know the Boss is possessed by a demon?”  I told her I’d figured it out, but so what?  We were in the field, hacking apart people who wanted to argue about who was king.  I told her as much and we discussed it.  Don’t get me wrong; I was all for having you back on the hilt, Boss.  At the time, though, your dark side was doing a good job of being a ruthless conqueror.

“You were enjoying yourself.”

Well… yeah.  But I was also willing to help Tort.

Trade-offs.  Powerful sword, but with an almost complete lack of conscience.  It’s what I get for trying my hand at dragon-slaying, I suppose.

“Fine.  What did she want you to do?”

Keep my teeth together, mostly.  Poke around and see if I could find you in there—Bronze said you were in there, so Tort wanted me to look.  That sort of thing.

“Find anything interesting?”

Your dark side has a lot of imagination and all of it nasty, Boss.

This, coming from a former dragon.

“All right.  Amber?  Then what?”

“As Firebrand says, your darker self conquered his way across the former kingdom of Rethven.  City by city, territory by territory, the kingdom grew.  After a time, many of them simply threw down their banners and surrendered.  Your knights were invincible—the original knights, not the mercenaries and killers the Demon King promoted to knights.

“Of your original knights, much has been said.  It was rumored the wearers of the black armor could not be killed.  Others said each suit of armor was forged from the bodies of demons, and fought on even if the wearer was slain.  It was even whispered your knights were demons, themselves.  This sowed fear among those who resisted.  And the punishments for resisting were… inventive.”  Amber shuddered—a literal description for a creature made of fire.  “I would rather not go into that.”

“Same here.”

“Thank you.  Within three years, your armies had either destroyed or conquered every city of note.  You returned to Carrillon and held a formal ceremony of coronation, complete with all the nobles of your new realm.  Some of them were new to such a station, appointed to rule in the absence of the old noble family.”

“Absence of the old noble family?”

“Inventive punishments,” Amber repeated.

“Ah.”

“Even so, the nobles, old and new alike, attended your coronation, along with their immediate families.  He was quite specific about it.”

“I can’t imagine why,” I told her, trying not to be too sarcastic.

“After that, you seemed…” she trailed off and paused, searching for a word.  “I will not say content, but… satisfied?  Comfortable, perhaps.  You seldom stirred from Carrillon, except for infrequent state visits to loyal cities or royal sword-rattling with ones rumored to be less loyal.”

“But, the conspiracy?” I prompted.

“Tort eventually included T’yl and Tianna.  T’yl, because she needed the help of another magician, and Tianna because she was… persistent in wishing to see her grandfather again.  She had not seen you since you went to war, and the necessities of the new temple in Karvalen were a good excuse to keep her from going to visit.  We kept her from seeing the atrocities your other self committed.”

“You engineered that?”

“Yes.  And, though you probably will not believe it completely, so did the Mother.  Neither of us would have her see the things you may conjure from the depths of your own heart.”

“I’ll… huh.  I don’t know what to say to that.  Sp—I mean, the Mother of Flame really tried to keep Tianna from seeing…?”

“I swear it.”

“I may have to give her the benefit of the doubt,” I mused.  “That’ll take some thinking on.  But I’m sidetracking again.  Conspiracy?  Tianna?”

“Her training as a wizard,” Amber admitted, “made her a useful member of the conspiracy, but her training as a priestess, I think, was her chief value.  I am unclear on the magical side of things, as you may expect.  Some of their initial ideas involved burning the dark thing from you, but Tianna felt this would be too dangerous—not only might it take some time, during which the other might escape, but it would be impossible to tell when enough of it had been burned away.  They might destroy parts of you, rather than only the monster inside you.  Light will destroy dark, but it can also destroy shadow, if you see what I mean.”

“All too vividly.”

“Tort, as the head of the conspiracy, kept it small.  I believe she tried to recruit Seldar some time later, since he resigned his knighthood and chose to enter—”

“He what?” I interrupted.  I couldn’t believe it. 
Resigned?
“Seldar?  As in Torvil, Kammen, and Seldar?  My right-hand-man Seldar? 
That
Seldar?”

“Oh, indeed he did.  Torvil’s loyalty is without limit; he would obey any order you gave, and do so with enthusiasm and imagination.  Kammen, likewise, obeys his King; he would do whatever was required, no matter how distasteful.  But Seldar was the one whose conscience overmastered his oath.  He left his sword, his sash, and his armor behind and joined the priesthood of the Lord of Justice.”  Amber smiled, a shining thing that brightened the whole room.

“He and I have had many talks, one priest to another.  Our respective spheres do not overlap, so we are not in competition with one another.  He is a good man, Father.”

“I know, and I’m proud of him, too.”

“Despite his action?”

“Because of it.  But that’s a talk I’ll have with him.  Continue, please.”

“Tort recruited him into the conspiracy after that.  He was… relieved.  For years, he feared you had become the monster he saw.  To know the thing he once served was, effectively, an usurper on the throne pleased him—on a personal level—to a degree I hardly know how to relate.  It also, I fear, awakened in him a rage so vast it could burn cities.  That thing used him, deceived him—offended him.  It wounded his heart when he discovered how it used his King.  If he were not then a priest of justice and trained to be of still heart and quiet mind, he might have killed your body to destroy the thing and free you.”  She paused, lips pursed.  “He might have tried, at least.”

“I’m kind of glad he didn’t,” I agreed.  “I’m not saying it wasn’t a good idea, but I’m glad he didn’t.”

“I say it was not a good idea,” Amber chided, sharply.  “You live.  That, in itself, is an important thing.”

“To me, yes.  Not necessarily to everyone else.”

“Dad?”

“Yes?”

“You know nothing of this matter.  Do not presume to speak of it to me in such a manner.”