The Born Queen Part 26

"I was hoping for a favor there, Majesty," the earl said.

"What is that, Cape Chavel?"

"If some lady could be found who needs a maid..." He trailed off, looking a bit embarra.s.sed.

"What's this?" Emily said. "Why can't I ride with you?" She turned to Anne. "I'm really not much good at sewing."

"I might be able to manage to please you both," Anne said. "I am presently in need of a maid, and your brother, for a time at least, will ride with me. I want to see personally how his men perform."

"Majesty," the earl said, "that is very very generous." generous."

"It is also very dangerous, Cape Chavel. Any maid of mine is in constant peril."

"I can handle a knife and sword as well as a bow," Emily said.

The earl pursed his lips and shot his sister a look probably meant to silence her.

"It's true," he conceded after a moment. "She can handle herself. There's peril everywhere, Your Majesty. You may attract danger, but from what I've heard, you're also good at repelling it. And to have my sister near me-it really is more than I could have hoped for."

"Well, I promise nothing, but we shall try it out for a few days and see how we get along."

Emily clapped her hands together but did not giggle. That in itself was promising.

A few bells later, in the Warhearth, the fresh air of the sunlit Sleeve seemed very far away. It wasn't just the lack of windows but the heaviness of the room itself and the ma.s.sive paintings of her family's martial past. One picture in particular seemed to have singled her out. It depicted from behind the first few ranks of an army on some sort of rise, so near the bottom of the frame of the painting that only the tops of helms were visible, and in the next rank full heads, then down to shoulders. At the crest of the hill stood a woman in armor, also showing her back, but with her head turned back to her men. Her hair was flame, twisting about her in coruscating strands, and her eyes were incandescent, inhuman. Her lips were parted and her neck was taut, as if she were shouting.

Before the warriors loomed a ma.s.sive, mist-shrouded citadel of dark red stone, and in the mists gigantic shadows seemed to move.

Genya Dare, at that last terrible battle, had fought right here, where Eslen now stood.

Genya Dare, who had let one Skaslos live to be the secret captive of the kings of Crotheny-until Anne let him go.

Follow me, she was saying. she was saying. Follow me, daughter-queen. Follow me, daughter-queen.

"Majesty, if you would like to do this another time-"

Artwair.

"No," she said, shaking herself back to the moment. "I'm fine. I was just wondering how the artist knew what Genya Dare looked like."

"He didn't," Artwair said. "The model was Elyoner Dare."

"Aunt Elyoner?"

"No, your father's grandmother. A Merimoth, originally, but her mother was a Dare from the Minster-on-Sea branch of the family."

"That's her?"

"Well, she didn't look exactly like that when I knew her. She was a good deal older. Why do you ask?"

Because I almost lost my virginity in her crypt.

"No reason," she said.

He shrugged, then pointed at the map he had spread out on the table. "Sir Fail will blockade Copenwis to prevent more reinforcements by sea. They will expect an attack by land because it's the best and quickest way to take the city. The city isn't really built for siege, and the highlands around it make it too easy to bombard with engines. That means they'll try to meet us somewhere on the Maog Vaost plain before we get there."

"And so?"

"And so I propose taking a somewhat indirect route to the city: moving east a bit and then doubling back to attack." His finger described a half arc.

"We can send a smaller mounted force the obvious way and have them camp to provoke the waiting force to settle. They'll have orders to retreat back to Poelscild. By that time we should have the position we want."

Anne nodded. "If you think this is the way to do it."

"We could take a larger force, but that would leave Eslen weakened, and we would still be delayed. If we go heavy on cavalry and light infantry, I think Copenwis might fall quickly."

"We'll try that, then. And if we're taking mostly horse, I've a mind to take Cape Chavel with us."

Artwair frowned a bit. "His reputation is good," he said. "His mounted archers are said to be without equal. But he got those from his father, and the man himself hasn't been tested in battle. Besides that, I worry about his loyalties."

"You think his allegiance to me is feigned?"

"I don't know what to think, Majesty. That's just the problem. I don't know him."

"Aren't we better putting him to the test now rather than later?"

"I suppose. But with you riding along..."

"Not that again, I hope."

He looked very much as if he did want to revisit that subject, but instead he shook his head.

"We'll try him," she said.

"As you wish, Majesty. Now, if we can talk about the defenses along the coast..."

Another two bells of that, and Anne headed up to her rooms, ready for a rest. She hardly had begun to undress when she heard a soft rap at the door. Throwing on a dressing gown, she went to see who it was.

The knock was from the Sefry guard, of course.

