Daughter of Ancients

Chapter 35

Once I rounded the southeast tower of the palace walls, I threaded my way through narrow lanes of fine shops, shuttered and deserted on this night, and across the slopes of the grassy apron that skirted the walls. The palace was built on the south-facing slopes of Mount Eidol, and the higher I climbed, the less uniform the walls, some sections built of the rose-colored, clean-dressed stone of recent centuries, some sections the age-mottled gray blocks of D'Arnath's time.

When I reached the northeast corner of the citadel, I was surprised to discover that the newer wall cut straight through this ancient quarter of the palace. The steepness of the apron slopes in this area had prevented the Builders from enclosing the entirety of the original structure with the thick new wall. Those parts left outside the wall had fallen into ruin. And among the collapsed walls and crumbling foundation stones stood the spindly tower like a bony finger with a swollen tip, pointing at the sky.

Though a scarlet balefire burned on the great wall, and palace guardsmen would certainly be patrolling the wall and the hulking northeast tower, the object of my search displayed no lights and no guards. This tower would have existed when D'Sanya was a child, far more imposing before the taller towers were built. Perhaps the tallest of its time. And certainly no potential rescuer would ever look for the dethroned Prince of Avonar in such a place, outside the palace enclosure. Everyone would assume he was confined in the prison block in the bowels of the palace itself.

Excited, I crept up the steep apron through a wet, grassy gully, staying low, avoiding any sound that might attract attention from the walls. Once atop the long hill, I caught my breath, then slipped from one ruined structure to another until I pressed my back to the side of the spindle tower that faced away from the palace. Raindrops dribbled down my nose and cheeks, and had long ago soaked through the back of Mae'Tila's cloak.

Though my feet were planted firmly on the ground, a glance upward left me a bit dizzy. The smooth, regular facing stones that had once sheathed the tower's exterior had long fallen away, leaving a mottled outer skin. Numerous stones protruded from this exterior like warts on a finger. Far above, the ruddy glow of balefires outlined the slight bulge of the top. I eased slowly around the base of the tower, marveling at its compact dimension and imagining the steepness of the stair cramped inside it. When I reached my starting point again without encountering a door, I was disconcerted.

I circumnavigated the tower base again, eyes upward this time, assuming that the doorway must be just above my head, its entry steps just broken away. When I returned to my starting point, my heart was in my throat. I leaned my head against the tower stones, closed my eyes, and let the rain pour over my face.

I had seen no doorway. But I had seen the way to get inside. The stones that protruded from the face of the tower were no Builder's whimsy, but an open stair— widely spaced nubs of stone that spiraled up the outside of the tower to the very top. If Ven'Dar was held prisoner in this tower, I would have to climb to get him out.

"Great Vasrin, do you amuse yourself in the eternal nights by devising these wretched tests?" I mumbled through gritted teeth as I set my foot on the first excruciatingly narrow, rain-slick step. "Or perhaps you think to force us to accept your existence." Surely godless fortune could produce no such perfect horrors.

I pressed my left shoulder to the rough wall, found a precarious handhold in the crumbling stone, and extended my left foot over the gap of open air to the next weathered protrusion, not daring to think what that gap would look like when I was five stories from the solid earth. Using my hand on the tower wall to brace me, I brought my right foot up beside the left. Again. Left foot forward—the part of the step nearest the wall would be the most solid. Secure a handhold. Push. Bring up the right foot. Again . . .

Twice I came near turning back. Once when I came to the first broken step, so narrow a stub that I could not rest both feet on it at once. I had to take an immediate second step with my right foot, trusting that the outer edge of the second stone would hold my weight while I brought the left foot up beside it, hoping not to get my boots tangled, praying that no watcher from the palace walls would see me perched there, paralyzed, for of course this had to happen on the side of the tower exposed to the balefire. The second time I faltered was when I came to the first missing step.

"No, no, no," I whispered, trying not to look down into the impossible void between my current position and the next relatively whole step, a span large enough that I would have to completely overbalance to shift my weight upward. "A plague on all Builders who believe their works are eternal."

I stood there for a year, it seemed, considering retreat, considering my purpose, trying to convince myself that I felt Prince Ven'Dar's life in that cold dead tower so this would not all go for naught. I wished for courage and longed for Gerick's strength and agility to shore up my own. Give all of yourself , I had told him. How pompous! How easy to give such advice when not staring your own demons in the face. And now Gerick was off with the Zhid, treading the very brink of his fears. And truly, he had a great deal more to fear than I did. Death was simple. Had he fallen from that brink or did he hold true?

I stretched my left foot toward the next worn stone, barely able to touch it with the ball of my foot. Pushing off with my left hand and right foot, I lunged forward and up. Though my stomach remained somewhere behind me, I got my weight over the step, fell forward, and grabbed the next step, bringing the right foot up beside the left.

