The Priory of the Orange Tree Page 12

  “I must go back to the Coffer Chamber,” Truyde said under her breath. “I had to find sixteen comfits for that loathsome bird. It will raise a stink if I am gone for long.”

  “Tell me what you were plotting with Sulyard, then.”

  “And if I do not tell you?” Truyde let out a huff of laughter. “What will you do, Mistress Duryan?”

  “Perhaps I will tell the Principal Secretary that I suspect you of conspiring against Her Majesty. Remember, child, that I have your letters. Or perhaps,” Ead said, “I must use other means to make you talk.”

  Truyde narrowed her eyes.

  “This is not courteous speech,” she said softly. “Who are you? Why do you take such an interest in the secrets of the Inysh court?” Caution flashed across her face. “Are you one of Combe’s intelligencers, is that it? I hear he makes spies of the basest sorts.”

  “All you need know is that I make it my business to protect Her Majesty.”

  “You are a chamberer, not a Knight of the Body. Haven’t you some sheets to strip?”

  Ead stepped closer. She was half a head taller than Truyde, whose hand now strayed to the knife on her girdle.

  “I may not be a knight,” Ead said, “but when I came to this court, I swore that I would protect Queen Sabran from her enemies.”

  “And I took the same oath,” said Truyde hotly. “I am not her enemy—and neither are the people of the East. They despise the Nameless One, as we do. The noble creatures they worship are nothing like wyrms.” She drew herself up. “Draconic things are waking, Ead. Soon they will rise—the Nameless One and his servants—and their wrath will be terrible. And when they rally against us, we will need help to fight them.”

  A chill went through Ead.

  “You want to broker a military alliance with the East,” she murmured. “You want to call their wyrms . . . to help us deal with the awakenings.” Truyde stared her out, her eyes bright. “Fool. Headstrong fool. When the queen discovers you wish to deal with wyrms—”

  “They are not wyrms! They are dragons, and they are gentle creatures. I have seen pictures of them, read books about them.”

  “Eastern books.”

  “Yes. Their dragons are one with air and water, not with fire. The East has been estranged from us for so long that we have forgotten the difference.” When Ead only looked at her in disbelief, Truyde tried a different tack: “As a fellow outsider in this country, hear me. What if the Inysh are wrong, and the continuation of the House of Berethnet is not what keeps the Nameless One at bay?”

  “What are you prattling about, child?”

  “You know something has changed. The Draconic creatures awakening, the breaking-away of Yscalin from Virtudom—these events are only the beginning.” Her voice dropped low. “The Nameless One is coming back. And I believe he is coming soon.”

  For a moment, Ead was speechless.

  What if the continuation of the House of Berethnet is not what keeps the Nameless One at bay?

  How had a young woman of Virtudom come to this heretical conclusion?

  Of course, she might well be right. The Prioress had said as much to Ead before she came to Inys, explaining why a sister must be sent to guard Queen Sabran.

  The House of Berethnet may protect us from the Nameless One, or it may not. There is no proof either way. Just as there is no proof to say whether the Berethnet queens are indeed descendants of the Mother. If they are, their blood is sacred, and it must be protected. She could see the Prioress now, clear as spring water. That is the problem with stories, child. The truth in them cannot be weighed.

  That was why Ead had been sent to Inys. To protect Sabran, in case the myth was true and her blood would prevent the enemy rising.

  “And you mean us to prepare for his . . . second coming,” Ead said, feigning amusement.

  Truyde lifted her chin. “I do. The Easterners have many dragons that live alongside humans. That do not answer to the Nameless One,” she said. “When he returns, we will need those Eastern dragons to defeat him. We must stand together to prevent a second Grief of Ages. Triam and I will not let humankind walk to its extinction. We may be small, and we may be young, but we will shake the world for our beliefs.”

  Whatever the truth, this girl had swallowed the torch of delusion.

  “How is it you are so certain that the Nameless One will come?” Ead asked. “Are you not a child of Virtudom, born to believe that Queen Sabran keeps him chained?”

  Truyde straightened.

  “I love Queen Sabran,” she said, “but I am no green child to believe what I am told without proof. The Inysh may have blind faith, but in Mentendon, we value evidence.”

