The Fall of Neskaya (19 page)

One morning, when the frost lay thick upon the dry curled grasses, more news came to Tramontana Tower. A squadron of armed men halted just outside the gates. They wore the livery of Ambervale, breasts crossed with scarves of the colors of both Verdanta and High Kinnally. Under a white flag of truce, their captain spoke privately with Kieran and the other Keepers.

Coryn, still awake after a night working the relays, sought out Liane. He feared the arrival of the squadron meant High Kinnally had fallen. He did not know what he might offer to comfort her, but he knew he had to try. He found her rushing from Bronwyn’s quarters, followed by one of the novices who often ran messages for the Keepers. Her eyes were reddened and swollen, her cheeks pasty. She pushed past him without a word, not even meeting his eyes, and hurried off in the direction of Kieran’s chambers. Even though she had shielded her emotions, he caught the edge of barely-contained panic.

Aran was waiting in the central chamber, along with Cathal and a few of the others who were neither asleep nor working the Second Circle.

“Liane’s been summoned to the Keepers,” Coryn said.

Aran nodded. “It doesn’t sound good.”

Coryn lowered himself onto a bench beside his friend, his hand a hair’s breadth away from Aran’s. This was the closest they’d been since that awful night. He struggled to think of the words that would set things right between them.

Deliberately, he laid his hand on Aran’s. Under the warm skin with its feathering of fine crisp hairs, he felt clean-edged bone, warm flesh. He half-closed his eyes, letting himself sink deeper into the contact. Aran’s mind rose to his with that unmistakable touch, filled with Aran’s personality. Coryn saw him as a shaft of sunlight, as a bird dancing on the wind, as a horse running free across moonlight-silvered fields. The images faded, and it was as if Aran spoke to him without words. He knew then why Aran had avoided him these past few weeks. It was not from any offense or injured feelings. Quite the opposite, Aran’s love for him ran just as strongly as it had before. In that moment of rapport, their friendship had changed. Aran had
desired
him and, knowing that Coryn could not return that desire, had withdrawn rather than risk their friendship.

“I’m sorry,” Coryn said, in a half-whisper.

Aran, turning away and blinking hard, slid his hand out from under Coryn’s. “I surprised myself as much as you. I didn’t know I felt that way. Maybe I didn’t, until that moment. Times like this, they lay us open and raw, running for comfort. And then, once it was done—anything I said would only add to your burden.”

“I’m sorry, too,” Coryn said. “You caught me by surprise. It isn’t—you know I love you. I would trust you with my life. Aran,
bredu
, you didn’t offend me. But something inside me—” He felt the muscles of his face tighten, his belly clench. He couldn’t go on.

“It’s all right,” Aran said with a fleeting smile, like a ray of sun breaking through storm clouds. “Things will get better with time. They always do.”

 

Kieran and the other two Keepers swept down the staircase, along with a handful of senior technicians. One Keeper led the way for the armed Ambervale soldiers, while the other two brought up the rear. Coryn thought that if any of the armed men had stepped even a hair’s breadth out of line, he might be blasted as he stood, so grim were the Keepers’ expressions. The men seemed to realize this, for their faces were as white and set as stone.

After the soldiers had been escorted outside the gates, Tomas, Keeper of the First Circle, returned to address the group, which had swelled to almost the entire population of the Tower. Gareth stood at the back of the room, still clothed in the thick white wool which he wore while monitoring a working circle.

“We have striven to remain apart from the petty conflicts of the outer world, excepting the lawful commands of those who hold our loyalty,” Tomas said. Neither his voice nor his posture gave away anything, so complete was his mastery. “Yet upon occasion, the world intrudes. The home castle of Liane Storn, who has lived and worked as one of us as monitor, is now claimed as fiefdom by King Damian Deslucido. He has sent his men to demand her presence as hostage for proof of her brother’s fealty.”

A ripple of emotion swept the room. One of the younger women cried out. Aran drew in a sharp breath.

