Divine Travails of Rats

Metamor Keep

 

Divine Travails of Rats

by Charles Matthias and Ryx

 

 

Pars V

Ascensum

 

 

Wednesday, June 23, 724 CR

 

Though his adoptive father had bade him not to seek out Nocturna in his dreams, Charlie did not simply give over to the witless sleep enjoyed by almost everyone else. There were many who could walk the path of Dreams, some with more facility than others, and many of those Nocturna employed to safeguard the dreams of those who knew nothing of the dangers that lurked within their own sleep.

Most were safe from them in any regard, unless the Dream was a powerful one. Such would call to those who Walked, either for Nocturna or with other intentions that drew Her servants to them like crows to carrion. But even untouched by the shadowy realm of Dreams all were open to any who sought them out directly. And, thus, Charlie sought and Walked unremarked through many dreams. To him they had the passage of time, though to the outside world they were fleeting. Looking into a dream from outset to dénouement would take but second even if, within the dream, perception spanned hours or even days.

True to his Duke and his charge, Charlie stepped into the dreams of the visiting princess once she had finally sought her slumber. He followed her through some dream of the banalities of her day upon the Steppes in the shadow of the Vysehrad mountains, though all who populated that dream were animorphed in some way or another. Into this Charlie saw her thoughts turn toward Bryn, standing atop the towers of the mountain fortress keep her family would winter in. He could not but chuckle at the strange juxtaposition of Bryn standing there with noble bearing next to one of her old brother's finest warhorses. The comparisons were frank, but humorous. Charlie slipped from the dream, finding no ulterior motivations therein. Only the confusion, fears, and curiosity of a young girl.

Into the dreams of her brother and guards Charlie wandered, finding most dreaming images the same; tame or ribald and every concept between. He discovered that there were three spies among the King's guard but their duty was to observe and report, nothing more. Charlie did discover that one of the King's stewards' apprentices was among his retinue for altogether darker reasons and lingered there longer. A simple whisper of loss had the young man scrambling in haste through a trunk of fancy garments for the tiny leather pouch of poisons.

Charlie captured those thoughts, and had the pouch abruptly release its contents into the man's face. That so frightened the poor man that he lurched awake, banishing the dream. He would have some difficulty finding sleep for the rest of his night.

Briefly he sent his thoughts toward the mithril mines of the flanks of the nearby mountains, to all who slept there, instilling a sense of something missing, but nothing kindled at his nebulous caress of so many dreams. The thief was either drunk from the festivities or not yet asleep.

He kept his dreaming mind active, but at every turn from Dream to Dream he had to force himself to turn away from the addictive draw of his sire's dreams. Often he found himself standing atop a shadowy hillock surrounded by standing stones and turned purposely away.

 

A touch upon his shoulder roused him to lamp light brightness and he squinted his eyes against it. “Your father asked that you be awakened with the mistress, Charlie,” Hogue said quietly, almost apologetically, before turning away and taking with him the unpleasant brightness of the witchlit lamp. “I have laid out a robe and hose for the dawn. Which of your raiment do you wish for the day?”

Charlie grunted and sucked his tongue, roughing it against the roof of his muzzle a few times before licking his whiskers. Slowly he levered himself up. “What is the hour?” He muttered, ending with a huge yawn. Beyond the open window all was dark save for a single torch on a distant wall.

“The sky is blueing, sire. Perhaps an hour before full dawn above.” The sunlight would take another hour beyond the lightening of the sky above to full day before it touched any of the buildings of Euper. “Andelwyne will be laying out the first meal in a quarter hour.”

“Thank you, Hogue. I can dress myself.” Charlie turned to drop his paws off of his overlarge feather bed and cast aside the covers. “Please lay out the dark blue for me. I am not in tourney today so can more dress to my station.”

“As you wish.” Hogue stopped at the door to set the lantern upon the entryway table near the frame. He cast Charlie an anxious glance. “Are you well, sire? Yesterday...”

Charlie chuffed and waved a hand toward him lazily. “I acted nine times a fool. Worry not, Hogue, I have taken no injury nor overmuch wine.”

“Very well. I was merely concerned. Wagging tongues and all.” He dreaded to think of the rumors that his body-servant must have heard. In a more timorous voice, Hogue asked, “Did you indeed truly cause injury to the Baron?”

“I did, yes. I have that and more to atone for today.” Hogue had almost drawn the doors closed before Charlie looked up from a long contemplation of his own long-toed rodentine feet. “Ahh, Hogue?”

The youth – forever so only two years past when the Curse stopped him from aging any further – paused and leaned back through the opening. “Sire?”

“Could you send word to Maysin, if she is in the household, that I wish to walk this morn? And that she attend me so garbed? I believe that she has an entourage wardrobe befitting my blue?”

“She is and does, sire, and I shall convey your message with her wardrobe.” His servant's eyes narrowed. “You are not riding in your family's processional today, sire?”

Charlie grimaced and shook his head. “Not this morn, no. See to my message.” With a bob of his head Hogue withdrew and the door quietly thumped closed behind him.

 

Charlie ambled into the dining hall while the house staff was laying out the place settings and stood to one side to wait rather than get in their way by taking his seat. Misanthe, unlike most of the upper class folks that Charlie knew, would be wroth with anyone who put themselves in front of the house staff for their own convenience when things were being prepared. Suria, still rubbing her eyes, yawned with a gape of her dangerous wolf muzzle. Her white teeth gleamed in the bright light of the hall. The outer doors had been opened to the morning breeze, filling the hall with the scent of Metamor – often not the most pleasant of things, considering the multitudes of people and species inhabiting it – but far less offensive to the nose than the harbor breeze of Sutthaivasse. The stench of tanneries and fisheries there would often leave those on the high ridge above the city closing their seaside shutters.

“Morning,” She growled upon completion of her yawn, tightening the sash of her robe needlessly. “How do you prefer to be boiled, brother mine? Slow, or a quick scalding?”

Whiskers twitching in a brief moue Charlie could only shake his head, “As swiftly as might be possible.” He admitted with a sigh. “Mother was still so wroth?” He almost reached up a hand to rub his cheek where she had slapped it the prior afternoon.

The young she-wolf laughed in a half-yip and bobbed her head. “Oh, dear, yes! She simmered the day through, waiting for you to return home from wherever it was you fled after laying your sire’s breast open.”

“I sought him out.” Charlie admitted, stepping out of the way as a trio of kitchen staff emerged from a side hall to begin laying out the morning meal. Owing to the possibility of considerable hangovers the meal was a light one; breads and pastries with small meats and fingerling vegetables steamed to Charlie’s preference. “We talked.”

Suria waited for the cooks to lay out the table before crossing to her chair. Charlie followed and helped her scoot it back to the table before going to his own. “Was he terribly injured?”

“Not such that could not be mended – albeit with stitches, unfortunately. He shall scar, I fear.” He could still see the rivulet of granite running the length of his sire's chest. He would not compound his mistakes of yesterday with breaking such a terrible confidence.

“And did you apologize for your appalling lack of chivalry?” A new voice cut in, smooth yet sharp, which brought their attention back to the door from the residences. Misanthe did not so much enter a place as sweep into it with an unbound urgency to be and do. Charlie rose with a bob of his head and moved to help her with her own chair as he had with his sister’s. The staff efficiently began laying out their fares as each preferred.

“For that, yes, mother.” Charlie affirmed modestly as he returned to his chair. “And the Baron forgave me, ascribing the injury to a weakness of his own shield.”

Misanthe scoffed with a sharp look, “Would that it were not being battered with all the violence of a petulant child at tantrum he may not have to make such a claim.” She shook her head and took up her chalice, holding it steady as one of the staff poured at her side. The scent was nothing more than that of milk. “And then storming off in pique, leaving all gaping behind you while your mount stood at the end of the list forgotten.” She sipped, then leaned forward, lightly placing the chalice back down. Charlie poured his own milk, as was his habit. He would much rather hear her sharp words than feel the sharp strike of her paw. “Were she but a horse such would not be remarked upon, but she is a member of this household and deserves far better treatment, Charlie.”

Again the young rat could only nod his head in assent, “I have quite humiliated her before the entire tourney crowd, yes, and mean to make some manner of apology this morning. I shall, in all due grace one who is being – punished, walk to the tourney field today, denied use of my mount by my wrathful parents.”

Misanthe’s russet brows rose and her ears pinned forward, “You would abandon her again for a second day?” She growled warningly. Charlie held up a placating hand quickly.

“No, mother. No, I shall not leave her here awaiting my wish. I have asked that she be garbed to be my retinue today, not mount. She will be given leave to enjoy the day as her own, as well, once I reach the festival grounds.”

“That is a start.” Misanthe conceded. She wagged a finger at him admonishingly, “Now, be sure not to tender her any coin beyond her norm. That would be – unseemly. It would give the impression of purchasing forgiveness rather than earning it.”

Charlie nodded and nibbled a stalk of steamed asparagus freshly gathered from the Keep gardens. “No, I full well intend to earn recompense for my poor behavior, on all accounts. I have yet to fully understand my sire’s motivations, which is the root of the anger I directed to him yesterday, and as yet have not fully come to grips with his choices. But we are speaking, and he has much to tell of – that night.”

