"Helped by the rumors we and the Scholars are spreading, of course," Thionan said with a grin.
"And the Marked?" Tek-aKet asked.
Thionan"s voice came low and rough. "Two days ago they started being taken to the Carnelian Dome, and not to the Jaldean Shrines. None have been seen, city or country, since."
The silence in the room was as thick as inglera fleece.
"We will hope there are some in hiding," Cullen of Langeron said, as his bird Disha nodded.
Thionan cleared her throat. "There"s something else, though it"s hard to know how significant it is," she said. "I"m sorry to say, Lord Tarkin, that your counselor, Gan-eGan, was yesterday found hanged in his private chambers. Hanged by his own hand, it appears. It seems a small tragedy in the face of everything else, and in the face of what the Marked have had to endure, but we thought perhaps you would want to know."
Dhulyn shut her eyes, seeing again the two images of the skinny, overjeweled old man, one with green eyes, the other standing behind, weeping. She blinked. Green eyes again. Like the Mage in her Visions. And the Scholar. Who was on his way even now with information. Perhaps more information than he knew.
Dhulyn glanced at Tek-aKet. He was pale again, his face fixed and resolute. But before she could ask any questions a young woman appeared in the cave"s entrance. Dhulyn recognized her as the same one, Rehnata by name, who had greeted them when they first arrived in Gotterang. Since then, the dark brown hair above her temples and ears had been removed in preparation for the tattooing of her Mercenary badge.
"They are here, my Brothers," she said to Alkoryn, acknowledging Dhulyn as well with a bob of her head. "Shall we bring them?"
"By all means," Alkoryn said.
From the sound, the warning had come just a second too late for Karlyn-Tan, Gundaron thought. He himself was too short to worry about b.u.mping his head, but being led blindfolded through pa.s.sages and tunnels meant bashed elbows and stepped-on toes, no matter how careful your guides. As things were, however, Gun was grateful to have sore elbows and bruised toes to distract him from what was coming. He knew Mar and Karlyn-Tan were right-this was what he had to do. But just at the moment, he was more than half convinced he"d been persuaded against his will.
Finally the blindfolds came off. They"d had them on so long that even the soft light of the lanterns carried by their guides was enough to have all four of them blinking and squinting. Gundaron tried not to hang back as they approached the open doorway of the underground meeting room. Not that he could do much more than drag his feet a bit since there were Mercenary Brothers both in front of and behind him. From what Karlyn-Tan had said, he"d expected Dhulyn Wolfshead herself to lead them to Tek-aKet, but it had been two black-haired Mercenary Brothers with Semlorian accents. The smiles they"d given him when they"d met them at the fountain made the skin on the back of his neck crawl.
Dhulyn Wolfshead would be inside the room, he thought, watching Dal-eDal pa.s.s through the entrance. Along with the Brother he hadn"t met, her Partner Parno Lionsmane.
The first Brothers he saw as he followed Mar into the room weren"t the two he was dreading the most, however, but Fanryn Bloodhand and Thionan Hawkmoon, who went so far as to lay her hand on her sword hilt and grin at him. Gun looked away and, seeing Mar"s face, followed her line of sight to where Dhulyn Wolfshead stood to the left of Tek-aKet. Mar stepped toward the Outlander woman with her hands lifted, reaching out, but hesitated, coming to a stop as the Wolfshead gave her the half bow that was the very knife edge of courtesy among the n.o.ble Houses. Such would be the greeting-Gun had seen it many times-between two n.o.bles who had some long-standing grudge, but were forced to be civil in some public gathering. Dhulyn Wolfshead straightened and turned her eyes away, and Gun braced himself . . . but her stone-gray eyes moved over and past him as if he was not even there.
He immediately looked down, heart thumping. It seemed he had nothing to fear from Dhulyn Wolfshead. It seemed that as far as she was concerned, he didn"t exist. He found himself hugging his arms around his chest, to convince himself he was was there, he there, he was was.
When he had enough control of himself to listen, he found that he had missed Dal"s first words. The Tarkin was speaking.
"To say that I am surprised to see you does not begin to describe my feelings, Dal-eDal Tenebro." He put up his hand and Dal stilled. "You are heir to your House, and now to the Carnelian Throne, and yet you come with your oaths of loyalty to me."
It was not a question, but Dal-eDal answered it.
"My lord-" he cleared his throat and began again. "I am not an ambitious man. I have never wanted more than my own Household. But my cousin Lok-iKol sees a mirror in every man, and his own image grinning back at him. Fate may lead even a distant cousin to become House of his family, whether he wished it or no, but the Tarkinate . . ." Dal shook his head.