"Forgive me, Majesty," he said, "but someone requests an audience."

"In my rooms?"

"Majesty, it's Mother Uun."

"Ah." She hadn't seen the ancient Sefry for a long while. It wasn't her habit to drop by for no reason.

"Send her up, then," she said. "And find some of that tea she drinks."

"Majesty."

A few moments later, two Sefry women were shown in.

Mother Uun was old even for a Sefry, and Sefry lived for hundreds of years. Even in the dusk light coming through the window, the spider work of veins in her face showed through translucent skin. She had her hair in a braid so long that it was wrapped around her waist three times, like a sash.

The other woman looked very young, but with the Sefry it was hard to know what that meant exactly. Her face was oval, her eyes some dark color, her mouth a bit crooked, as if she were always on the verge of a deprecating smile.

"Majesty," Mother Uun said, bowing. "May I present Nerenai of the House Sern."

The young woman bowed again. "A pleasure, Majesty."

Her voice was pleasantly husky, with a lilting accent Anne did not recognize.

"The pleasure is mine," Anne said. "To what do I owe this visit?"

"Intrusion, I'm sure you mean," Mother Uun said. "I'm sorry for the late hour. I won't keep you long."

"Sit," Anne said. "Please."

The two took their places on a bench, and Anne settled in her armchair.

Mother Uun's gaze seemed to pick through her. "Your power is growing," she said. "I can see it all around you. I can feel you when I close my eyes."

Anne suddenly realized how glad she was the Sefry had come, happy to have someone she could talk to who might not think her merely mad.

"I-things are happening to me. I do things I don't understand sometimes, as if I'm in a dream. I think things..." She sighed. "Can you tell me what's happening to me?"

"Not everything, I'm sure, but Nerenai and I have come to offer what knowledge we have."

The tea arrived at that moment, and Anne waited impatiently while the two had a sip.

"There is a woman I see," Anne said. "She burns, and she has power. She helps me, but I don't know if I can trust her."

"A woman? Not one of the Faiths?"

"She killed the Faiths," Anne said.

Mother Uun's eyes widened. "That's interesting," she said. "I don't know what that might mean. Nerenai?"

"The Faiths are advisers," Nerenai said.

"Not very good ones," Anne replied.

The younger Sefry shrugged. "They are limited, it is true. Or were, I suppose. But they see things in the flow of the great powers that others cannot. And they have followers in the temporal world."

"Yes," Anne said. "I've met some of them. They kidnapped me."

Nerenai frowned, and steepled her fingers together.

"The burning woman must be your arilac," Mother Uun said. "It could appear as anything."

"Arilac?"

"In the oldest stories about the thrones, there is a mention of the arilac, a sort of guide who appears to lead those who have the power to claim it toward the throne. She is your ally in that, at least."

"But the question you must ask yourself," Nerenai said, "is what advice the Faiths might have given you that the arilac did not want you to hear."

"I spoke to their ghosts," Anne said. "They didn't tell me anything about why they died."

"They may not have known. It might have been something your arilac feared they would learn later."

"Then she isn't to be trusted?"

"I would question everything she-or, rather, it it-tells you. It wants you to find and control the sedos throne, and in the most direct manner possible. There may be other, more difficult ways that it withholds the knowledge of. If it asks you to do something you think is wrong, press it for an alternative."

"So if she asks me to cut off my hand-"

"I would question that," Nerenai said. "Follow the arilac, but not blindly. Stay skeptical."

Mother Uun shook her head. "I antic.i.p.ated the arilac, suspected it had already found you the first time we met, but I did not know enough to help you with it. That's why I sent for Nerenai. Her clan holds those secrets. She can help guide you." She smiled. "A guide to help with the guide."

"I am at your service, Majesty," Nerenai said.

Anne studied the two women for a moment. Part of her desperately wanted to believe that Nerenai was sincere, but another part of her feared the woman was a spy. That was the trouble with being queen: She couldn't really trust anyone. Suddenly, where she had once had friends, she was surrounded by strangers.

But I did that on purpose, didn't I? she thought. Her reasons for it were still good. she thought. Her reasons for it were still good.

"Before I say anything, I'd like to ask you something else," she said.

"I'm at your pleasure, Majesty."

"You know I freed the Kept. Was that a bad thing?"

"Yes."

"How bad?"

"Very bad," Mother Uun said. "Although I can't be more specific than that."

"He promised to mend the law of death and then die himself."

"And he will do both of those things. It's what he does between then and now that is likely to be the problem."

"It's been months."