Keeping my eyes narrowly focused on the next step, convincing myself that the handholds in the cracks and crevices could truly prevent a fall, I half climbed, half crawled up that devil's staircase in the dark and the rain. For every interminable moment, I told myself that if Gerick could make accommodation with his deepest terror to accomplish our purpose, then I, a daughter of Avonar, could surely deal with mine.

After a while, the cold rain washed all such considerations out of me. That staircase became my whole world.

My cold left hand clawed at the stone wall as I stared at the step in front of me, pressing my numb mind to tell me why things looked so different. I dared not turn my head to look in any direction but forward. The wind whipped my wet hair into my eyes. The next step was wider. Longer, too. The curve of the wall to my left was less pronounced. And the sound of the rain had changed. A lower, more solid sound than the pattering of drops on my head and shoulders. Holding absolutely still, as if the shift of an eyelash would upset my balance, I flicked my gaze upward. A roof! Emboldened, I flicked my gaze left. An armspan from my scraped knuckles was the threshold of a roughly rectangular opening.

Carefully, refocusing my eyes on the step, I moved my left foot up and forward. Shifted my hand to the edge of the door opening and stepped up. Clutching the ragged stone, and taking my first full breath in at least an hour, I peered into a tiny dark room. The three rectangular window openings had no shutters or panes, and gusts of rain splattered on the stone floor.

"If you tell me you've traversed the Skygazer's Stair to rescue me," said the hoarse voice from the interior, "I shall sing your praises from every mount in Gondai."

The poor man was drenched and shivering, chained to the wall with a steel shackle about one ankle, his limbs bound so tightly with dolemar rope that I doubted he'd been able to make use of the wine flask or the basket of sodden bread that sat on the floor an arm's length away.

"Best save your singing until we've got you down from this place, Your Grace," I said, as I dropped to my knees and set to sawing at the tough silver cord about his scored wrists.

"You're not just an illusion, telling me what I want to hear? Last I heard I was no longer anyone's prince. More disgrace than grace, one might say."

"I've a number of things to tell you that you're not going to want to hear. You might rather I were an illusion." I freed his hands, throwing the scraps of rope across the room.

He shook his hands and worked his fingers, smiling and grimacing all at once. "Ah, no, mistress. You are a most welcome reality. If you had come by way of a portal, the Lady's enchantments would have prevented your seeing me. So even if anyone had thought of searching this place, it would have done me no good. I was beginning to fear I would be but more dust in these crevices before some adventurous child attempted the stair and . . ."

He suffered a coughing spasm that he finished off with a huge sneeze before he could go on. I handed him the wine flask and applied my knife to another set of bindings.

After a long drink, he pushed the dripping hair from his eyes and rubbed his wrists. "Some weeks ago the perceptive Mistress Aimee told me a story of a young woman of strong opinion who had arrived at her house uninvited and left it as a most valuable ally, astonishing even Lady Seriana into speechless wonder. Might you possibly be this person of startling reputation?"

His kind humor held no trace of mockery. Though I could not forget that this man had ruled Avonar for five years and walked D'Arnath's Bridge, I felt no awe in his presence—not as I had when Gerick's father had parted the crowd at the hospice. Perhaps because I still thought of Prince D'Natheil as a dead hero come to life in our need. Perhaps because Prince Ven'Dar wore only a bedraggled dressing gown. "They arrested me straight from my bed," he said when he saw me staring at his bare, dirty feet. ,

"For better or worse, I am that same Jen'Larie, a stubborn Builder's assessor who got involved in affairs far beyond her capacities." I sawed at the turns of silver cord about his legs as he pulled away the five turns of rope I'd cut through at his thighs. "I'm sorry I've nothing warm or dry to offer you. Only bad news. And I don't know enough about matters of succession to say if you're still a prince or not."

"I believe I know the worst," he said, his smile fading. "I saw the flares when the wall defenses triggered, and I heard the bells. The balefires burn?"

"They do." I eyed the shackle that linked his left ankle to the wall. "I'll try to pick this lock, but if it's heavily enchanted . . ."

"No need to spend your time or effort," he said, throwing off the last bindings I had cut from his legs. "Give me a moment, and stand back a little." He laid a hand on the lock and closed his eyes.

Of course. Now he was free of the dolemar, he could call upon his talent and power.

I moved toward the doorway, then thought better of it and stepped over to one of the three square window openings. Better to have something to hold on to when I looked out. But my discomforts soon paled to insignificance.

