The Way of Kings (93 page)

“Spren live in everything,” Hesina replied.

“They can’t live in
everything
,” Kal said, dropping a peel into the pail at his feet. He glanced out the window, watching the road that led from the town to the citylord’s mansion.

“They do,” Hesina said. “Spren appear when something changes—when fear appears, or when it begins to rain. They are the heart of change, and therefore the heart of all things.”

“This longroot,” Kal said, holding it up skeptically.

“Has a spren.”

“And if you slice it up?”

“Each bit has a spren. Only smaller.”

Kal frowned, looking over the long tuber. They grew in cracks in the stone where water collected. They tasted faintly of minerals, but were easy to grow. His family needed food that didn’t cost much, these days.

“So we eat spren,” Kal said flatly.

“No,” she said, “we eat the roots.”

“When we
have
to,” Tien added with a grimace.

“And the spren?” Kal pressed.

“They are freed. To return to wherever it is that spren live.”

“Do I have a spren?” Tien said, looking down at his chest.

“You have a soul, dear. You’re a person. But the pieces of your body may very well have spren living in them. Very small ones.”

Tien pinched at his skin, as if trying to pry the tiny spren out.

“Dung,” Kal said suddenly.

“Kal!” Hesina snapped. “That’s not talk for mealtime.”

“Dung,” Kal said stubbornly. “It has spren?”

“I suppose it does.”

“Dungspren,” Tien said, then snickered.

His mother continued to chop. “Why all of these questions, suddenly?”

Kal shrugged. “I just—I don’t know. Because.”

He’d been thinking recently about the way the world worked, about what he was to do with his place in it. The other boys his age, they didn’t wonder about their place. Most
knew
what their future held. Working in the fields.

Kal had a choice, though. Over the last several months, he’d finally made that choice. He would become a soldier. He was fifteen now, and could volunteer when the next recruiter came through town. He planned to do just that. No more wavering. He would learn to fight. That was the end of it. Wasn’t it?

“I want to understand,” he said. “I just want everything to make sense.”

His mother smiled at that, standing in her brown work dress, hair pulled back in a tail, the top hidden beneath her yellow kerchief.

“What?” he demanded. “Why are you smiling?”

“You
just
want everything to make sense?”

“Yes.”

“Well next time the ardents come through the town to burn prayers and Elevate people’s Callings, I’ll pass the message along.” She smiled. “Until then, keep peeling roots.”

Kal sighed, but did as she told him. He checked out the window again, and nearly dropped the root in shock. The carriage. It was coming down the roadway from the mansion. He felt a flutter of nervous hesitation. He’d planned, he’d thought, but now that the time was upon him, he wanted to sit and keep peeling. There would be another opportunity, surely….

No. He stood, trying to keep the anxiety from his voice. “I’m going to go rinse off.” He held up crem-covered fingers.

“You should have washed the roots off first as I told you,” his mother noted.

“I know,” Kal said. Did his sigh of regret sound fake? “Maybe I’ll just wash them all off now.”

Hesina said nothing as he gathered up the remaining roots, crossed to the door, heart thumping, and stepped out into the evening light.

“See,” Tien said from behind, “from this side it’s green. I don’t think it’s a spren, Mother. It’s the light. It makes the rock change….”

The door swung closed. Kal set down the tubers and charged through the streets of Hearthstone, passing men chopping wood, women throwing out dishwater, and a group of grandfathers sitting on steps and looking at the sunset. He dunked his hands into a rain barrel, but didn’t stop as he shook the water free. He ran around Mabrow Pigherder’s house, up past the commonwater—the large hole cut into the rock at the center of the town to catch rain—and along the breakwall, the steep hillside against which the town was built to shield it from storms.

Here, he found a small stand of stumpweight trees. Knobby and about as tall as a man, they grew leaves only on their leeward sides, running down the length of the tree like rungs on a ladder, waving in the cool breeze. As Kal got close, the large, bannerlike leaves snapped up close to the trunks, making a series of whipping sounds.

Kal’s father stood on the other side, hands clasped behind his back. He was waiting where the road from the manor turned past Hearthstone. Lirin turned with a start, noticing Kal. He wore his finest clothing: a blue coat, buttoning up the sides, like a lighteyes’s coat. But it was over a pair of white trousers that showed wear. He studied Kal through his spectacles.