Misanthe slowly chewed a bit of fowl that had been roasted the previous day and then left in a cold box to chill that it be better morning fare. “Ahh. Indeed. That night changed many things, but also set in motion events that would affect your life, young man. Full well to find some understanding of it and set aside this childish petulance you hold toward him. Your dam is nearly as furious as I, you should know. I believe, when last I saw her, she was seeking out a willow branch.”

Charlie winced and his tail tucked down against the back of his chair at the thought of that. He had only experienced a switch once, after unwisely making too rough with a horse, by the stable master under direction of his father. He had never again mistreated a steed, or any other animal, and avoided the mere thought of any transgression that might mete out a re-application of that stinging punishment.

“I will… present myself at the Matthias pavilion before going to the Hassan seat, then.” He sighed, not looking forward to the Lady Kimberly’s anger.

“See that you do.”

Misanthe had no more to say after that and Charlie felt a measure of relief. Suria glared at him for a moment as if irritated that her brother hadn't been more thoroughly chastised, but her irritation with her brother could never last.

Charlie glanced at the empty seat at the head of the table for a moment and cautiously changed the subject. “Where is Father?”

Misanthe dabbed the end of her snout with a kerchief to clean it and then replied, “Your father is seeing to some private arrangements with the Duke and will rejoin us in time for the procession.” A procession Charlie had already announced he would not participate in. “Now, do eat something this morning, Charlie. Something more than that asparagus you've nibbled to nothing.”

Breakfast, while prepared well as always, was tasteless to Charlie but he put himself to the task of finishing it lest he receive another rebuke. Suria and Misanthe exchanged idle talk about the wares that they had seen, gossip overheard from their visitors and local nobility, and the unexpected victory of the rat Goldmark over the Long Scout lutin Keleficks as the last fight of the previous day. Even as he forced himself to finish a slice of toast with raspberry jam, his ears lifted to listen with sudden interest.

Apparently, when Keleficks made his first sortie against the Rat – who entered battle in the form of a rat’taur as large as a stout pony – Goldmark’s block was so powerful that it sent the Lutin’s cudgel rebounding with enough force to knock him out entirely when it struck him in the brow. Charlie found himself laughing to the point of breathlessness as Suria described it. No few of the house staff had also been among the audience and offered remarks of their own, as was the wont for free speaking in the Sutt house, that only compounded the hilarity of the all-too-brief engagement.

In due course Misanthe finished her meal, her pace matched almost perfectly by her children. One of the notes of diplomacy that Malger had instilled in them; never finish before the Host of a given meal, but do not tarry such that they are waiting for you to finish so that they might progress to the next course. Charlie bowed out as gracefully as he could under the cool regard of his mother and humorous teasing of his sister so that he could dress for the day.

 

Returning to his chamber he found Hogue and the young rat Peter – Charlie’s sibling by blood but not surname – chatting in the residence hall just outside the door to his chambers. Peter was holding the rich blue raiment that Charlie had chosen for the day draped over both arms while he and Hogue regaled each other with the entertainments they hoped to enjoy once they were released from their morning duties. Not far away a pale Lutin, standing slightly taller than Peter but shorter than Hogue, smiled as he quietly listened. He carried two weighty tomes, freshly fashioned of buttercream hued leather and likely as yet to be scribed with the doings of the Sutt household though in which Charlie’s recent escapades would find themselves penned, in his wiry arms.

“Hogue, At’fek, Peter.” Charlie spoke warmly as he approached, managing to pronounce the Lutin’s name in a passable approximation of his native language. Aside from being the House scribe the Lutin was also their translator when diplomatic needs took them north of the Dikes to High Chief Keletikt’s kingdom. Though aging, the elder Shaman-cum-High Chief still held the Lutin nations firmly in check. He had successfully implemented a regimen of teaching among many of the older tribes so that the youth were learning their letters and numbers along with their land-lore and hunting. Raiding continued, but only from outlying unaffiliated tribes and at such a reduced rate that a single raid was enough to earn comment even to the Duke’s ears rather than an accumulated report given by Patrol-master Sir Wolfram.

“Master Charlie.” the Lutin bowed with a smile. Holding the two weighty tomes up slightly by way of excuse he made his way past them down the hall toward the main rooms and, ostensibly, the library.

With a wave of his hand Charlie bid the youth and young rat precede him into his chambers.

“Charlie!” Peter gasped ebulliently, full of the infectious energy of the truly young, even as he carefully laid out Charlie’s garments, “Someone told me that the mages are going to put on a special show after the final tilt, today.”

Charlie nodded and drew off his robe. Hogue quietly took it from his paw with an eager glance of bright eyes as he smiled at his lord’s younger brother, his own enthusiasm for the performance of magecraft tempered only by his duty to his noble charge. “Yes, Peter, I would expect that something of that sort would occur, as it does each year. This year moreso as we are entertaining outlander Royals as well.” Hogue helped him out of his shirt and breeches, leaving him unabashedly naked before the two. Such was not in the least unusual; Charlie had been attended by his two body servants since he was younger than Peter’s age. They had seen him in every state of undress imaginable, healthy and ill, bruised from training or rather dizzy from too many cups after a long night entertaining guests. Peter, being his brother, paid no heed either way. There was scarce little privacy in the Matthias house with so many other brothers sharing a single room so seeing his brother unclothed was nothing unusual.

And, in the privacy of his own chambers, Charlie felt no overwhelming stir of modesty. After so many years he had lost that shyness.

Peter deftly plucked the buttons loose along the front of Charlie’s doublet, inspecting the threads to ensure that all were sewn securely. “Yes, but I was not able to attend last year.” He pouted, glancing up briefly, “Nor the year before that.”

Standing with his arms slightly raised and his tail curved safely to one side Charlie stood still to let Hogue quickly run a brush across his short, smooth pelt to dislodge any loose fur or snarls left by sleep. “You were ill last year, Peter. And too young by far the year before, and living in the Glen besides.” Seeing his younger sibling’s discomfiture at having missed out on the previous festivities Charlie slipped the topic onto another tangential track smoothly. “What mages will be performing, did they say?” At a light tap on his shoulder Charlie turned and settled into the chair that Hogue drew back from his desk.

“The grandmaster’s wife and two other skunks, I was told. They will be working some grand display for the Duke and his guests!”

“Kayla?” Charlie arched a brow and twitched a scalloped ear back toward his brother though he faced the mirror, and thus saw Peter by his reflection. “That is Grandmaster Rickkter’s wife, a skunk. Murikeer and Kozaithy would be the other two skunks.” Charlie held still while Hogue sorted what passed for the rat’s hair to get it properly coifed, though there was scarcely enough to bother with such diligence. Like pretty much every other rat of the Matthias lineage his head was swathed in the same short fur as the rest of him, if ever so slightly longer from his brow following a line between his ears and downward along his spine to fade into the general lie of his pelt slightly north of his tail. “Likely adept Jessica will attend, then, if the skunks are. It seems that their efforts transcend the political maneuvering of the damn guilds.” A decade past the mage guilds had come to a falling out and established three separate guilds focusing on different aspects of magecraft, yet each claimed to be the master of all schools. The internecine politicking drove the Duke’s advisor on magical affairs, Murikeer, to distraction on a monthly basis. Luckily the more powerful mages; Grandmaster Rickkter, his wife Kayla, the Adept Jessica and the Khunnas skunks had eschewed any allegiance to the guilds and, thereby, kept them in check with non-insubstantial threats of dire consequences if their bickering got out of hand.

Hogue, for once, said nothing throughout the conversation, allowing brother to speak to brother while he carefully selected a few bits of jewelry from the box in which Charlie kept such things. The metals of most jewelry tended to stain the rat's fur so he seldom wore any at all, though he kept plenty on hand for ceremonial occasions. For his ears he chose small studs of silver and azure, three for the lower rim of each ear, facet cut to catch the light whenever his ears moved, a fourth stud set below the others was graced by a slightly larger polished oval emerald. About his neck he draped a mantle of braided silver and pale blue sapphires that would complement his wardrobe and a torc of sculpted silver that fit snugly, each end adorned with deep green emeralds resting at the points of his clavicles. His fingers were adorned with similar combinations of silver and blue, with the middle finger of each hand sporting a ring of silver and emerald.

After adorning his charge with a thief’s dream of silver and stones Hogue and Peter both helped him into the form fitting, impeccably tailored blue hose and equally snug doublet that was buttoned up the front and tightened via laces up the back to show off his physique. He found it unpleasantly uncomfortable for any length of time but did have to admit that, in combination with the hose of fine cotton, made him cut quite a striking figure. Lace adorned wrist and collar, creating a nest of white in which the silver and gems of the jewelry nested against his fur as if displayed within a jewelry box lined with brown felt. Charlie slipped on matched cuffs of silver and sapphires at each wrist and, glancing into the overburdened jewelry box, deftly lifted a last item. This he secreted up the sleeve of his doublet.

Due to the snugness of the doublet Charlie’s arms had their movement constrained considerably, lest he tear out the stitching at the shoulders and underarms, so Hogue had to help him into the deep blue velvet surcoat with its plush sleeves and high, lace collar. He would remove it before the day was too far along, for it would be unbearably warm by mid-day, but for the introductions of the morning it would show fine comportment and refinement.

Charlie had to snort at himself in the mirror; he looked every inch as much the fop as his father, and rather intensely disliked it. The tailors left him little room to move as his father did and he would have to remedy that the next time they came. Malger could dance easily in his full attire, and fight easily with one sword or both without tearing the seams. For a few hours, at least, he would suffer the sacrifice of extravagant wealth in good grace.