  “And you have evidence that the Nameless One will return? Or is this guesswork?”

  “Not guesswork. Hypothesis.”

  “Whatever your hypothesis, your plot is heresy.”

  “Do not speak to me of heresy,” Truyde shot back. “Did you not once worship the Dawnsinger?”

  “My beliefs are not in question here.” Ead paused. “So that is where Sulyard is gone. On some mad-born quest in the East, trying to broker an impossible alliance on behalf of a queen who knows nothing about it.” She sank onto the lip of the well. “Your lover will die in this attempt.”

  “No. The Seiikinese will listen—”

  “He is not an official ambassador from Inys. Why ever should they hear him out?”

  “Triam will persuade them. No one speaks from the heart as he does. And once the Eastern rulers are convinced of the threat, we will go to Queen Sabran. And she will see the necessity of an alliance.”

  The child was blinded by her passion. Sulyard would be executed the moment he set foot in the East, and Sabran would sooner cut off her own nose than strike up an alliance with wyrm-lovers, even if she could be persuaded to believe that the Nameless One might rise while she drew breath.

  “The North is weak,” Truyde ploughed on, “and the South is too proud to treat with Virtudom.” Her cheeks were flushed. “You dare to judge me for seeking help elsewhere?”

  Ead looked her in the eye.

  “You may think yourself the only one who seeks to protect this world,” she said, “but you have no idea of the foundation upon which you stand. None of you does.” When Truyde knitted her brow, Ead said, “Sulyard asked for your help. What have you done to assist him from here? What plans have you made?” Truyde was silent. “If you have done anything to aid his mission, it is treason.”

  “I shall not speak another word.” Truyde pulled away. “Go to Lady Oliva if you like. First you will have to explain what you were doing in the Coffer Chamber.”

  As she made to leave, Ead closed a hand around her wrist.

  “You wrote a name in the book,” she said. “Niclays. I think it refers to Niclays Roos, the anatomist.” Truyde shook her head, but Ead saw the spark of recognition in her eyes. “What has Roos to do with all this?”

  Before Truyde could answer, a wind rushed through the grounds.

  Every branch quivered on every tree. Every bird in the aviary ceased its singing. Ead released her hold on Truyde and stepped out of the alcove.

  Cannons were firing in the city. Muskets went off with sounds like chestnuts bursting on a fire. Behind her, Truyde stayed beside the well.

  “What is that?” she said.

  Ead breathed in as her blood pounded. It had been a long time since this feeling had swept through her body. For the first time in years, her siden had been kindled.

  Something was coming. If it had got this far, it must have found a way through the coastal defenses. Or destroyed them.

  A flare like the sun breaking through cloud, so hot it parched her eyes and lips, and a wyrm soared over the curtain wall. It burned away the archers and musketeers and smashed a line of catapults to splinters. Truyde sank to the ground.

  Ead knew what it was from its magnitude alone. A High Western. A monster from its teeth to the bullwhip of its tail, where lethal spikes jutted. Its batt
le-scarred abdomen was rusted brown, but the bulk of it was black as tar. Arrows sliced from watchtowers and clattered off its scales.

  Arrows were useless. Muskets were useless. It was not just any wyrm, not just any High Western. No one living had laid eyes on this creature, but Ead knew its name.

  Fýredel.

  He who had called himself the right wing of the Nameless One. Fýredel, who had bred and led the Draconic Army against humankind in the Grief of Ages.

  He was awake.

  The beast wheeled over Ascalon Palace, casting the lawns and orchards into shadow. Ead sickened, and her skin burned, as his smell enflamed the siden in her blood.

  Her longbow was out of reach in her chamber. Years of routine had blunted her vigilance.

  Fýredel landed on the Dearn Tower. His tail coiled serpentine around it, and his claws found purchase on its roof. Tiles crumbled away, forcing guards and retainers far below to scatter.

  His head was crowned with two cruel horns. Eyes like pits of magma blazed out of the dark.

  “SABRAN QUEEN.”

  The sky itself echoed his words. Half of Ascalon must be able to hear them.