“I’m going with you,” Kal blurted. “Up to the mansion.”

“How did you know?

“Everyone knows,” Kal said. “You think they wouldn’t talk if Brightlord Roshone invited you to dinner? You, of all people?”

Lirin looked away. “I told your mother to keep you busy.”

“She tried.” Kal grimaced. “I’ll probably hear a storm of it when she finds those longroots sitting outside the front door.”

Lirin said nothing. The carriage rolled to a stop nearby, wheels grinding against the stone.

“This will not be a pleasant, idle meal, Kal,” Lirin said.

“I’m not a fool, Father.” When Hesina had been told there was no more need for her to work in the town…Well, there was a reason they’d been reduced to eating longroots. “If you’re going to confront him, then you should have someone to support you.”

“And that someone is you?”

“I’m pretty much all you have.”

The coachman cleared his throat. He didn’t get down and open the door, the way he did for Brightlord Roshone.

Lirin eyed Kal.

“If you send me back, I’ll go,” Kal said.

“No. Come along if you must.” Lirin walked up to the carriage and pulled open the door. It wasn’t the fancy, gold-trimmed vehicle that Roshone used. This was the second carriage, the older brown one. Kal climbed in, feeling a surge of excitement at the small victory—and an equal measure of panic.

They were going to face Roshone. Finally.

The benches inside were amazing, the red cloth covering them softer than anything Kal had ever felt. He sat down, and the seat was surprisingly springy. Lirin sat across from Kal, pulling the door closed, and the coachman snapped his whip at the horses. The vehicle turned around and rattled back up the road. As soft as the seat was, the ride was terribly bumpy, and it rattled Kal’s teeth against one another. It was worse than riding in a wagon, though that was probably because they were going faster.

“Why didn’t you want us to know about this?” Kal asked.

“I wasn’t certain I’d go.”

“What else would you do?”

“Move away,” Lirin said. “Take you to Kharbranth and escape this town, this kingdom, and Roshone’s petty grudges.”

Kal blinked in shock. He’d never thought of that. Suddenly everything seemed to expand. His future changed, wrapping upon itself, folding into a new form entirely. Father, Mother, Tien…
with
him. “Really?”

Lirin nodded absently. “Even if we didn’t go to Kharbranth, I’m sure many Alethi towns would welcome us. Most have never had a surgeon to care for them. They do the best they can with local men who learned most of what they know from superstition or working on the occasional wounded chull. We could even move to Kholinar; I’m skilled enough to get work as a physician’s assistant there.”

“Why don’t we go, then? Why
haven’t
we gone?”

Lirin watched out the window. “I don’t know. We should leave. It makes sense. We have the money. We aren’t wanted here. The citylord hates us, the people mistrust us, the Stormfather himself seems inclined to knock us down.” There was something in Lirin’s voice. Regret?

“I tried very hard to leave once,” Lirin said, more softly. “But there’s a tie between a man’s home and his heart. I’ve cared for these people, Kal. Delivered their children, set their bones, healed their scrapes. You’ve seen the worst of them, these last few years, but there was a time before that, a good time.” He turned to Kal, clasping his hands in front of him, the carriage rattling. “They’re mine, son. And I’m theirs. They’re my responsibility, now that Wistiow has gone. I can’t leave them to Roshone.”

“Even if they
like
what he’s doing?”

“Particularly because of that.” Lirin raised a hand to his head. “Stormfather. It sounds more foolish now that I say it.”

“No. I understand. I think.” Kal shrugged. “I guess, well, they still come to us when they’re hurt. They complain about how unnatural it is to cut into a person, but they still come. I used to wonder why.”

“And did you come to a conclusion?”

“Kind of. I decided that in the end, they’d rather be alive to curse at you a few more days. It’s what they do. Just like healing them is what you do. And they
used
to give you money. A man can say all kinds of things, but where he sets his spheres, that’s where his heart is.” Kal frowned. “I guess they
did
appreciate you.”

Lirin smiled. “Wise words. I keep forgetting that you’re nearly a man, Kal. When did you go and grow up on me?”