"I was warned to be skeptical of your loyalty," Tek-aKet said, nodding at where Fanryn Bloodhand and Thionan Hawkmoon stood leaning against a small table to Gundaron"s left. "Perhaps you do not want the Carnelian Throne, but you would have me believe that you choose this moment to act against your House?"
Dal licked his lips. "I do not believe I go against my House, my lord," he said, in that quietly strained voice that had been all Gun had heard from him for the last day. "I believe my House has Fallen."
At this everyone, Gun included, edged forward. Fanryn Bloodhand straightened to attention and Thionan Hawkmoon put a restraining hand on her Partner"s arm. Even the Wolfshead and the Lionsmane exchanged glances.
"Who is it, then, who sits on my throne?" Tek-aKet"s voice was hard as the rock overhead.
"I do not know," Dal said. "Outwardly, it seems to be my cousin." Dal glanced suddenly at Parno Lionsmane, but Gun couldn"t see that the Brother had moved in any way. "Possibly, in some way, it is. But I do not believe it. Something else occupies . . . something else is there." He straightened, and Gun saw for the first time the dark smudges under the man"s eyes. "Indulge me, my lord," Dal said. "I have waited what seems an age to tell the full story only once, and it is choking me."
Tek-aKet glanced at the older Mercenary Brother seated next to him. When the man nodded, the Tarkin gestured at Dhulyn Wolfshead, indicating that she should take the seat next to him. That left an empty seat across the table.
"Sit, Dal-eDal Tenebro. Refresh yourself, tell your story."
Dal nodded, waited until a cup was poured for him, but made no move to pick it up. He took the chair, though, Gun thought, feeling the ache of his own muscles.
"I have spent my whole life waiting, and watching, my lord; so long that perhaps I forgot what it was that I was waiting for." As Dal folded his hands on the table in front of him, Gun saw them trembling. "Lok had my father killed, and I believed I was waiting for the right moment to avenge him. I wonder if I would ever have found it." Dal drew in his brows, frowning at his hands on the table.
Mar shifted, stepping forward as if she would move closer to the table. Gun put his hands on her shoulders, and pulled her back a little, until she was standing against his chest. Her skin felt warm, even through two layers of clothing, and she relaxed under his hands, though she kept her eyes on the faces of the four seated at the table.
Dal glanced up at Tek-aKet and waited until the man nodded before he continued. "Perhaps three days after he took the Dome, my lord, my cousin called me to him, saying that he had an errand for me." Keeping his eyes fixed on Tek-aKet, Dal"s voice did not falter. "For years he has kept me under his hand, and I have not left Gotterang unless as his companion. Yet he has now, suddenly, asked me to do so, in order to find the Mercenary Dhulyn Wolfshead."
Mar glanced at Gun over her shoulder, her eyebrows raised; Gun pressed his lips together and nodded. A quick look around the room showed much less puzzlement than he would have expected. She"s told them, She"s told them, he thought, he thought, by all the Caids, she"s told them by all the Caids, she"s told them.
Dal, too, had noticed the change of atmosphere in the room. "Apparently, you know more of this than I, though I knew that my cousin had shown interest in this Brother before he took the Carnelian Throne.
"He said no more of her at that moment, and I walked with him to the room where your crown, my lord Tarkin, and your treasures, and the jewels that your wife brought with her to her marriage are kept. He said he was looking for a relic of the Sleeping G.o.d."
Tek-aKet nodded. "An old bracelet," he said, "with green stones. I know of it. The Jaldean Shrine here in Gotterang has been asking for it for months."
"As you say, my lord. Lok found it, a gold bracelet in the antique manner of the Caids, and he put it on." Dal picked up the cup of ganje that had been poured for him, looked inside it, and put it down again. He"s not looking anyone in the face, He"s not looking anyone in the face, Gun thought. Gun thought. When did When did that that start start? Dal had always been the most watchful of men.
"What of it," the Tarkin said. "My mother wore it often. I"ve worn it myself."
Gun wouldn"t have thought it possible, but at these words Dal paled even more, the shadows around his mouth stained a faint green.
"Drink something, man; you"re no use to us if you faint," Dhulyn Wolfshead said in her rough voice. The Cloudman to the Tarkin"s left stood and with his own hand poured out water from the gla.s.s jug on the table and handed the mug to Dal-eDal.