  “SEED OF THE SHIELDHEART.” More stone fell from the tower. Arrows skittered off his armor. “COME FORTH AND FACE YOUR ENEMY OF OLD, OR WATCH YOUR CITY BURN.”

  Sabran would not answer his call. Someone would stop her. The Virtues Council would send a representative to treat with him.

  Fýredel exposed his gleaming metal teeth. The Alabastrine Tower was too high for Ead to see its uppermost balcony, but her newly tuned ears picked up on a second voice: “I am here, abomination.”

  Ead froze.

  The fool. The utter fool. By emerging, Sabran had signed her own death warrant.

  Screams rang from every building. Courtiers and servants were leaning out of open windows to behold the evil in their midst. Others ran pell-mell for the palace gates. Ead charged up the Privy Stair.

  “So you have awakened, Fýredel,” Sabran said with contempt. “Why have you come here?”

  “I come to give you warning, Queen of Inys. The time to choose your side is near.” Fýredel let out a hiss that raised gooseflesh all over Ead. “My kin are stirring in their caves. My brother, Orsul, has already taken wing, and our sister, Valeysa, will soon follow. Before the year is out, all our followers will have awakened. The Draconic Army will be reborn.”

  “Damn your warnings,” Sabran hit back. “I do not fear you, lizard. Your threats have as much weight as smoke.”

  Ead heard their words like thunder in her head. The fumes that rose from Fýredel were grindstones on her senses.

  “My master stirs in the Abyss,” he said, tongue flickering. “The thousand years are almost done. Your house was our great enemy before, Sabran Berethnet, in the days you call the Grief of Ages.”

  “My ancestor showed you Inysh mettle then, and I will show it to you now,” Sabran retorted. “You speak of a thousand years, wyrm. What deceit does your forked tongue sell?”

  Her voice was naked steel.

  “That is for you to discover erelong.” The wyrm stretched out his neck, so his head closed in on the other tower. “I offer you one chance to pledge your fidelity to my master and name yourself Flesh Queen of Inys.” Fire roared behind his eyes. “Come with me now. Give yourself up. Choose the right side, as Yscalin has. Resist, and you will burn.”

  Ead looked to the clock tower. She could not reach her bow, but she had something else.

  “Your lies will take root in no Inysh heart. I am not King Sigoso. My people know that your master will never wake while the bloodline of the Saint continues. If you think I will ever name this country the Draconic Queendom of Inys, you will be bitterly disappointed, wyrm.”

  “You claim your bloodline shields this realm,” Fýredel said, “and yet you have stepped out to meet me.” His teeth burned red-hot in his mouth. “Do you not fear my flame?”

  “The Saint will protect me.”

  Even the most god-drunk fool could not believe Sir Galian Berethnet would extend a hand from the heavenly court and shield them from a bellyful of fire.

  “You speak to one who knows the weakness of the flesh. I slew Sabran the Ambitious on the first day of the Grief. Your Saint,” Fýredel said, mouth smoking, “did not protect her. Bow to me, and I will spare you the same end. Refuse, and you will join her now.”

  If Sabran answered, Ead did not hear it. Wind rushed in her ears as she tore across the Sundial Garden. The archers hit Fýredel with arrow after arrow, but not one pierced his scales.

  Sabran would keep goading Fýredel until he torched her. The blockhead must really think the wretched Saint would protect her.

  Ead ran past the Alabastrine Tower. Debris cascaded from above, and a guard fell dead before her. Cursing the weight of her gown, she reached the Royal Library, flung open its doors, and wove her way between the shelves until she hit the entrance to the clock tower.

  She cast off her cloak, unbuckled her girdle. Up the winding steps she went, higher and higher.

  Outside, Fýredel still taunted Sabran. Ead stopped in the belfry, where the wind howled through arched windows, and took in the impossible scene.

  The Queen of Inys was on the uppermost balcony of the Alabastrine Tower. It stood just southeast of the Dearn Tower, where Fýredel was poised to kill. Wyrm on one building, queen on the other. In her hand was the ceremonial blade that represented Ascalon, the True Sword.

  Useless.