Coryn got to his feet, his hands curled into fists. “You will not give her over? You cannot!”

Tomas turned slowly to lock eyes with Coryn. “Ordinarily, we would not surrender one of our own to any petty lordling who takes it upon himself to issue such commands.” Beneath the harmonics of his words rang another message, one everyone in the Tower could clearly hear.
And we have the means to defend ourselves against such rabble.

Then he drew his breath and Coryn’s heart sank. “In this case, the lines of fealty are not clear. This King Damian may indeed have the legal right to make such a demand. We will consider his claims in light of historical precedent and the titles he now possesses. However, Liane herself has consented to go with them.”

“What!”

“Why?”

Coryn started to join the protest, but a sudden realization stopped his voice. If Liane stayed, Ambervale might well use the refusal as a reason to retaliate. Even if Tramontana defended itself, it might well be drawn into a larger conflict. This was the only way to remain neutral, if for a short time only.

Tomas held up one hand for silence. The moonstone ring on his middle finger glinted in the light. “For her own reasons, Liane has chosen. Her Keeper has permitted it. There is nothing more to be said. It is a private matter.”

Cathal jumped to his feet. “Other men with ambitions won’t see it that way! They’ll think all they have to do is march up to any Tower they please and make demands!”

The muscles of Coryn’s hands ached, and his nails dug crescents into the flesh of his palms.

“Then we must teach them otherwise!” someone else cried.

“For the moment, we will not do any teaching at all,” Tomas said. “We will go about our business and let Liane go about hers.” With those words, he swept from the room.

Like an arrow loosed from a bowstring, Coryn bolted up the stairs for the women’s quarters. Aran followed a pace behind. Liane’s door was slightly ajar, revealing her, along with Bronwyn and one of the younger matrix mechanics, a shy girl from the mountainous country near Aldaran, sorting through clothing and folding it into Liane’s carved chest.

“Liane!” Coryn cried. “You can’t go! You—”

Bronwyn drew herself up to her full height, eyes flashing cold light. Coryn’s next words died on his tongue. Liane herself, after a quick expressionless glance which took in first Coryn and then Aran, bent once more to smooth the creases from a delicate linex chemise.

“This is no place for you,” Bronwyn said to Coryn, her voice firm but not unkind. She stepped outside the room and closed the door behind her.

“But Liane—”

“If you care for her at all, you will not add to her distress in this manner! Do you think this is easy for her? Do you think she would willingly choose the life of a hostage?”

Coryn shook his head. “She doesn’t have to go! Kieran will not surrender her if she refuses, and as her Keeper, he has ultimate authority. She doesn’t know what she’s doing!”

“She knows
precisely
what she is doing,” Bronwyn answered in a voice like the crack of a whip. “And it is not many who would demonstrate her courage or her loyalty. Tomas did not explain the terms of Ambervale’s demands, for such are truly not the business of the Tower. But since you are involved as possible heir to Verdanta . . .”

Her eyes flickered to Aran, standing beside Coryn. Coryn shivered, realizing the vulnerability of his own position. With Eddard a prisoner in his own castle and Petro missing, he might well be the next legitimate Lord Leynier. It was a role he had never wanted, scarcely even considered. How long would it be before Deslucido commanded Tramontana to surrender
him?

Now Coryn drew himself up. If he might be a lord, he could act that way. “Aran is my sworn brother,” he used the inflection suggestive of paxman. “Speak before him as before me.”

The outer edges of Bronwyn’s mouth curled slightly. “Then understand this. Liane is to travel not to Ambervale but to Linn. She may be a prisoner, hostage against her brother’s obedience, but she will be treated gently there. Her surrender is the price of her brother continuing to hold High Kinnally as an Ambervale fief. The alternative,” she paused briefly, studying him, “is to place High Kinnally under
Verdanta
rule.”

