A Fall of Princes Read online

  “Who will follow you?” demanded Hirel, the more cruel for that his cruelty seemed to wound her not at all. “Who will accept the rule of a woman?”

  “Who will be left to claim the power? I have the Kasar still; Keruvarion’s law binds the empire to the bearer of the brand. Asanion will be harder, I grant you. But I can rule it, and I will. With you or without you.”

  “You will have to slay me with your own hand.”

  “Or marry you. On my terms. I’ll not be your veiled and big-bellied slave, Hirel Uverias. Nor will I wait my turn with all your other slaves, contending with them for a night of your favor. Unless you agree to do the same for me.”

  It was to be expected. She still thought like a man. She did not know how to be a woman.

  She would not lower those bold black eyes. The same eyes that had transfixed Hirel on the first night of their meeting, refusing to accede to the laws of nature: of race then and of caste, as now of gender.

  She spoke almost gently. “It’s hard, I know. But it’s not unheard of. My mother bound my father to the same.”

  “Your father had been a priest; and he was never an Asanian high prince.”

  “So? Can you do any less than a bandit king?”

  “I would not stoop to it.”

  She laughed. It was cruel, because there was no malice in it. It turned Hirel’s resistance into the petulance of a spoiled child.

  She was glorious when she laughed. She had no shame of this that she had chosen; she had nothing resembling a maiden’s modesty. In front of all the staring mages, she took Hirel’s face in her hands and kissed him.

  Hirel’s heart thudded; his head reeled. Sarevan, mage and priest though he was, wild and half mad and as near a giant as made no matter, had never frightened Hirel more than a little. A prince could match a prince, though one be descended from a god.

  This was still Sarevan, little changed once one grew accustomed to the single great change. Yet her touch woke Hirel to something very like panic. A prince could match a prince. But what of a Sunborn princess?

  She drew back slightly, searching his face. It flamed under her gaze. She smiled. “I think I love you, too, youngling. Don’t ask me why.”

  “If there are gods,” Hirel muttered, “they laugh to hear you.”

  “They do.” She reclaimed her hands. Her smile took on an edge of iron. “But I am not marrying a man who refuses to grant me the full freedom which he grants himself.”

  Hirel’s breath escaped him in a rush. “I never said that I would bind you. You need not take the veil, nor shall I imprison you in the harem. You may even,” he said, and that was far from easy, “you may even bear arms, although for that we must change the law in Asanion.”

  “And?” she asked, unmollified.

  “Is that not enough?” He knew it was not. Her brows had lowered. He glared back. “I cannot bind myself to you alone. My nature forbids it. I am a man; I am made to beget many sons. My desires are strong and they are urgent, and they are not to be denied. Whereas a woman is made to bear a few strong children; her lusts are less potent, her needs gentler, her spirit shaped for the loving of a single man.”

  She laughed again, and now she mocked him. “Hear the wisdom of a child! I almost hate to disillusion you. But alas, it is illusion, and I will not be swayed by it. Bind yourself, Hirel, or set me free.”

  “And raise another man’s son as my own?”

  “Only if you demand the same of me.”

  He tossed his aching head. “You will drive me mad.”

  She would not even pretend to regret it. She only waited, unshakable.

  She was very beautiful. She was not the only beautiful woman in the world. She was certainly the most obstinate, and the most unreasonable, and the most maddening. And she brought with her the greatest of all dowries.

  It was not worth the price she set on it.

  What price had she paid to offer it?

  “Be free, then,” he snapped at her. “But do not expect me to acknowledge your get.”

  “Even when it is yours?”

  “How can I ever be sure of it?”

  “You will,” she said, “I promise you.”

  She held out her hand with its flame of gold.

  He stared at it until it began to fall. Then he caught it. Raised it. Kissed it. “Lady,” he said, “whatever comes of this venture, certainly I shall not perish of boredom.”

  Now she looked as a maiden ought, eyes downcast, demure and shy. Struggling, no doubt, to keep at bay a grin of triumph.