"Thank you." His voice was a thread of air. He sipped at the water and set the mug down next to the untouched ganje. He cleared his throat, but his voice when he continued was still rough. "Lok found the bracelet," he said, "and slipped it over his hand. As I watched, the bracelet faded, dissolved, and was absorbed into his skin. I looked up, and Lok was watching the spot where the bracelet had been and smiling. And his shadow, on the wall behind him, was not his own, but larger, darker, than it should have been-" Dal sucked in a short, sharp sip of air, "and was the wrong shape, as if it had wings about to open."
Parno Lionsmane"s cup tilted, but he caught it before it fell.
"The lantern-" Tek-aKet started to say.
"No, my lord," Dal interrupted. "My own shadow was there, pale and ordinary, as familiar to me as my own hand. Except that my shadow seemed to shrink from his, as if it knew something I did not." This time, when Dal stopped speaking, no one else moved or spoke, so obvious was it that he had not finished. "There is more, my lord. When I looked again to my cousin, to ask him about what I had seen, his eye was green. Not blue as it has always been, and, his eye patch-" Dal lifted his left hand to his own face, as if to show them where the eye patch should be. "I don"t know, perhaps because of the angle at which we were standing, perhaps because he had touched it somehow-" Dal looked across the table at his Tarkin. "My lord, I could see that both both his eyes were green. his eyes were green. Both Both of them." of them."
Mar shifted abruptly and Gun loosened the suddenly tight grip he"d taken on her shoulders. His breathing came uncomfortably quick, and in his mind he saw again the barricade of shelves and books that kept away the Green Shadow. The Cloudman at the table with the Tarkin made the old sign against evil, thumbtip to tip of index finger, the Mercenaries standing around the room developed suddenly neutral expressions, and Wolfshead and Lionsmane looked at each other, recognition in their faces. But Dal spoke matter-of-factly like a man beyond caring what other people thought.
"Clearly, you believe what you saw," the Tarkin said finally. "What do you believe it means?"
"It means you must not wait, my lord," Dal said. Suddenly reaching out his hand to the man across from him, Dal looked the Tarkin directly in the face. "Listen to me. This is no ordinary coup. I have thought that it did not matter to me who sat on the Carnelian Throne, but I tell you, it matters to me what what sits there, and that green-eyed thing is not my cousin." Once again he spoke, not as a frightened man who expects to be held in contempt, but as a man freely owning a fear in the face of which the opinions of others were meaningless. "It has the Marked brought to the Dome, and they leave broken and mad. The Carnelian Guard-" He broke off, frowning. "Elite troops injure themselves with carelessness or in quarrels, except for those who go off duty and disappear. Gan-eGan has killed himself. Children are weeping in corners. Whatever this is, its poison is spreading. You must waste no time. You must act sits there, and that green-eyed thing is not my cousin." Once again he spoke, not as a frightened man who expects to be held in contempt, but as a man freely owning a fear in the face of which the opinions of others were meaningless. "It has the Marked brought to the Dome, and they leave broken and mad. The Carnelian Guard-" He broke off, frowning. "Elite troops injure themselves with carelessness or in quarrels, except for those who go off duty and disappear. Gan-eGan has killed himself. Children are weeping in corners. Whatever this is, its poison is spreading. You must waste no time. You must act now now."
Gun licked his lips. One pair of eyes had left off looking at Dal-eDal and had fixed on him. One pair of stone-gray eyes that had slid over him, unable to see him when he had entered the room, were focused on him now.
"Let"s ask the Scholar," Dhulyn Wolfshead said. "I"ll wager my second-best sword he knows what this is, or can guess. He knows more than anyone what the formerly one-eyed Lok-iKol has been up to."
Gun"s hands formed fists at his sides. It felt like every eye in the room was on him. Even Mar had turned around and was searching his face, her eyebrows drawn down, her lips parted.
"Come, Gundaron of Valdomar." Gun winced at the tone in Dhulyn Wolfshead"s husky voice. "From the look of you, Dal-eDal"s not the only one here who"s seen this green-eyed thing."
Everyone was was looking at him, Gun saw as he tried to swallow with his suddenly dry mouth. Everyone except Parno Lionsmane. He stood behind the Wolfshead, his hand on her shoulder, his eyes squeezed shut. looking at him, Gun saw as he tried to swallow with his suddenly dry mouth. Everyone except Parno Lionsmane. He stood behind the Wolfshead, his hand on her shoulder, his eyes squeezed shut.
"Come forward, boy, and tell us what you know of this."