Doffing a rogue’s pointed hat that rested neatly between his ears he flicked his fingers down the upturned sides to the point above his muzzle with a deft flick. Hogue chuckled and plucked a small cluster of pheasant feathers from a small cubby to one side of the wardrobe to slip into the feather notch along the right side of the cap. “A perfect ensemble, Milord.” The youth said with a bright smile, carefully adjusting the long feathers of the cap and lace about Charlie’s throat to best affect. “You cut quite a dashing figure.”

“Of a rat in motley.” Charlie quipped, shifting his arms to test the limits of his motions. Peter pranced over from the far side of the room with a belt of gleaming white leather tooled in the form of running stags. From it dangled a sheathed poniard similarly tooled. Charlie held his arms up slightly as his brother looped the belt around from behind and cinched it snugly about his waist.

“Charlie, we are all beasts in motley at Metamor.” Peter admonished in a moment of clarity mature beyond his years.

“Not all.” Hogue admonished with a brief chuckle, tapping Peter between his pale pink rodent ears with a single fingertip, “Though he is right. You are no mere jester, Charlie, dressed in extravagant motley. You’d turn the eyes of even a human who still thinks us demons out there as you are now.”

“For my silver if naught else.” Charlie tugged at the lace of his sleeves and regarded himself in the mirror one last time. “But, be that as it may, it is the last day of the summer festival, a bad day for maudlin thoughts.” Snugging his belt comfortably about his hips Charlie raised his arms to clap both of his helpers upon their shoulders, “Hogue, the day is yours as you wish. If you see Jackson remind him that he is to prepare my chamber for my return this evening. Peter, see if the Lady has any tasks for you to complete. I will see myself to the gates.”

“I delivered wardrobe and message as you asked.” Hogue reminded him as the three of them made for the door, shooing Peter out first.

While Peter scampered off to see if Misanthe had any more requirements of him Charlie waited for Hogue to close the door of his rooms. Other servants would be along, likely within moments of their departure, to return the chambers to their pristine state awaiting his arrival before they, too, retired to the festival. “Thank you, Hogue.” Reaching out, Charlie clasped his hand and shook it as they turned toward the main hall. “Good man. I’ll see you on the morrow, then?” Charlie had been trained by some of the best cutpurses Malger could convince to tutor him, as well as Malger and Misanthe who had both, for differing reasons, learned the sleight of hand tricks of thievery in the years of their youth. While he was pumping Hogue’s hand his other was deftly pilfering into the small coinpurse dangling from Hogue’s belt to add a few more coins to the youth’s collection.

 

The sun had not yet shown itself over the mountain peaks to the east when Charlie emerged from the Livery gate of the Duke’s wing. In the distance the hulking form of a giant was raking out the loose boxes that housed those mounts belonging to the Knights of the Red Stallion and the Knights of the Holy Yew. The giant’s huge rake cleaned each stall out in only a few passes and was shoveled into a wagon with an equally large tool.

“Milord?” A deep though feminine voice came to his ears before he had gone a half dozen strides and he turned to find Maysin approaching from a side gate from which she had emerged. Though she may have set out from the Sutt garrison there was no telling how far she had walked to emerge from the Keep within moments of his own exit. When Charlie turned she gave a single-handed sweep of her rich blue dress with a look of ‘what’s with this getup’ curiosity.

“Maysin, ah!” Charlie beamed with a smile, “You look very nice.” The solid blue was very striking atop her black-and-white striped hide.

“Yes, milord Charlie, but why such a formal costume?” She asked deferentially, her hooves chuffing quietly on the neatly trimmed grass of the livery courtyard.

With a moue Charlie’s ears backed, briefly. “Because of my – ahh – behavior yesterday I am not going to be on the list today, though my sire’s use of magic disqualified him and I did advance. So I will not need you as a mount today.” A shadow emerging from the same door Myasin had made Charlie’s gaze shift briefly, but only long enough to see Bryn’s regally garbed form approaching with Argamont’s taller frame beside him, dressed with finery the equal of Maysin’s.

“Ahh, Charlie!” Bryn hailed with a wave, increasing his pace for a few strides. Argamon’s ears twitched forward and Charlie saw his gaze sweep Maysin up and down for a moment, the tall stallion servitor smiling admiringly. “I see we are of like mind.” The young duke-in-waiting taking Maysin in with a smile and short bow.

“Indeed, Bryn.” Charlie chuckled, “Maysin, as I will not be contesting on the List I will, perforce, be attending my father and the Duke in the royal box. I would have you attend me, please, if I may ask that of you.”

“Not Hogue?” Maysin backed one ear timorously. She had served Charlie many times in the company of Metamor’s royals and was accepted by the entirety of the family with pleasure.

“I have released him for the day to attend the festivities on his own whim.” Charlie tipped his head slightly and looked up at the monochromatic striped mare’s concerned expression, “And I would do the same, if you desire to enjoy the day for yourself.”

She shook her head slowly, “No, I would be honored to be of service.” After a moment the corners of her expressive equine lips twitched up in a brief smile, “And the food will be much better than what most of the vendors have.”

Charlie bobbed his head with a smile, “True, true!” He agreed, then straightened his back and squared his shoulders, turning to face her more directly with a serious mien upon his muzzle. “But first I would do something, with Bryn and Argamont to witness.” Clearing his throat Charlie slipped nimble fingers into the sleeve of his doublet. “Maysin, I am sorry.”

Her head titled and her eyes widened, as if expecting his statement to be the opening line of a dismissal or other unpleasant news. “Sorry, milord?” She quavered, hands dropping to her side in a pose of formal attentiveness.

“Yes, Maysin, I am sorry. For my behavior yesterday, in disrespecting and dishonoring you, who have of your own will and desire have comported yourself to be my steed.” Charlie carried on diligently. Bryn’s ears came up and he shifted, quite subtly, to an aristocratic pose of attention to an important moment. “I acted in ill grace toward my sire on the field of arms, and I left you – who leave yourself vulnerable and exposed without garb in a manner many would find ill suited to their pride and intelligence – standing tacked and barded in the summer sun as any other might abandon a mere horse.” With a shake of his head Charlie stepped closer to her, until they were barely a handspan apart and he had to raise his head markedly to keep eye contact. “I am in your debt. I am always in your debt, for the service you offered, and offer, to myself and my House.” Raising his hand, and stretching the seams of his surcoat to their limit, he reached up to lightly capture one of her tall, striped ears. Delicately he removed one of the decorative jeweled studs, which was mere costume jewelry worth a few silvers but was still fetching against her flesh and pelt. Palming it he slipped a larger, heavier, and far more ornate stud into the empty piercing before stepping back. The stone was a deep green, oval cut emerald enwrapped in a web of gold as fine as a spider’s web. Alone it cost more than her entire wardrobe and a goodly portion of her wages. “If, at any time, for any reason you require aid of me, day or night, in any way present that stone to any of our House and I will come to your aid and service without question.”

Maysin’s hand went to her ear the moment he turned loose of it. Thought she had only caught a momentary glimpse of the stone she could feel its weight in her ear and with the pads of her thick fingers. “Charlie, this is far too much!” She gasped in surprise. “You did not wrong me, at all, yesterday! That is my serv-“

Charlie held up a finger and lightly touched her lips, “Maysin, it is not the value of that token, it is the token itself. It is the mark of a promise made.” He paused and smiled, then chuckled softly, “I could have offered as much with a bit of copper or pin, and it would carry the same value. That more suits you, I think.”

“I agree.” Bryn coughed modestly to one side, “And, in so saying, House Hassan will know of that token and bear its value accordingly, Maysin. I bear witness to the promise made.” Stepping around the stunned zebra Bryn stood beside Charlie to face her and rested a heavy hand upon the young rat’s shoulder, “And yes, lass, this churl did you a disservice yesterday. What you, Argamont, and every one of those who have come into the services of our Houses in the manner you do is beyond any service ever expected of a houses’ servitors in history. Though we don’t say it often enough, you honor us with that service.” He nodded toward Argamont who had moved forward to stand at Maysin’s side. “Leaving you caparisoned, for all intents and purposes naked, upon the tourney field like a mere horse was poor observation of that honor.”

Maysin’s ears backed and her muzzle dropped in profound consternation, only to come back up suddenly when Argamont slipped a strong arm around her waist. She looked to Bryn’s sometime steed and back to the two nobles and attempted a smile. “Thank you, milord.” She managed to whisper after a few moments, her ears still backed.

“No, Maysin.” Charlie shook his head and reached out to chuck her lightly under the chin with a curled finger. “Thank you. I hardly say it often enough.” His gaze twitched slightly to one side, “And you, Argamont, though you are not in my service.”

“That is understood, your grace.” Argamont intoned with deep bow, his arm still around the stunned zebra’s waist. “By both of us, though she is sorely shocked by your formal acceptance of a debt. Most afford those who serve them no debts of honor. You are a fine lord, and will be a fine Duke one day.”

“Not before me!” Bryn cut the formality with a laugh, clapping Charlie’s shoulder with a thick-fingered hand. “Now, let’s quit gawping here and get to my father’s box before the Dawn Wine is gone!”

Charlie lifted his arm as high as it would go and patted Bryn on the back. “Save me some, Bryn; I have one more errand to run ere I reach the High Box.”