  Hirel could not even be indignant. Aranos’ expression was too intriguing a study.

  TWENTY

  The mages had wrought well, Hirel granted them that. The hall blazed with magelight: sparks of white and gold, blue and green, red and yellow, set like jewels in the roof. Flowers bloomed on the grey stone and wound up the pillars; hangings shimmered behind, light and shadow interwoven, shaping images that shifted and changed whenever he glanced at them.

  He stood by the undying fire in a circle of mages, clad as a prince who went to his wedding, in an eightfold robe of gold and diamond. The mages of the guild stood two and two, each servant of the light with his dark companion.

  Zha’dan loomed over them, painted and jeweled and braided, outblazing the fire itself with his splendor. He flashed Hirel a white smile, which Hirel returned with the faintest of flickers.

  He glanced at his companion. Aranos held the place of the honored kinsman, attended by his priests with the scroll of the contract. Han-Gilen’s prince faced them with Orozia and the guildmaster.

  They had words to say: ritual challenges, ritual concessions. They called the lady Sarevadin. Odd to hear it as a woman’s name. One might have thought that the empress had known, to choose a name that would serve for a daughter as for a son.

  He marshaled his wandering wits. It was a very long contract, and very complex. But its heart was simple. The heir of Asanion took to wife the heir of Keruvarion. He granted her full freedom, as in turn she granted him. When he came into his inheritance, he must share his throne with her; so too must she share the throne of Keruvarion. The first child of their bodies would stand heir to both empires.

  He set his name where he was bidden. When he straightened, he went rigid.

  An Asanian bride did not show herself at the exchange of legalities that was the wedding proper. When her kinsmen had sold her with due ceremony, slaves bore her in a closed litter to her husband’s house. There she would feast among the women until he had done feasting with the men. Then, and only then, would he see her: swathed and veiled and weighted with jewels, enthroned amid the riches of her dowry.

  She wore a veil, a shimmer of royal white over her bright hair. Her gown was of a northern fashion, shocking to Asanian eyes: a skirt of many tiers, white and gold, broad-belted with gold about her narrow waist, and a vest of gold-embroidered white, and a kingdom’s worth of gold and emeralds about her arms and her neck and her brows, suspended from her ears and woven into her hair.

  None of it sufficed to cover her breasts. Her nipples, like her lips and her eyelids, bore a dusting of gilt.

  She took the pen from Hirel’s stiff fingers and signed her name next to his, in the characters of the Hundred Realms and again in those of Asanion. Hirel bit his lip lest he disgrace himself with laughter.

  Aranos was appalled. Even Prince Orsan seemed mildly startled by her coming, if not by her presumption.

  Having sealed the alliance under Asanian law, they faced the prince and the priestess in the rites of Keruvarion. Orozia demanded Sarevadin’s torque of priesthood, held it up in her hands, raised a long chant in a tongue which Hirel did not know.

  She ended on a high throbbing note. Her hands lowered. She set the torque again about Sarevadin’s throat, with much solemnity and no little resistance from the Sunchild.

  The prince quelled her with a stern word. “You may not repudiate your calling. You are High Princess of Keruvarion; you will continue in A
varyan’s priesthood. As your father has done. As many another ruling queen has done.” She bent her head then, submitting without humility.

  Hirel spoke the words that he had been instructed to speak, but as soon as he had spoken, he forgot them. They were only words. This was reality. The hand he held, no warmer or steadier than his own; the voice that murmured in his silences; the eyes both bold and frightened, and once the glimmer of a smile.

  He was rapt. Bewitched. He the prince, the logician, the master of his royal will.

  He hardly tasted the wedding feast. Some he must eat, and some he must drink: it was the rite. They drank from the same cup, ate from the same bowl. She ate and drank for them both.

  She caught fire under all the eyes. She had even cold Aranos falling into her hand, hanging on her every word, dwindling when she turned her eyes away from him. Sevayin, they called her. Sevayin Is’kirien, the Twiceborn, the Sun’s child.

  o0o

  Then it was past, and they were alone, locked in a chamber with a hearth and a winetable and a bed broad enough for a battlefield. Hirel did not know where to go.