  “Leave this city, and harm no soul,” she called, “or I swear by the Saint whose blood I carry, you will face a defeat beyond any the House of Berethnet has ever exacted on your kind.” Fýredel bared his teeth again, but Sabran dared to take another step. “Before I leave this world, I will see your kind thrown down, sealed forever in the chasm in the mountain.”

  Fýredel reared up and opened his wings. Faced with this behemoth, the Queen of Inys was smaller than a poppet.

  Still she did not balk.

  The wyrm had bloodlust in his eyes. They burned as hot as the fire in his belly. Ead knew she had moments to decide what to do next.

  It would have to be a wind-warding. Wardings like this used a great deal of siden, and she had so very little left—but perhaps, if she poured her last store of it into the effort, she could work one upon Sabran.

  She held her hand toward the Alabastrine Tower, cast her siden outward, and twisted it into a wreath around the Queen of Inys.

  As Fýredel unleashed his fire, so Ead broke the chains on her long-dormant power. Flame collided with ancient stone. Sabran vanished into light and smoke. Ead was distantly aware of Truyde coming into the belfry, but it was too late to hide what she was doing.

  Her senses closed in on Sabran. She felt the strain on her braids of protection around the queen, the fire clawing for dominance, the pain in her own body as the warding gulped away her siden. Sweat soaked her corset. Her arm shook with the effort of keeping her hand turned outward.

  When Fýredel closed his jaws, all was silent. Black vapors billowed from the tower, clearing slowly. Ead waited, heart tight as a drum, until she saw the figure in the smoke.

  Sabran Berethnet was unscathed.

  “It is my turn to give you a warning. A warning from my forebear,” she said breathlessly, “that if you make war against Virtudom, this hallowed blood will quench your fire. And it will not return.”

  Fýredel did not acknowledge her. Not this time. He was looking at the blackened stone, and the spotless circle around Sabran.

  A perfect circle.

  His nostrils flared. His pupils thinned to slits. He had seen a warding before. Ead stood like a statue as his merciless gaze roved, searching for her, while Sabran remained still. When he looked toward the belfry, he sniffed, and Ead knew that he had caught her scent. She stepped out of the shadows beneath the clock face.

  Fýredel showed his teeth. Every spine on his back flicked up, and a long hiss rattled on his tongue. Holding his gaze, Ead unsheath
ed her knife and pointed it at him across the divide.

  “Here I am,” she said softly. “Here I am.”

  The High Western let out a scream of rage. With a push of his hind legs, he launched himself off the Dearn Tower, taking part of the spire and most of its east-facing wall with him. Ead threw herself behind a pillar as a fireball exploded against the clock tower.

  The cadence of his wings faded away. Ead lurched back to the balustrade. Sabran was still on the balcony, in her circle of pale stone. The sword had fallen from her hand. She had not looked toward the clock tower, or seen Ead watching her. When Combe reached her, she collapsed against him, and he carried her back into the Alabastrine Tower.

  “What did you do?” came a quaking voice from behind Ead. Truyde. “I saw you. What did you do?”

  Ead slid to the floor of the belfry, head lolling. Great shudders pushed through her body.

  The essence in her blood was spent. Her bones felt hollow, her skin as raw as if she had been flayed. She needed the tree, just a taste of its fruit. The orange tree would save her . . .

  “You are a witch.” Truyde stepped away, ashen-faced. “Witch. You practice sorcery. I saw it—”

  “You saw nothing.”

  “It was aëromancy,” Truyde whispered. “Now I know your secret, and it reeks far worse than mine. Let us see how far you can pursue Triam from the pyre.”

  She whirled toward the stair. Ead threw her knife.

  Even in this state, she struck true. Truyde was pulled back with a strangled gasp, pinned by her cloak to the doorpost. Before she could escape, Ead was in front of her.

  “My duty is to slay the servants of the Nameless One. I will also kill all those who threaten the House of Berethnet,” she breathed. “If you mean to accuse me of sorcery before the Virtues Council, I bid you find some way to prove it—and find it quickly, before I make poppets of you and your lover and stab them in the heart. Do you think that because Triam Sulyard is in the East, I cannot smite him where he stands?”

  Truyde breathed hard through her teeth.

  “If you lay a finger on him,” she whispered, “I will see you burn in Marian Square.”