Maysin looked awkwardly at both Argamont, who did not seem interested in letting go of her waist, and Charlie, whose expensive gift weighed on her mind more than her ear. Argamont acknowledged the noble rat's announcement with a mere flick of his ear, his eyes still on the zebra mare. Bryn regarded his friend with raised ears and wide eyes, “Oh? Another soul to whom you must make amends?”

He nodded with a sigh. “Yes. My mother, the Baroness.”

“Oh ho!” Bryn replied with a snort, crossing his arms and favoring the rat with a haughty stare down the length of his nose. “And what have you to say to your brother-in-arms whom you abandoned to the matrimonial machinations of his own mother?”

Argamont whinnied in amusement while Charlie stared incredulous at the ducal heir. “I fear I do not understand your meaning. I cannot believe that your family would have agreed to a betrothal so soon, and certainly not the foreign king!”

“Nay, they have not agreed to a betrothal, but without your companionship to accompany me, I had no choice but to remain in company with my family and with the foreigners.” Bryn's dark ears lowered and he exuded an air of affected offense and shame. “I had no choice but to spend time with her!”

“He even danced with her,” Argamont put in with a delighted snort. Maysin frowned at him and finally managed to slip herself out from the stallion's grasp. The strawberry roan favored the zebra with a brief glance of genuine affection, before the ribald glint returned to his dark eyes. “Quite a lovely couple our young lord and lady made.”

Charlie blinked and held back the laugh he felt. “You danced with the princess?”

Bryn nodded, his affected air of offended dignity comical in its exuberance. “We entertained our guests privately after last night's festivities. Music was playing and all of us were told to dance. My mother ensured that the princess and I would be paired together as often as possible.”

His whiskers twitched with mischief. “Did you trod one of your hooves on delicate royal toes?”

“Do not be foolish!” His ears lifted for a moment as if only now considering the tactic for the first time. “Mother would skewer me!”

Charlie finally laughed and shook his head. “Do not fear this princess, Bryn. She's just as nervous about you as you are of her.”

“Probably more nervous about how much a horse our young lord is!” Argamont offered with a nickering laugh. Maysin jabbed him in the side, a disapproving scowl stretching her supple lips.

Bryn's ears backed in genuine embarrassment and his eyes narrowed toward the man who served as his mount. Charlie caught the glance and waved his hands in the air as high as he could reach and laughed one more time. “Enough! Enough! I offer you, Thomas Bryn Hassan, my humblest apologies for abandoning you to your mother's matrimonial mischief. I promise you that I shall keep you company to ameliorate any such attempts at amorous arrangements by your as... assertive mother.”

Bryn flicked up his long ears and then flipped them back down. “Well! Good!” He snorted and then held back his own laugh no more. A hearty bray interjected his mirth and he gripped Charlie by the shoulder and gave him a brief shake. “Now let's go. It's a long walk and the roads are going to be filled before the hour is out.”

Charlie felt a measure of relief and warmth in his heart. He had shamed himself on the tourney field and yet his friends still stood with him. Together the four of them made their way from the Keep, through the gates, and through Keeptowne shadowed by the quartet of Watch members. Though it was still early in the morning, it was festival time and so the streets were thrumming with vendors from all over the valley and Keepers eager for the final day. Like Charlie, Bryn had eaten already and so they did not linger at any of the vendors though they did glance at many, inspiring hope in the heart of many at the sight of their wealth only to be disappointed when they continued on their way without reaching for their money pouches.

When they reached the festival grounds the relaxed mood Charlie felt in the company of his friends evaporated. The easy laughter he shared with Bryn was replaced by a sullen reserve. He fidgeted as they walked toward the pavilions and the High Box, hesitating to break away. Bryn, as always, noted his discomfiture and finally, after they had walked the long way around the Sutt pavilion, grabbed him on the shoulder and gestured with his other arm at another pavilion flying a pinion bearing a rat. “You have something to do, don't you, Charlie?”

He took a deep breath, his whiskers and tail drooping. “Yes, I do. Thank you, Bryn. I will join you when I can.”

Bryn smiled and offered him a chuckle. “Take what time you need. I doubt even my mother can get me married before midday.”

Maysin followed him as he made his way through the pavilions towards the heraldry of his birth family. The Sutt and Hassan pavilions stood near the rear of the High Box and were the largest by far, but the Matthias pavilion, set off in a ring of pavilions for minor nobility, was nearly their equal. It's size was not a reflection of their prominence but only their fecundity. Even their youngest children were now old enough to come to Metamor for the festival, and so with over twenty Matthias of varying ages in attendance along with nearly as many servants and guards there to protect the children they needed a large space in which to congregate.

Two soldiers in the green livery of the Matthias clan stood outside the pavilion and nodded to Charlie and Maysin as they approached. The same rat-head crest that he had viciously assaulted on his sire's shield adorned their chest. He recognized both the dog and the human from his visits to the Narrows, but their names were a mystery to him. Charlie nodded to them and folded his hands at his waist. “Is the Baroness here? I would like to pay her an audience.”

The dog nodded again. “Milady is here and expecting you, Milord.”

Charlie twitched his whiskers, remembering what his mother had said over breakfast. “Thank you.” He turned to Maysin and offered the zebra a smile. “I think I should see her myself.”

Maysin nodded and gave him a confidant mile. “I will wait here for you, Charlie.”

Charlie stepped inside and was surprised by how quiet and empty it was. Tables were arranged in the center of the tent holding fresh basins of water for washing muddy paws and covered platters of fresh fruit, breads, and cheese to sate hungry bellies. A few servants milled about preparing for the day, but he saw no rats. There were a few private inner rooms, and out of one of them a familiar opossum emerged. “Lord Charlie? Your mother is waiting inside.”

Charlie took a deep breath and turned toward the opossum who stepped out between the folds of the inner chamber to let him through. “Thank you, Baerle,” he said with an inclined snout as he stepped past. The warm radiance of a witchlight glowed within. He put one hand on the soft linen doorway and slipped through. The cloth trailed down his tail as he blinked in the light.

The inner chamber was arranged as a small sitting room with a single mirror to help the lady of the house properly correct her adornments after enjoying the hustle and bustle of the festival. There were two cushioned chairs and a small trunk tucked beneath the mirror and table against which rested a fresh willow branch all lit by a trio of witchlights circling above. Sitting in the chair farthest from the entrance was his mother, Baroness Kimberly Matthias. She bore an azure gown with frills along her arms and neck. The amethyst lined stone rested against her bodice. Her dark eyes fixed on him and her voice, soft and controlled, met him, “Come in and sit down, Charlie, my son.”

He opened his muzzle to speak but could not move his tongue. Dumbly, he sat down, long tail sliding into hole in the back and pooling on the cloth covered ground beneath them. His hands gripped his knees and he did he best to keep his claws from digging into the luxurious fabric. “I... I'm sorry, mother.”

His mother's eyes were so intent, her snout still though not quite able to hide a faint tremble, that Charlie lowered his until he stared into her lap. Her hands were wrapped tightly about one another so that her knuckles were white. Those hands had tended and cared for him when he'd been weakest and more innocent. He felt shame anew for turning their gentleness to wrath.

“I am sorry. I shamed myself and I shamed my sire.”

“Father.”

Her voice was so clipped it made him blink open his eyes. “What?”

The Baroness narrowed hers. “He is your father and you will call him so. Do not use whatever term you've devised to hide that behind your adoption by Archduke Sutt. Not to your own mother.”

He tensed, feeling as sharply upbraided by the reprimand as if he'd been struck on the backside by the willow branch at her side. “I am sorry I shamed my father. I am sorry... I am sorry I hurt him and you and all our family.”

Charlie could see the tourney field in his mind, kicked up with dust and smelling of the sweat of hundreds of Keepers who'd been there and bled before him. Before him cowered his father, hiding behind a battered shield, his voice filled with uncertainty, fear, and worry; not worry for his own life, but for Charlie himself. He had prided himself on recognizing mood from only the timbre of a speaker's voice and yet he had failed to hear it when it mattered most.

The Matthias clan – his family – had been watching from opposite the High Box. What must they have felt that in that moment? His younger brother and sisters, all of whom looked up to him, were either confused or filled with shock at how violently he had struck at their father. Erick, his litter-mate who was dear to him in a way he could never express, must have stumbled in denial, unwilling to admit that his brother would do so contemptuous a thing. And his mother Baroness Kimberly Matthias, must truly have been livid, struck to the heart as deeply as the band struck the Baron in the chest.

“I'm so sorry...” Charlie trembled and bent forward, his snout falling into upturned hands. Another pair of hands caught his shoulders, these tender and firm. He blinked and look up in time to see his mother wrap her arms about his shoulder sand pull him tight to her chest. Tears dripped down her cheeks as she rumpled her dress and his own with her embrace. Tentatively, Charlie slipped his arms around her back and held close. His reserve lasted only seconds before his grip pulled taut and he shuddered, feeling very much a child again needing the comfort of his mother.

Despite being a head taller than his mother, it was her chin that rested between his ears, and her whiskers that brushed across their tender pink flesh. He could smell not only the bath salts she scrubbed her fur with the previous day but the remnant of the coffee she had drunk that morning to help rouse herself as early as the Sutt household. Between them the strong and familiar scent of rats filled his nostrils, not just his mother's unique texture, but that of his many brothers and sisters, but especially the brittle coolness of his father's musk a blend that always carried a touch of stone amongst the fur.