  She—Sevayin, he must resolve to call her—had lost a little of her brittle brilliance. She filled a cup with wine and held it out.

  Hirel declined it. She toyed with it; sipped; hesitated; set it down.

  “It’s not done, you know,” she said. “There’s still the crux of it. I hope you haven’t lost your courage. Because,” she said, and her voice shook, “I don’t think I ever had any.”

  She looked most valiant, standing there in all her beauty, trying not to tremble. Hirel let his body act for him. It went to her; it held her, or she held it. They clung together like children.

  It was she who broke the silence. “I dreamed this,” she said. “And you.”

  “And you call yourself no seer?”

  “I’m not. I’m merely mad.” She laughed as she said it, unsteadily. “And to crown it all, now I can’t escape. Now I have to begin my lessons in the high arts.”

  “I shall take delight in teaching you.” Hirel held her at arm’s length. She smiled shakily. He smiled back. “I confess, I have somewhat more skill as a lover of women than as a lover of men. And rather more inclination for it.”

  “I . . . incline . . . very much toward you.” She swayed forward, brushing his lips with hers. Her hands sought the fastenings of his robes.

  They were wedding robes; they parted, slipping away of their own accord. He wore no trousers beneath. Her breath caught. “You’ve grown again, cubling.”

  “How fortunate you are,” he said. “No one can know when you wake to desire.”

  She lowered her eyes. “I can,” she said very low.

  He touched her. She quivered.

  It was not wholly true, what Hirel had said. Her breasts were taut.

  He freed them of encumbrances; the vest, the necklaces, the golden pectoral. He loosed the clasp of her belt. It sprang free. Her skirts fell one by one.

  There were nine. He appreciated the irony.

  She cast off the ornaments that he had left her, and the drift of veil. Only the torque remained, and a single jewel: a chain of gold about her hips, thin as a thread, clasped with an emerald. He set his hand to it.

  “Not yet,” she said, her laughter half a gasp. Her heart was beating hard. “That’s the maiden-chain. It has to wait until you’ve made a woman of me.”

  o0o

  She was. Entirely. A maiden, and then a woman. As he breached the gate, she cried aloud. For pain. For exultation.

  They sang in him. They wrought a great and wondrous harmony, a symphony of bodies joined together. He soared upon it. He made himself one with it.

  They descended together, he and she. He laid his head on her breast. She wove her fingers into his hair.

  Slowly their hearts quieted. Her cheeks were wet, but the tears were none of grief.

  He let his hand wander down her belly and hips to the clasp of the chain. It parted.

  His fingers found their way between her thighs. She sparked to his touch, but she shifted slightly, away from him. He yielded to her will; his hand came to rest again on her hip.

  “Hirel,” she said after a few tens of heartbeats. He turned his head to kiss her breast. “Hirel, where were you when the mages loosed their power on me?”

  He raised his head, frowning that she should speak of it now of all times. But he answered her readily enough. “I was locked in a chamber, and no one would let me go to you.”

  She met his eyes. “Where were you, Hirel?”

  “I told you, I—” He broke off. She knew what he had said. She wanted more. “I was locked away, but I heard your cries. They all denied that there was aught to hear.”

  “There was nothing. I was silent, Hirel.”

  “I heard you,” he insisted.

  “You did.” She scowled. Damn these witches and their paradoxes. A smile flickered; she bit it back. “You were in my mind. You and the mages. You’ve been in and out of it ever since.”

  “That is preposterous.”

  “Have you ever had a better night’s loving? Or a stranger?”

  “You have a gift for it. And I am besotted with you.”

  Her smile escaped. “And I love you, my proud prince. But something is happening with my power. I should have suspected it long ago. I began to when I found you amid the pain, and your presence eased it a little. It’s been growing stronger since; it’s strongest when you touch me. I’ve been afraid to believe in it. Afraid I only dreamed it. But now I know. We’re mages, Hirel. Both of us.”