Gun found himself responding to the tone of command in the Tarkin"s voice, stepping around Mar and coming closer to the table before he realized he"d made up his mind to do it. Mar touched him on the arm as he pa.s.sed, her worried eyes searching his face. He looked away from her. He couldn"t tell them everything everything. He couldn"t tell them that he, himself-they would never understand. Mar would never understand. He would lose all that was growing between them.
When he was facing the Tarkin, he cleared his throat, and released the breath he was holding. "I have seen it, my lord Tarkin. It is real." Gun glanced around, but except for Mar, there was no friendly face. "I-we"ve been hiding," he said. "Can you tell me, Lord Dal, have the Marked been going to the Dome only since since the . . ." Gun bit his lip and then continued. "Since the green has come into Lok-iKol"s eyes?" the . . ." Gun bit his lip and then continued. "Since the green has come into Lok-iKol"s eyes?"
"I believe the decree changed that morning, just hours before my cousin, or the thing that he has become, sent for me."
"What can you tell us, Scholar of Valdomar?"
Gun drew in a deep breath and settled his shoulders. He found himself folding his hands in front of him, as if about to recite his lesson. If only this was just another lecture, another examination in his Library. That what he was about to say was only interesting history, and not something that might very well change the lives of everyone in this room, including his own.
"I believe it is this Green Shadow that seeks for and destroys the Marked. That the teachings of the New Believers are nothing more than an excuse, invented to give it freedom to act."
Gun saw movement out of the corner of his eye and hesitated. The Cloudman was nodding, a satisfied smile on his face.
"Continue," the Tarkin said.
"I cannot explain how, my lord Tarkin, but I have only recently remembered seeing what Lord Dal describes, the green light, the misshapen shadow, the . . . the feeling of otherness, in Beslyn-Tor, the Jaldean High Priest. It seems I took no notice of it at the time, but afterward, as I say, I remembered remembered seeing it many times." Gun waited for the murmurs to die away. seeing it many times." Gun waited for the murmurs to die away.
"I think I saw it in Lok-iKol once, but not in the same way," Gun continued when no one else spoke. "At that time, Lok-iKol did not move or speak, but stood slackly, like a rag doll, as if the Green Shadow only looked through his eyes. In any case, it was the priest who wanted Marked brought to him, not Lok-iKol."
"The Green Shadow," Parno Lionsmane said under his breath.
Gun meant meant to continue, to tell about himself, to tell everything, but his throat closed. He looked down at his clasped hands, trembling, knuckles white. When he looked up again, he met Dhulyn Wolfshead"s eyes. to continue, to tell about himself, to tell everything, but his throat closed. He looked down at his clasped hands, trembling, knuckles white. When he looked up again, he met Dhulyn Wolfshead"s eyes. She knows, She knows, he thought. he thought.
"They say Beslyn-Tor has suffered a stroke, and lies feeble and raving in rooms Lok has given him in the Dome," Dal said, leaning back in his chair with a thoughtful look.
"Always the Jaldeans," Tek-aKet said. "Zella warned me they were the real danger, and I didn"t listen."
"They supported Lok-iKol"s coup," Dal pointed out.
"But why? why? Was it this Green Shadow?" Was it this Green Shadow?"
Gun nodded. "It wants the Marked."
"The Marked." Tek-aKet let out a forceful breath. "I did not give the New Believers what they wanted."
"And so they gave their support to someone who would." Parno Lionsmane focused his attention on Gun over his Partner"s head. "But what did that support entail?"
"The people." It was Dhulyn Wolfshead"s raw silk voice that answered. "How did the traitors get into the Dome so easily? Almost all of the Carnelian Guard, soldiers whose duty it is to protect the Dome, and more than half of your Personal Guard, Lord Tarkin, have been in the streets for the last moon, helping the City Guard keep order, quelling little riots and mob violence. All started by the Jaldeans."
The Tarkin was shaking his head. "They wouldn"t have done so much on Lok-iKol"s bare word that he would enact their laws. Lok-iKol must have been doing something for them already."
Gundaron swallowed. "Lok-iKol was collecting Marked for them, my lord."
"Explain."
"Not everyone came voluntarily to the shrines to be blessed by the Sleeping G.o.d. Some even left the city, or moved to new quarters, never obeying the edicts about their dress. Lok was seeking these out and holding them for the Jaldeans when he found them."
"And how was he finding them?"
Something in the Tarkin"s tone, in the glint of his eyes, made Gundaron look away, down at the white knuckles of his clasped hands. He licked his lips. "I found them for him, my lord."