Two thoughts burst across Coryn’s mind. The first was that King Damian was very sure of his control over Eddard. The second—the threat to the Storns that they submit to their long-held enemy. Once he might have rejoiced, even gloated, at the thought, but his years in the Tower and his friendship with Liane had given him a larger perspective. Now he asked himself what if the situation were reversed, and Verdanta were forced to bow to High Kinnally? It was not to be imagined, not to be borne! So Liane, too, must have felt.

The moment of silence drew on. Bronwyn said in a softer voice, “Do you see why she cannot speak with you? Not even to say farewell?”

“I would have hoped—” Coryn’s throat tightened around the words, choking them. “She and I, all we had together, our work in the circle—Kieran’s dream of putting all that behind us—I thought she loved me.”

“She does, as a brother. Which is precisely why the kindest thing is to leave her with her choice.”

Oh, Liane!
His heart ached for her.

“And I,” Aran spoke up, “may I see her?” Coryn heard the generosity, the compassion behind his words. Aran might not return her love in kind, but he offered what he could.

Bronwyn’s expression betrayed nothing. “Once she has settled things here, I will ask her. Go now, both of you. Let us do our work.”

Aran did see Liane, although he said nothing to Coryn of their conversation. Coryn saw her from a distance, as he watched from one of the turrets as the Ambervale soldiers escorted her away. He wondered what might have happened if Tramontana had sent
clingfire
to High Kinnally, if Liane had not been right all along. Bronwyn said Liane did not blame him; he wished he could be so generous to himself.

As days melted into weeks, Liane’s absence shifted from a raw wound to one slowly healing. Two pre-adolescent boys from Rockraven, carrot-haired twins, arrived in a flurry of activity. They were younger than the usual novices, but because of their twin-bond, their mother, who had had some Tower experience as a young woman, determined that they needed early training.

Midwinter Festival came, along with a blizzard that made any sort of travel impossible. Except for a few rumors along the relays from Neskaya Tower, nothing more was heard of King Damian or his newly-conquered lands. Coryn told himself that surely there would be news if something major—a rebellion or assassination—had happened. Through the long winter nights, when he was not working, he could not help thinking about Liane, about Eddard and Tessa, hostages in their own home. He wondered, too, whether Petro and Margarida were even still alive. He felt sure he would know if they were not, but he could not locate either of them. Perhaps they had found some way of shielding themselves against
laran
search, a wise precaution if Rumail were involved in the occupation.

Work brought blessed relief, and Coryn’s skills sharpened even more. In these days, he found an unexpected confidante in Bronwyn. Of all the senior workers, she understood the conflicting loyalties of blood and Tower. She’d never spoken of her own family, or why she remained in a Tower when so many other nobly-born women were called away to marriages after a few years. Rumor had it that she was related to the powerful Hastur clan, that she had used her rank to refuse more than one marriage offer. So it was to Bronwyn that Coryn took the disquieting thoughts which would not go away, no matter how long or deeply he meditated.

Would Ambervale forces soon appear on Tramontana’s threshold, demanding his custody to enforce their control over Verdanta?

“I do not want to leave the Tower,” he told her as they sat together in her chambers, cradling cups of hot spiced wine while the winds outside the walls wailed like starving banshees. “This is my place. This is the work for which I was born, not ruling some small but charming mountain estate.”

“I think you are right,” she said slowly. Her mind brushed against his with the sweetness of chiming silvery bells. “We knew when you came to us that you would become a
laranzu
of great power. The Keepers saw how skillfully you handled assembling the screens.”

She meant the construction of a sixth-order matrix, which had been a major Tower project all winter. One of the younger women had been careless in calculating her cycles. Under shifting hormone levels, her control had slipped. Coryn had strengthened his own hold on the energon rings, taking over for her and steadying them until Kieran could reconfigure the circle. Months of work had been saved in that single reflexive action. As Kieran had said afterward, Coryn alone could not have saved the screens, but no one else could have done what he did.