That night when we were nearly robbed,
Kal thought immediately.
That night when you shone light on the men outside, and showed that bravery had nothing to do with a spear held in battle.

“You’re wrong about one thing, though,” Lirin said. “You told me that they
did
appreciate me. But they still do. Oh, they grumble—they’ve always done that. But they also leave food for us.”

Kal started. “They do?”

“How do you think we’ve been eating these last four months?”

“But—”

“They’re frightened of Roshone, so they’re quiet about it. They left it for your mother when she went to clean or put it in the rain barrel when it’s empty.”

“They tried to rob us.”

“And those very men were among the ones who gave us food as well.”

Kal pondered that as the carriage arrived at the manor house. It had been a long time since he’d visited the large, two-story building. It was constructed with a standard roof that sloped toward the stormward side, but was much larger. The walls were of thick white stones, and it had majestic square pillars on the leeward side.

Would he see Laral here? He was embarrassed by how infrequently he thought about her these days.

The mansion’s front grounds had a low stone wall covered with all kinds of exotic plants. Rockbuds lined the top, their vines draping down the outside. Clusters of a bulbous variety of shalebark grew along the inside, bursting with a variety of bright colors. Oranges, reds, yellows, and blues. Some outcroppings looked like heaps of clothing, with folds spread like fans. Others grew out like horns. Most had tendrils like threads that waved in the wind. Brightlord Roshone paid much more attention to his grounds than Wistiow had.

They walked up past the whitewashed pillars and entered between the thick wooden stormdoors. The vestibule inside had a low ceiling and was decorated with ceramics; zircon spheres gave them a pale blue cast.

A tall servant in a long black coat and a bright purple cravat greeted them. He was Natir, the steward now that Miliv had died. He’d been brought in from Dalilak, a large coastal city to the north.

Natir led them to a dining room where Roshone sat at a long darkwood table. He’d gained weight, though not enough to be called fat. He still had that grey-flecked beard, and his hair was greased back down to his collar. He wore white trousers and a tight red vest over a white shirt.

He’d already begun his meal, and the spicy scents made Kal’s stomach rumble. How long had it been since he’d had pork? There were five different dipping sauces on the table, and Roshone’s wine was a deep, crystalline orange. He ate alone, no sign of Laral or his son.

The servant gestured toward a side table set up in a room next to the dining hall. Kal’s father took one look at it, then walked to Roshone’s table and sat down. Roshone paused, skewer halfway to his lips, spicy brown sauce dripping to the table before him.

“I’m of the second nahn,” Lirin said, “and I have a personal invitation to dine with you. Surely you follow the precepts of rank closely enough to give me a place at your table.”

Roshone clenched his teeth, but did not object. Taking a deep breath, Kal sat down beside his father. Before he left to join the war on the Shattered Plains, he
had
to know. Was his father a coward or a man of courage?

By the light of spheres at home, Lirin had always seemed weak. He worked in his surgery room, ignoring what the townspeople said about him. He told his son he couldn’t practice with the spear and forbade him to think of going to war. Weren’t those the actions of a coward? But five months ago, Kal had seen courage in him that he’d never expected.

And in the calm blue light of Roshone’s palace, Lirin met the eyes of a man far above him in rank, wealth, and power. And did not flinch. How did he do it? Kal’s heart thumped uncontrollably. He had to put his hands in his lap to keep them from betraying his nervousness.

Roshone waved to a serving man, and within a short time, new places had been set. The periphery of the room was dark. Roshone’s table was an illuminated island amid a vast black expanse.

There were bowls of water for dipping one’s fingers and stiff white cloth napkins beside them. A lighteyes’ meal. Kal had rarely eaten such fine food; he tried not to make a fool of himself as he hesitantly took a skewer and imitated Roshone, using his knife to slide down the bottommost chunk of meat, then raising it and biting. The meat was savory and tender, though the spices were much hotter than he was accustomed to.

Lirin did not eat. He rested his elbows on the table, watching the Brightlord dine.

“I wished to offer you the chance to eat in peace,” Roshone said eventually, “before we talked of serious matters. But you don’t seem inclined to partake of my generosity.”