Charlie made no move to let go, even when the stone medallion about her neck dug into his chin. He had never had anything but love in his heart for his mother and he would not change that now. Against her chest he murmured, “I love you, mother. I'm sorry.”

“I love you too, Charlie,” she replied as her arms squeezed him tight one more time before letting go. She shifted back into her seat. He twitched his now freed whiskers back into place and sat up a bit. He smiled at the corners of his snout at those words. With firmer voice she continued, “We all love you, Charlie. Your brothers and sisters adore you! I love you with all my heart; not a day goes by that I do not think of you and wish you were at my side. And your father loves you; he may not say it, but I know he too thinks of you always.”

He took a long deep breath, fighting to regain his reserve lest he become as emotional as a woman. “I know. I know it and I'm sorry I forgot.” Charlie closed his eyes and found waiting for him the vision from his sire's dreams. He ground his molars together and by instinct reached for his chewstick. But he stilled the motion and forced his eyes open once more. “But I saw things, mother, I saw things that made me question that love. Father has... been trying to explain them to me.”

“Is that why he came to our chambers so late?”

“Aye. I fear I kept him up telling me the story e'en to the midnight hour.”

A brief snort almost seemed to brighten her demeanor. “How like him.”

Curious, he narrowed his eyes. “He said nothing to you?”

“No. He tossed and turned in his sleep and did not finally find rest until shortly before I rose. Our servants are rousing him now so he can put in a good appearance and quiet the rumors. I expect you to greet him where you both can be seen.”

“As does my...” he stumbled and then continued, “my mother. And father.”

“Charlie,” Kimberly said, stretching out one hand to grasp his own. “Your father did not need to tell me anything for me to know in my heart what hurts you so. I may not have raised you, but you are still flesh of my flesh, you are still my son.”

He nodded and sighed. “I hurt because I'm not a Matthias. And there's more to it than just the powers I share...”

She tightened her grip on his hand. “He is telling you about Marzac isn't he?”

His whiskers flicked upward with his eyes. “He's told you the tale?”

Her snout tightened and she shook her head. Her voice was hushed, and her free hand lifted to her chest to rest upon the purple stone resting there. “No. Not his part. But I know it haunts him more than anything else. He has never truly slept well since those days. Most nights he manages well enough but there are others.... Do not tell him I told you this, but I have seen him whimper in his sleep like a common dog.”

Charlie felt shame fill him again. “I'm... I'm sorry. I didn't know.”

“Very few do, Charlie. And what he is telling you now he has spoken to few if any before. I have never heard all of it.”

“But you knew,” he said with a sigh. “You knew something was wrong.”

She nodded and patted his hand, offering him a faint smile. “I did. I could not put it into words but I knew. But it took another to make me see it for what it was.”

His eyes narrowed, curiosity blossoming anew in his heart. “Another? Who? What happened?”

Her smile did not waver, but there was a timorous note to her voice. “I am not the storyteller your father is, but I'll tell you what happened. It was only a few days after your father returned from Lake Barnhardt to help Jessica...”

 

 

Wednesday, May 9, 708 CR

 

The children well knew that when the skunk came by to visit their mother that it was a time that the two were not to be disturbed. Even though the lessons had usually taken place in the somewhat confined environs of the tree house common room the children knew that the studies were a time they had best take their play up to their own rooms.

But not so this day for, upon arriving to visit the young mage had requested a private audience with his student on one of the balconies of the Mountain's Hearth Inn. While they had from time to time met in the cellars of the Brewery now that Kozaithy had joined them, never before had he asked her to meet him at the Inn and the atypical request left the Lady Kimberly pensive with worry. Charles was away for the day, exploring the Narrows with James and Gibson that they might settle on a plan of construction for his envisioned Keep for their fief. Baerle was with the children while they napped giving Kimberly a couple of hours respite from their rambunctiousness.

Thus Kimberly found herself alone with the unusually somber skunk for the first time since the two had bumped into each other in a hallway at Metamor Keep some years before. Only two, it was, but it seemed like so many more at times. At other times it seemed like only yesterday.

Leaning against the heavy door of stout oarwood that opened onto the balcony perched astride the peak of the Hearth's steeply pitched shale and thatch roof Kimberly pushed it open with a slight struggle despite the oiled hinges. But, where she had expected a flat, wind-swept platform she found a complete room beyond that weighty door. It was bright with sunshine and it stung her eyes that had become accustomed to the gloom of forest. Three of four walls were made up almost entirely of hand poured glass heavy with waves and warps that distorted the view beyond the solar; or any view inside from without. The ceiling, likewise, was mostly glass. It was before the far windows that the mage Murikeer stood, his hands laced behind his back above the voluminous plume of his white slashed black tail. His finery was simple; if well crafted; mere trews of buttery soft leather and a light shirt of deep gray broadcloth as a peasant might wear. His lower legs and feet were unshod, as was his wont, for his legs were shaped like those of a dog rather than flat as a skunk's normally would be.

Such were the vagaries of Metamor's curse, but none had thought much of it in the years she had known him.

“I am here, Muri,” the young magician's apprentice intoned quietly at the back-turned ears of the taller youth. “What – what is this place?” She craned her head to look around, amazed at the incongruity of the ornate castle room hidden atop the Inn. Murikeer turned around and made a small motion with one hand. Behind the lady rat a quiet whisper ending in a weighty thud heralded the heavy door sweeping closed. His one good eye gazed down upon her, his apprentice and friend, without his customary smile but retaining his usual warmth, though his expression was somber.

Kimberly tilted her head slightly, whiskers and ears backing at the sudden sensation of feeling trapped by the weight of that heavy portal. “Muri?”

“Welcome, milady.” He bowed his head slowly and then let his gaze cast about the brightly lit room. “This is but an illusion. A recreation of one of the many rooms I've found in my new home... or, rather, what it may look like once I've repaired it sufficiently.” He shook his head and chuffed a quiet, soft laugh. “Lord Avery was certainly generous, but the old house has been sorely left to the elements the past few years. Luckily it was overlooked by the invaders in the winter and escaped complete destruction. No one without will see aught but an empty balcony.” His gaze came in time back around to settle upon her. “It has been busy, of late. I am sorry to have left you without tutelage in the nonce.” He churred warmly with a deeper bow of apology and sweep of one arm toward one of the many large chairs. “You are well in your house?”

Kimberly tittered softly and let out a deep sigh. “Well, yes, but like you, ever so frightfully busy with so many energetic young rats running about getting into everything.”

“Such is the curse of the change, a new lifestyle. Please, take your ease, milady.” He waited while Kimberly settled into one of the massive chairs. For a moment she was timid about the massive throne of age polished wood and brocade, but when her hand touched the arm she felt that it was real enough beneath the illusion. To her surprise Murikeer approached and settled onto the ottoman at its foot rather than another chair nearby. She found her hands clutching the long tail she swept around to drape across her lap.

“What brings you with such a look of seriousness about you today, Muri?” she asked in her quiet, rodentine voice.

“All is well, milady.” He sat forward on the ottoman, the long plume of his tail relaxed in an arc behind him like some shadow of fur trying to steal upon him unawares. “But I come with concerns, such as for your ears alone. You may be the only shield standing before a darkness incomprehensible.”

Kimberly blinked, her pulse quickening in alarm and her fingers clutching her tail all the more tightly, and then she scowled. “Master Murikeer, you are trying to frighten me?”

The skunk shook his head slowly, raising one hand and extending it, palm up, toward her. Kimberly gazed down upon it, but found nothing amiss the black pads and stark monochromatic fur. It was not that she did not trust him; he was ever the gentleman around her and never acted athwart her or Charles in the years they had been friends. Tentatively she raised one of her own small hands reached out to her palm down upon his own. “I am most contrite, milady, but the weight of my words must strike true, like the unquiet omens offered by Nocturna, that they might be remembered upon waking.” No sooner had her palm come to rest upon his own than his free hand raised and swiftly, like a viper espying a mouse, darted down to tap the back of her hand with the stout claw of his middle finger. The sound of claw striking flesh through fur was surprisingly sharp in the quietude of the solar.

Kimberly yelped in surprise at the painful prick of that sharp claw and snatched her hand back, clutching it defensively at her breast. He made no attempt to restrain her paw, now capture it to offer up another painful strike. “Muri!” she snapped angrily, holding her assaulted paw close.

Murikeer bowed his head before her in contrition. “Again, my apologies, milday. Others may have done so well with a light touch as that, had I but known. Kayla, James, Jessica. Lindsey before them. Each has been touched by the lingering shadow of Marzac, a subtle and deep seeded taint of evil. It is that against much I must warn, and gird you, milady; my friend.”

“You needn't strike me, Muri!” She snapped at him, raising her hand to press her thin lips against the stricken back, tasting the blood that welled through the short fur. “What is this you speak of with such frightful solemnity? I know well what happened to them, but they were all saved!”

“By whom, milady?” Murikeer raised his head and gazed into her eyes with his own. Upon the intricately tooled leather which covered the gaping rent where his right eye had been small gems winked in the spring sunshine through the windows. Upon the end of his claw a single drop of dark red blood glistened.

“By whom?” she asked, confused. “By you? You, and Charles and that raccoon and others.”