"How?"
Gun bit his lip, his throat tight as a fist. He risked a glance at Mar. Her face was still as stone, but she said nothing. "Research." His whisper sounded uncomfortably loud in the silence of the room. Dhulyn Wolfshead looked at him with narrowed eyes; he shifted his own and was startled to find the same searching look in the eyes of the Racha bird.
"What were the Jaldeans doing with the Marked you helped locate?" Tek-aKet"s voice was silkily quiet.
"I don"t know. That is-" Gun kept his eyes fixed on his folded hands. "I didn"t take any part after the people were found. Afterward, when I remembered . . . now I know that Beslyn-Tor came to give them what he called the Sleeping G.o.d"s blessing. But as for why why . . . I think he-I think . . . I think he-I think it, it, the Green Shadow, is destroying the Marked; it fears them, as if they can harm it somehow." the Green Shadow, is destroying the Marked; it fears them, as if they can harm it somehow."
"You never tried to find out?" Gun glanced up at Parno Lionsmane, but immediately dropped his gaze. The Mercenary looked like he"d opened a pie only to find snakes writhing inside.
"I didn"t know know." He couldn"t tell them everything, they wouldn"t believe him.
"It may be that the Green Shadow took the memories from him," Dhulyn Wolfshead said.
"And it was for this that you brought my Partner, my soul, to Gotterang?" The growl in the man"s voice showed it wasn"t just for his coloring that he was called Lionsmane.
"No!" Gun cried out, holding his hands up, pushing away the worst of it. "Dhulyn Wolfshead wasn"t for the Jaldean. Lok-iKol wanted to keep her for himself."
"And who else?" Dhulyn Wolfshead glanced over his shoulder and suddenly Gun knew exactly who was standing just behind him. He could almost smell the distinctive sweetness of the soap they"d used in Karlyn-Tan"s room.
"And Mar, too, if she proved to be a Finder as he suspected." He squeezed the words out through the barrier his throat had become.
"As he suspected because you you had told him so-" had told him so-"
"Enough, Parno." The Wolfshead"s voice, though soft, had the force of a cracked whip. All the murmurs in the room died away. "We are all alive, which is more, apparently, than can be said for Lok-iKol," she smiled her wolf"s smile, "on whom, as his mother wished, has fallen a terrible curse." She turned to Gun. "What of you, Scholar of Valdomar?"
"I"ll kill him if you like," Parno Lionsmane said, and there were a few murmurs in the room that showed others agreed.
"He meant no harm," Dhulyn Wolfshead said, steel showing in her voice. "You forget the Scholarly mind, my soul. It isn"t real to them unless it"s in a book."
Gundaron looked up at her. There was no horrified disbelief on her face, as there was in Parno"s. He felt a crumbling hollow in his mind where there had been a good solid wall. A wall that he"d built by sticking to his books, his notes. By not asking awkward questions and by telling himself that everything was all right. He had a sudden mental image of the little page Okiron once telling him that Lok made him nervous, and of himself telling the boy that everything was all right. He"d told himself over and over, since leaving Tenebro House, that he was doing all he could to make amends and there was no point in dwelling on the past. But he"d still been hiding something behind that wall. Of course he"d been horrified when he"d finally remembered, finally realized, what Lok-iKol and Beslyn-Tor were doing. But that hadn"t been why he"d wanted to leave. He"d wanted to leave out of fear for himself, not out of horror at what he"d done to others. Out of fear of the Green Shadow, and what it might still do to him. Out of fear of Pasillon. Not out of resolution and defiance, as Mar had done, but out of fear.
Of course the Outlander woman showed no surprise now; she"d known all along, she"d seen him in Lok-iKol"s study, and known what he was.
"We have strayed from our point." Gun roused himself at the sound of the Tarkin"s voice. "What of the green-eyed Jaldean spirit? What can be done now?"
Gun cleared his throat. No one had offered him anything to drink, and he was afraid to ask. "Lord Dal is right, this is not Lok-iKol. The Shadow does not want what Lok-iKol wanted. If you wait to gather an army, my lords, there may not be an Imrion to save. From what I have seen, the Shadow doesn"t care about the country, only about the Sleeping G.o.d and the Marked." Gun coughed again.
The Racha bird startled them all by suddenly opening and closing its wings.
"These people came together, my lord," the Cloudman said. "Shall we accept what they told us without verification? You can withdraw to the mountains. An army can"t fight the Clouds," he said, reminding them all of the old saying.