  He thrust himself to his knees. “You are a mage. I am glad for you. It was bitter, your power’s loss. But I have no part in it.”

  “You are the heart of it,” said Sevayin, relentless. “You were there when I lost my power. You were with me when I almost died; it was you who turned me back to the light. You found the Eye of Power. You were almost on top of it when I destroyed it. We came to love one another; we faced death together, as we faced life. Somehow, in the midst of it, my magery bound itself to you. It’s part of you now.”

  “No,” Hirel said. “I can believe the improbable, but not the impossible.”

  She seized his hands. He could never accustom himself to her strength, even though he knew what she had been and what she would always be: born of warriors, trained for war. He glared into her eyes, and lost his battle thereby.

  It was a sharpening of all the senses. He could see through stone; he could hear across worlds. His skin knew every nuance of the air. He tasted love and fear and gladness. He scented wonders.

  Power, she whispered. Her lips never moved. This is power. I thought I had lost it. I wanted to die for lack of it.

  “I am not made for it!”

  She drew back. Hirel reeled, blind, deaf, all but bodiless.

  By slow degrees his senses grew again, but dimmed and dulled, mere earthly senses. The only brightness was Sevayin lying beneath him, her face a vision of lamplight and shadow, crowned with fire.

  With great care he touched her cheek. The power roared and flamed about him.

  Her smile was sad and joyous at once: warmth and coolness mingled, scented with flowers. Flameflowers, burning-sweet. “Oh, yes, my love,” she said, “you are made for it. It flames in your blood. It takes its strength from you.”

  “Ah,” he said, wry, not yet angry. “I am your familiar.”

  Her eyes glittered. “You are much more than that!”

  “Certainly. I am your lord and husband.”

  “And my lover.”

  She stroked him until he quivered with pleasure. Her joy made his heart sing. She was whole again and growing wild with it, leaping up, sweeping him with her, spinning like a mad thing. She reached for the fire that was in her; she set her will upon it.

  Hirel groped through the blinding pain. He found her huddled on the floor, too stunned even for temper.

  “Crippled,” she said. “Still—after all—”

  “Y
ou are not!” Hirel cried.

  She barely heard him. “I was so sure. I knew. My power has come back. It has been coming back ever since the change; and you are its focus. But the pain is still there. The walls are as high as ever.”

  She raised her head. Her lips drew back from her teeth. “I will break them down. By Avaryan, Hirel, I will.”

  o0o

  The Red Prince was gone again. So too was Aranos.

  The mages would not tell Hirel where. The how he could guess. Even a little of the why, if he set his mind to it. There was trouble. The war did not go well. But for which side—that, they refused to say.

  He could not find Sevayin. She was present in his mind, an awareness as of his own body, a glimmer of night and fire; in time, she had promised him, he would learn to follow the presence to its source. But he had not yet learned, and she had hidden herself well.

  He spared a moment for temper. A wife should hold herself at her husband’s disposal.

  This one did as she pleased. Which was nothing but what she had always done, insofar as she could in this wintry eyrie.

  Hirel could do nothing that befit a prince. There were no servants but the mages, and they performed none but the most essential of services. He must bathe and dress and amuse himself.

  There were books, a whole vault of them. None could tell him what passed between the empires. One of the mages condescended to a match or two of weaponless combat; he would speak of naught but holds and throws and falls.

  At length, driven by his mighty restlessness, Hirel came to the heart of the castle, to the chamber of power denuded of its wedding splendor. Its fire burned unabated. If it failed, Sevayin said, the fortress would fall; for the fire was the power that held stone upon stone.

  Hirel sat on the floor in front of it. It looked like a simple mortal fire. Its warmth caressed him; its dancing soothed his temper.

  He closed his eyes. The flames flickered in the darkness. “If you are power,” he said to them, “serve me. Tell me what my jailers will not have me know.”

  “Are you strong enough to endure the telling?”

  Hirel glanced over his shoulder, unstartled. The fire’s doing, perhaps.