Murikeer shook his head slowly, dipping his free hand into a pouch at his hip and drawing out a small object. Kimberly's gaze twitched to it distrustfully, her whiskers lying flat back along her muzzle and her round rat ears flattering back upon her hand. It turned out to be nothing more sinister than a rather shapeless roundel of amethyst worn to a smooth polish by time and water. He held it in his palm and shook his head. “Nay, milady. T'were not us, alone, that brought to bay and vanquished those whom were seduced by Marzac's lingering evil. It was those who were closer than we, those alone who could prize their way beyond its power and wrest away those who they loved.”

“Loved?” Kimberly found her gaze fixed upon the unremarkable purple lump of stone. Murikeer's claw descended to touch it, moving slowly to trace a line of crimson across the smooth surface as fine as a spider's thread. With surprising finesse the skunk traced a complex pattern upon the stone with her own blood.

“Rickkter, Baerle, Weyden, Habakkuk. To each of those they came, their own love the only shield between them and the darkness, but each suffered, some more than others, in standing between Love and Shadow when the shadow was so powerful.” His fingertip circled and slashed, dotted and swirled, covering the stone in a filigree as fine as any embroidery Kimberly had ever seen. “But here is one more over whom we fear the shadow lurks, awaiting. And between that shadow and victory, but one small, frail shield. And it is the nature of a shield to take the strikes levied against its bearer, and to that end the shield must be hardened.”

“Whom?” Kimberly found herself both entranced by the apocalyptic portent of his words and the work of that one fingertip. How was it that her blood went so far, and covered so much of that stone, when all he had prized from her was but a single drop?

“Charles.”

Kimberly's eyes snapped up to find him gazing up at her through the thick white of his brow, the skunk's dark eye warm but alarmingly intense in its regard. “Charles? You're telling me that he is touched by evil? He is not! I would know! He has been naught but gentle and loving since that harrowing journey!”

The skunk looked down once more and nodded. “As were all of the others. Jessica, herself, wrought wondrous miracles with that shadow upon her. She sought only to do good, but in the end it nearly claimed her. It did claim Berchem, the archer, for a time that was almost forever. She sought to change the curse, milady. She turned me into a child, as she did with Charles, as you well know. But it was for the purpose of evil that she performed saintly tasks, or so she thought.” He sat up slowly and leaned back, gazing down at the stone in his hands. “But only Weyden was able to win through that darkness and its seductive touch to reach her heart and open her eyes.” He raised his gaze. “As it was Baerle convincing James to surrender the song of the Bell, and Rickkter wrest Kayla away from becoming a deadly dragon.”

“But what does this have to do with me, and Charles?”

“You, milady, are... in danger. The shadow convinces those to whom it whispers that they do good, though they do evil beneath the beneficence.” He raised his hand, bearing the purple stone toward her, “You, and your children, are in the most danger. For Charles is mighty, and in the grasp of darkness I fear for the frailty of your flesh, though never your spirit.” Kimberly leaned back in the chair as if to distance herself from the sorcerous stone enwrapped in the complex filigree of her blood. “Breathe upon the stone, milady Kimberly. When you release your breath, think of Charles, and your love for him.”

Fearfully Kimberly gazed back down at the stone not an arm's length away. Between the spider thread fine lines of Murikeer's work she could see her face gazing back at her in reflection, undistorted despite the craze of occlusions and cracks which rendered the crystal all but opaque. Leaning forward slightly, timorously stretching her neck toward it, Kimberly glanced up into Murikeer's dark eye once before back down at her reflection. Taking a slow breath, she pursed her lips.

She remembered. The first time she met Charles was in his office at the Writer's Guild. She was newly arrived at Metamor, fleeing from... it didn't matter now. She had been mostly human but for the fully grown rat tail. She feared she was becoming a hideous thing. Vermin. A thing that skulked in dark places and ate the foulest leavings of man. A Rat. Charles called her beautiful.

He introduced her to other rodents. He brought her food and bought her new clothes which fit her new body. He took her to watch the sun set over the mountains and for strolls through the castle gardens. He held her in his strong arms and comforted her when she felt she could never be loved. At first she had thought it all a chivalrous act to help a lady in distress, but nothing more. But, the look in his eyes turned day by day, some times hour by hour, from worry, concern, and uncertainty, to gentleness, devotion, and love.

Charles, ever seeking her good, never failing to compliment her on her appearance, offered himself and all that was he to her. He sought her hand in marriage. He endured the long cold nights on patrol to provide for her. He went to Marzac because he loved her and his family more than his own life. That was her Charles Matthias, her rat, her knight, and her husband. That was the man she loved with all her being.

Letting out a slow breath, she blew softly across the stone. “Eli,” she offered in silent prayer even as her breath left her lips, “protect the man I love, be he a rat as he is, from the evil that hunts him!” As her breath wafted across the polished rock the fire lines drawn in her blood faded, like breath fog on a window, until they were gone. Only when she leaned back did Murikeer's fingers curl about the stone.

“What will that do?” she asked softly.

“Nothing and, I hope, everything.” He extended his hand and turned it over, holding it steady until Kimberly raised her hand. Opening his fingers he pressed the cool pebble into her palm. It was small enough that even her own small hand was able to fold over it utterly. “Your blood and his are now mixed upon the stone. Yours with your breath, his.. by other means. It will allow you to speak to him. No matter where he is, how far away or how deeply enthralled, no matter how deafened by the shadow, he will hear you.” He drew his hand back and touched his ear with one long, stout claw. “Not here,” his touched moved to his brow, “nor here.” His hand then dropped to rest over his breast above his heart. “But here; heart to heart. Soul to soul.” He leaned back and rested his hands upon his knees. “It was the words of those whom loved the stricken that won through, always. That is our most potent weapon. But the shadow is sly, and may bring him to deafen his ears to you, and harden his heart to the words his ears might hear.” He nodded toward the stone she held. “But not against the words that pierce the heart and speak truly. But, that is not the least it can do, but I hope that it will be all that is needed.”

She opened her fingers and gazed down at the stone, now appearing as nothing more than a polished river pebble. “What else does it do?”

“If he should take his hand up against you, if he should turn his Sondeck upon you, it will shatter. In so doing it will unleash the curse of Metamor unalloyed upon him, reducing him to a rat true, in mind and body.” He held up a finger and raised his gaze to meet hers. “For a time, only, as the magic will fade. But hopefully time enough for you to escape, or restrain him for us to act more directly against the dark touch. Also, if you should take up a hammer and smash it, the spell will be unleashed and take him no matter how far removed he is.”

“But what of my children!?” she quailed fearfully. She had seen the power of his Sondeck unleashed in the past, as she had that of Charles' friend Jerome.

Murikeer smiled, though there was no joy in it, “I have giften them with baubles which they will find themselves holding most dear and close to them. If he should strike them the magic will be unleashed. I did not prick them as I did you, however, for the spell I placed therein is one that was exhaustive in its creation. He will see what he expects, should he strike them. An illusion most detailed to his eyes of their fate at his hands, but the baubles I have crafted will shield them from harm.”

Kimberly dropped her gaze to the stone and swallowed. “You frighten me, Murikeer, but – I will keep this close, and hope that I should never find use for it.”

“Would that I could but hope the same, milady, but I act in fear for you should these events come full circle for him as they have for the others who took up that terrible quest. I could only hope to have been as strong as they. For you, for him, and for your children I cannot stand idly by and simply wait with watchful eyes. I choose to act in preparation, though none of the others who also watch have knowledge of what I have done. I desire that none do, so tell not a soul lest the shadow hear, and gird itself against my wards. The others may also make their precautions. If they bring such to you, accept, please.”

Kimberly clutched the stone close and heaved an unsteady sigh, “I will, Murikeer. And – thank you, for all that you have done, and still do, for my family. For me.”

Murikeer smiled warmly, and for once the pleasure of his smile reached his good eye, lifting his whiskers as the shadow of his tail swept slowly from side to side behind him. “You are my student, milady, as well my tutor. As much a mother as the one I lost so long ago. To speak the love you have for him, merely hold the stone close to your heart and speak of it. He will hear though may not be aware of what it is he hears, but he will feel that touch within his own heart.”

 

 

Wednesday, June 23, 724 CR - Morning

 

“After returning home I placed the stone on a chain and have worn it ever since.” Kimberly lifted the stone pendant from her chest for just a moment that Charlie might take a closer look. The amethyst was dull but in just the right glint from the witchlights he could see a flash of color. Along one side a small crack marred its otherwise smooth surface. He could not recall a time that his mother had been without it.

“It's not shattered,” Charlie noted in a soft voice as he studied the stone. “So unless you had Master Murikeer magic it back together again you did not reduce father to a rat true. Does... does he know what it is? After all these years?”

“I have never told him but I know he understands in part. It is a quiet way between husbands and wives. Some things are never said, simply known. So it is with this and with Marzac. Your father and mother speak thus too.”

He nodded and after rubbing the soft tip of his finger across the narrow crack in the stone, leaned back and let his mother rest it against her bodice. A slight glance, a tilt of the snout, a moment of profound silence, and so many other little things he had observed between his father Malger and mother Misanthe over the many years in which narratives deeper and truer than any words could convey were shared between them. “So what did you do, mother? I know it was another three days before... before the...”