Avonar was burning. Not just scarlet balefires or the illusory blue-white sheets of triggered warnings, but pockets of garish orange flames and billowing black smoke throughout the lower city. At least three of the Sillvain bridges were alight, and the armory—the great warehouse where enchanted swords and ever-sharp lances and pikes had been stored for generations— burned as well. From the dark line of the city wall, marked by the balefires on the five towers, pinpricks of light—handlights or torches—spread southerly into the night for as far as I could see, an ocean of warriors.

Though impossible to see at such a distance in the night and the rain, I knew the eyes of those warriors were cold and empty, and I knew the tide had only just begun to run.

"Hurry, my lord prince," I whispered. "For Avonar and Gondai, hurry."

Sprink ! The sharp rattle of metal made me jump.

I helped him stand, a matter of such difficulty I began to wonder if I would have better spent my time finding Gerick or searching out someone else to help us.

"Ah, that stings," he said, resting his hands on his knees and letting his head droop. "It will take a little time to get the blood flowing in my more remote parts. Time you must use, brave Jen'Larie, to tell me how you found me, why you could possibly have doubts about my status, and what you know of the precarious state of this kingdom."

I told him briefly of Gerick's rescue, of destroying the oculus in the desert, and of the events at the hospice. He twisted and squatted and stretched as he listened, peppering me with incisive questions all the while. By the time I told of Lady Seriana's news, Ven'Dar stood beside me, and we watched a wedge of orange flame penetrate the boundaries of the city wall, an arrow aimed straight at the heart of Avonar. The last vision of Gerick's captivity was taking on reality right before us.

Warmth pulsed from Ven'Dar's compact body as he gripped the window edge and gazed out on the end of the world. "Stories say that ancients who came to Skygazer's Needle kept moonstones here that they would use to view the stars and planets and so unravel the strange movement of time and events. You tell me that young Gerick, once a Lord of Zhev'Na, leads the Zhid assault on Avonar, but has no intention of destroying us. And you say that D'Arnath's daughter … is not. . . and is leading our defense which will destroy us. I am perhaps or perhaps not a Dar'Nethi prince, though surely bereft of any subjects save a courageous young woman lacking power or talent. And we are relying on a blind woman and a mundane to bring us help because our own defenders are Zhid." He shook his head slowly, the creases of his forehead carved deep. "We could use the Skygazer's magic right now, could we not?"

I dabbed at my tears with the back of one hand. "Aye, my lord. But it's all true. I swear it."

Ven'Dar aborted another bout of coughing with another swallow of wine. "Every instinct of history names me fool and traitor to even consider your beliefs. If we're wrong … if this goes any further …" He waved the wine flask at the horror below us before passing it on to me.

"We're not wrong." I was soaked through to my bones, and the relentless wind slapped my wet cloak against my legs. The wine in the flask left a scalding trail down my gullet. But I would have wagered the lives of everyone I loved that what I said was true. "Gerick sent me to set you free. He's afraid, my lord. Afraid he is not enough to take her down alone. Afraid of what the attempt might do to him. His father is dying, and you are the only person with any power or influence who might choose to aid rather than kill him. He trusts you and desperately needs your help."

"Not as much as he trusts you, I think, Jen'Larie. Even if he is as I wish to believe, I don't know that I will be able to help him." He laid his hand on my shoulder. "Before anything, I must decide whether these 'visions' of yours are warning or misdirection and see to the defense of Avonar. He could not expect me to do otherwise. There will be a few souls left in the city that I can trust to carry out my orders. Once I've done what I can, we'll see if we can find young Gerick."

"I don't know exactly what he intends except to confront D'Sanya," I said, "but I know where he is." I pointed to the wedge of fire. At its apex flared a swirling column of blue-and-purple light. Had I the skills to feel and hear and sense enchantment at such a distance, I could not have been more certain.

"Tell me, my lord, what does the Chamber of the Gate look like?"

He looked at me quizzically. "A large circular room.

A dome of light supported by columns. A wall of white fire—enchantment to set your heart soaring . . ."

He didn't have to describe the rest. I had seen it in Gerick's last vision while sitting in the cellar.

Every Dar'Nethi child learned that if not for D'Arnath's Bridge, our power for sorcery would fade, because of the Breach that separated us from the mundane world. The mundane world, its passions pent up like the roiling ingredients in an Alchemist's glass, would succumb to chaos and violence. The Bridge was the link that bound us together, that allowed our worlds to nourish each other and that gave us hope for the day the Breach would be healed. Without it, the worlds would die.

As strange muted lightnings flared in the long-neglected southeast quarter of the city where a certain bathhouse stood, and a sinuous river of light began to flow out of the Zhid ocean toward a quiet shrine of Vasrin north of the city, the wedge of fire moved slowly, inexorably toward the Heir's palace. Toward the Gate. Toward the Bridge.