“Before he went to seek the aid of Malger Sutt, your father?” Charlie swallowed and nodded. “Yes, I know of it. And I know what happened is the foundation of their friendship. I know there was no betrayal because Charles could never hurt me. No matter what Master Murikeer feared, Charles could never hurt me or you children.”

Charlie's whiskers drooped as he tried to remember anything from that time, but of course all he could think of was what he had learned from his sire the night before. “What baubles did he give us? I don't remember them at all.”

Kimberly rested her hands in her lap and sighed. “They were colorful little river stones. One by one they were all lost. I think you and Bernadette both lost yours on the journey to Sondeshara. By then it didn't matter.”

He nodded and grabbed the chewstick he'd brought with him. He nibbled on the end for a few seconds before asking, “So what did you do?”

Kimberly lowered her eyes. “I hoped and prayed. I was scared... so very scared for you all. But when Charles returned that night, he scooped you all into his arms with such love and gentleness I knew he could never hurt you. But..” Her throat tightened and in it he could hear her pain. “But Bertram was different. I could see it in his eyes, something I had never seen before. Hate.” Kimberly tensed, eyes closing tightly. Charlie expected to see tears flow but her cheeks were untouched. He gnawed on his stick and said nothing. After a few moments his mother opened her eyes and continued in a hush. “He would kill that little boy if provoked. I kept my hand on the stone all that evening. And the next few nights I made sure that Natalie and Bertram did not come or left as soon as Charles returned home.”

“It's hard to believe... Bertram?” Charlie shook his head. “Erick and he are practically inseparable now.”

“That frog is a good young man and a bosom companion to your brother,” Kimberly agreed, a smile touching the edge of her snout. “I think your father took him on as a squire to make up for what Marzac tried to make him do.”

Though he said nothing, Charlie wondered if the shepherd Silvas was given so much leeway in the Narrows for a similar reason. How many others had his sire hurt because of Marzac that he now offered an unending stream of generosity?

“So what happened next?”

Kimberly sighed and clasped her hand around the stone pendant again. “I kept our home as best I could with Charles off visiting the Narrows each day. I prayed and I watched, and I held this close and loved him as best I could. And then, a few night's hence, everything happened at once... It began with... I had... an unexpected visitor in my bedchamber.”

 

 

Saturday, May 12, 708 CR – Eve of Midnight

 

The Lady Kimberly Matthias was roused by a sharp crack and sat up in her bed abruptly. The suddenness of the noise, so close at hand, had elicited the beginning of a startled squeak from her throat but the appearance of a looming form towering at the foot of her bed bade that squeak reach deeper and escape her breast in a full scream of fright. Instinctively she lashed out with the only thing that was readily, if not easily, within reach; she hurled a spark of fire at the intruder.

Both scream and spark guttered away before traveling far plunging the room into silence and her sleep-fogged vision cleared enough to see that the shadow was cast by a witchlight that was not her own and the visage it illuminated was one familiar to her. One harried eye looked down upon her, recumbent in her own bed, with the gaze of a madman.

“Murikeer!” She cried out indignantly, snatching the coverlet over her though her modesty was assured by the shift she wore when sleeping. “Why are you in my bedchamber!?” He had never gone anywhere near the private rooms of the Matthias residence in the many years he had visited, when she lived in Metamor and the Glen both. To find him intruding now, moreso while she was asleep, sent a shock of fear and dread through her that had nothing to do with the fright of his intrusion.

Grasping a bedpost with one hand he reached out with his other. “Come, milady, I need your help and swiftly.” The skunk hissed, his good eye gleaming under the steady glow of his witchlight.

“Murikeer, I am not in my modesty! Any you're in my...”

“I would wish any other manner, milady, but time is of the utmost importance.” His fingers grasped beckoning at the air. “Please, come with me now! Charles' life may depend on swift action!”

“Charles?” She sat up straighter, turning to her right to where her husband slept. Only his side of the bed was empty. Startled, she pulled her legs off the bed and stood, still clutching the coverlet close. “What has happened to my husband?!”

“We have lost him, milady.” Murikeer quailed in fear as he stepped around the end of the bed and reached for her shoulder. She shied away reflexively, backing toward the corner between bed table and wall near the closed window. “We have lost him, and I fear only you can find him again.” He approached no closer, dropping his arm to hold his hand toward her, palm up.

After a few moments of indecision she stepped forward and reached for his hand, gathering the coverlet close against her throat with the other. “Where are we going?”

“Not far, milady, but very far as well. I cannot easily explain.” Kimberly could feel the urgency in the gentle grasp of his long fingers as she lay her hand upon his. “Where does he keep his vine?”

“In the stables, below, why?”

“We will need it.” Helping her drape the long bed linen over her shoulders and wrap it around her Murikeer followed her out of the bedchamber and across the living room toward their front door.

“What of the children?”

“They hear nothing, milady, and sleep undisturbed.” He gently urged her toward the door, haste writ in every fiber of his being and bristle of the monochromatic fur tufting from the throat and cuffs of his wardrobe. “We will go, I hope, no further than the stables.”

“Will they be safe?”

“On my life, Kimberly, on my very life.”

Little mollified she preceded him through door and out into the cool darkness of the Glen commons. Circling around the tall buttressing roots of the tree they descended a short distance to the door of the stable in which Charles kept his pony, Malicon, and the vine that sustained him in ways none of them could fully grasp. “But, Muri, what do you mean you lost him?”

“After the others were touched by the tattered remnants of Marzac we feared, as I said when I gave you that talisman you wear, that Charles had not escaped it.” Drawing open the door he let a dim witchlight bob ahead of them into the stables. Malicon's head raised above the partition of his stall and a curious snort escaped his nose, short equine ears pricked forward. Against the back wall the vine spread from beam and post, shifting subtly in the light. “We watched over him, to see if the touch might find him.”

“We?”

“Garigan, myself, James and others.” Leading Kimberly over to a pile of straw near the back wall he bade her to sit down, her long rodent legs crossed as he had taught her during meditations to clear her mind before his tutelage. “But he slipped away, and I fear that he has been cast in the shadow through which we cannot see.”

“Marzac has taken him?” Kimberly quailed, clutching at the amethyst talisman Murikeer had crafted for her, horror widening her eyes and flattening back her round ears.

“Its shadow has reached out and touched him, we fear.” Sitting down facing her Murikeer reached out to take her hands gently in his. “And with all of our forewarning we cannot pierce that veil. But you can.”

“I?”

“Yes, Kimberly, you. No one else, you. From this place, with the conduit that I prepared.”

Kimberly felt the cool stone in her hand, the intricate tracery of dark lines crazing about its smooth surface under sensitive fingerpads. A quiet, whispering rustle moved about behind her, a light touch brushing across her tail, but Kimberly could not bring herself to move, to tear her gaze away from the skunk's lone eye before her. “What must I do?”

“Seek him.” Murikeer nodded to the talisman in her hand. “The way to his spirit resides within you.” Folding her hands between his own he closed them upon the stone. “Seek him as you seek the threads I have shown you; like fire, air, water.” Leaning close, the gaze of his single eye calm but earnest, his voice intoned, “His is a thread only you can see; it binds the two of you.” Kimberly felt something brush her shoulders, along her arms where they emerge from the draped coverlet. Leaves appeared beneath her sight as the vine wound about her forearms. Had she not known of the vine that helped her husband live the sight would have sent her into a panicked catatonia.

Even with that knowledge its serpentine animation left her heart cold with instinctive fear. But she did not move to cast it off while slender tendrils worked about her wrists and between her fingers. Murikeer drew his hands away ignored by the vine. Taking a breath to steel herself Kimberly bowed her head slightly and looked toward her cupped paws, through the tight bundle of leaves, and to the softly glowing purple stone resting in the shadows of her grasp.

Expanding her senses she listened for the telltale notes and subtle scents that Murikeer had taught her. Where he could see threads she could hear sound; the trill of birds, the pluck of a harp's string, a chord of distant music. Where Murikeer saw color she smelled spice and earth. In her palms a deep, throbbing melody rumbled in basso resonance. It was a complex melody she had never truly isolated before, it had always been around her, everywhere; subtle but ever present, always underscored by a quintet of brighter, dancing melodies in higher octaves. One of the quintet had faded, long ago, to a distant tremulous whisper but it had never truly been lost from the symphony.

But now, as she listened, the heart of the music had become entangled with that faded whisper and two had become jarring. Something harsh, burdensome and discordant had taken up the faded whisper and begun to mimic it. But it was frightfully off key, dissonant and sharp like a bow drawn too roughly across the strings of an over-tightened violin.

And the scents were of family; the stables most profoundly. Malicon's heavy equine spiciness, the wood and straw and light, soft sweetness of the vine beneath her chin. Murikeer's personal scent was a void in her physical senses but there was the other scent, her sense of the magic about him which he saw with his mage's sight was a complex melange of aromas which her nose could not prize apart. Mingled throughout was a scent identical to that of Charles, her children, Baerle and the others in the Glen; the curse. All such complexities she had long ago learned how to set aside so that she could focus on those scents and sounds she sought.

The dry acridity of fire, the scintillating coruscation of water, the unique musks of her husband and children. His and four others were strong, each tickled her senses with fleeting snippets of laughter and memory. The last was subtle, almost lost among those others, but as with the new strand of melody there was another that lingered with the scent of that faint trace. Somehow, despite being so strikingly similar that the mere tingle of it brought forth bright memories there was a dark coldness about it; a rancid bite that made her whiskers fold back. She could let the soft scents of her children slip aside to focus more upon Charles' melody and scent but, no matter how she plucked and pushed with her inner focus, she could not separate the corrupt scent and discordant tune mimicking something she had lost.

“Ladero,” Kimberly whispered, not lifting her gaze from the glimmering purple stone. Dark tendrils, the thread-thin roots of the vine, traced about the stone, dug into the tracery that Murikeer had etched upon it. “My boy, my Ladero.”

“He is there?” Murikeer murmured quietly, his voice shimmering at the edge of her focus without intruding.

Kimberly let her eyes drift closed, bending her ears and nose toward the tangled presence of her lost husband. “Yes, but no. Something.” She shook her head, unable to separate one from the other. “Master Muri, can you see?”

“No, milady,” Murikeer admonished gently. “I cannot see. That is why we need you to seek him through the veil of shadow that Marzac has enshrouded him.”

“I – I will try, Muri. But he is... so distant. He seeks something, his thoughts are bent toward it.”

“Ladero.” Murikeer's soft churr was a hissing growl of irritation. “That is his bell, his hyacinth. That is the seduction that grasps at his heart.” The skunk let out a defeated sigh. “He is beyond us, Kimberly. Now, only you can reach out to him. Please, try to call him back. Let him know you're there, with him, wherever it is the shadow has taken him.”

“He seeks Ladero?” Kimberly's hands wavered as, behind her closed eyes, shadows began to take on vague forms in the darkness. A moving, upright form with a long shadow swaying behind it. Beyond, a looming shadow like a tower or tree. “Can he...?”

“No!” Murikeer hissed warning. “That veil none can pierce and return! Do not let him go there, Kimberly!”

“But...” Kimberly pressed on, striving through her focus to reach out toward the shadowy form of her husband in the misty darkness. He began to appear more real, more substantial; scent and sound assuming a familiar form. Before him, reaching into the grayness of the heights, the branches of a great tree stretched out overhead while buttressing roots bulked like walls from the earth. “He... he is there!”

“Kimberly, focus!” She felt the skunk's gentle touch. “The shadow that seduces him lies! Reach out to him, warn him of the lie!”

As she drew closer to the monochromatic half-dream form of her husband she sensed that, while the towering tree and gray skies cast no shadows upon the shattered ground over which he trod, there was a single shadow stretching behind Charles. Where it lay across the buttressing roots it took on a smaller form that was not Charles but walked at his side.

The shadow's music shrieked in her ears with the chord of Ladero and the scent was corruption and rot, but Charles strove for it. It was her son! But, it was not! Kimberly's heart withered in fear even as she yearned to reach out and draw her lost son to her breast once again.

But it was not Ladero. It was something – other. Some deadly doppelganger whose inky black talons had reached out to grasp her husband's heart, blinding him to its corruption.

“Charles!” Kimberly cried out, unsure if it was her physical voice that cast forth his name or merely her own imagined plea. “Charles, beware! He is false!” She strove toward the gray form in the darkness before her. But the shadow abruptly reared up, striving outward from the gnarled wall of the dark tree's root, and cast a pall between her and her husband. She felt it surge toward her and felt the icy vileness wash over her in a cacophony of ghastly noise and revolting stench.

In her hand the amethyst stone dimmed abruptly, the tendrils of the vine enfolding it suddenly blackening and shriveling away. The nearest leaves also blackened, wrinkling into desiccated husks and falling from the vine. Murikeer's fur flattened in dismay, frustrated that he could do nothing but witness the struggle through the all too frail seeming rat seated before him hunched over the dim purple glow in her cupped paws. Behind her the solid bulk of Malicon stood silently, like a wall, his head dipped over her shoulder but otherwise unmoving. The vine draped over his back from the wall of the stable, entwining over Kimberly's shoulders and about her arms. Even as its slender tips blackened and fell, more rustled forward, fully enshrouding the stone.

After a few moments the fitful dimness began to flutter with light, wan and pulsing, once more. “The shadow hears you, it knows you can pierce its darkness! Call to him, Kimberly! Warn him!” Reaching out, Murikeer laid his hands upon her forearms where the vine did not touch and lent as much of his presence as he could. There was no magic he could lend, her conduit was too frail, to tenebrous, to attempt any aid.

All Murikeer could do was offer the reassurance of his presence, like that of the quiet pony and valiant but mysterious vine. Grateful for what each offered, Kimberly tightened her grip on the amethyst, shaken but not deterred. Her husband was there somewhere. Her heart flowed outward to find him again, listening for his melody, smelling for his scent. And from her heart wended a melody of her own within a prayer. She wasn't even sure if it reached her tongue, but it was a prayer all the same.

“Eli, help my husband. Help us.”

 

 

Wednesday, June 23, 724 CR - Morning

 

“I'm sorry to interrupt,” Baerle said, sticking her narrow snout in through the heavy, cloth door, “but there is a gryphon here with a message for milord Charlie.”

Charlie smiled despite himself. “That would be Kurgael.” News of the chief messenger of the Sutt family always made him feel young. Though his mother had turned to face Baerle, his eyes noted the grimace touching her features at the interruption and so he forced the grin from his snout and lowered his whiskers. “I suspect I am being summoned.”

Kimberly nodded and stood, hands clasped at her waist and long tail trailing across the back of her chair. “If so, you should go, my son. There is not much more to tell of that night; at least not from what I saw. I spent the rest of the night praying. Somehow word reached James and Baerle who came to my aid and sat with Murikeer and I. And then...” She gasped and shook her head, relief and pain touching her cheeks and jowls. “And I will tell you the rest on the morrow if you wish. We will not be returning to the Narrows until the second day so there is time enough to ask any other questions you have.”

And, Charlie mused to himself, time to spend with his siblings and heal any wounds inflicted on their hearts as well as his own. A smile came to him at the thought of showing Erick, Bernadette, and his sister Baerle around Metamor as they often had shown him around the Narrows. “And if I do I shall ask. And if not I shall come see you all anyway.”

Kimberly smiled, lifting her whiskers as well as her jowls. She reached out a hand to grasp him on the shoulder. He stepped toward her and wrapped his arms around her back, resting his chin on her shoulder in a gentle yet firm embrace. “I love you, my son. You are almost fully grown. For your family's sake, both Sutt and Matthias, and for your own, your honor, your reputation, and your soul, do not ever again act the child you did yesterday.” Though her voice held steel that pierced him anew the warmth of her love tempered the thrust.

“I...” he caught the apology, uttered so many times already, before it left his throat. “I will. You have my word, mother.” He gripped her firmly once more and then stepped away, turning toward the doorway where Baerle's gray-pointed snout had appeared a moment before. He paused with one foot through the portal to turn his head back to Baroness Kimberly. “I love you too, mother.”

She waved him off with one last smile, her other hand clasping the amethyst medallion at her breast. A profound look of exhaustion pinched her eyes and sagged her cheeks. Charlie stepped back into the main part of the pavilion and then out into the day. The sun had just crested the mountains and everything was bathed in long shadows and brilliant colors. Charlie narrowed his eyes and shielded them with one arm as he looked about.

Maysin remained where he had left her, her long equine face turning to him with a hopeful warmth. Reclining on his haunches next to her was the four-footed gryphon Kurgael. His father's chief messenger cocked his head to one side, cracking his beak in a familiar way. “Good morning, Lord Charlie. Your father and mother have arrived at the High Box and request your presence. Your sister adds, 'if you can sit down'. I'm not sure what she meant, but the rumors I have heard suggest you might deserve it if you have just visited the Matthias pavilion.”

Few were the Sutt servants allowed leeway to speak so about the household; Kurgael's length of service and closeness to the family allowed him that privilege. Had Charlie a ball of some sort he would have bounced it off the gryphon's head and then laughed. Lacking the ball to brain the beast he just laughed. “One of these days Suria is going to be the one in trouble. She'd better not...”

“Expect you to be anything less than chivalrous?” Maysin suggested with a flick of her tail.

Charlie nodded with a slight bow, the impish grin remaining. “Of course.” When he straightened, his smile and tone grew serious. “I should never be anything less.”

Maysin returned the smile and inclined her long head respectfully, the bright green gem in her ear sparkling in the first rays of the sun. “Where do you wish to go, milord Charlie?”

“Let us to the High Box, my friends.”

It was not a long distance from the Matthias pavilion and what time they had Charlie spent listening to Kurgael describe what he'd done the last two days of the festival when he'd been given leave of his duties as a messenger. Maysin walked at his side, quiet and attentive, though her eyes and ears kept guard against interlopers as she'd been trained. But of the many revelers already up to enjoy the morning shows and displays none paid the richly adorned rat much notice. Or at least, their guarded glances and sudden whispers when they thought they were out of view of the rat's widely set eyes, suggested that they didn't want to pay him obvious attention.

It would not be the first time he had been the object of talk and it would not be the last.

They found Versyd and Argamont and several other servitors in the antechamber below the main part of the High Box playing a game of dice. Kurgael joined the two horses while Maysin followed Charlie up the stairs into the box.

While normally throughout the day the box would witness the coming and going of many who were close to Duke Thomas or Archduke Malger Sutt, it seemed unusually crowded that morning. Not only was King Pelaeth and his retinue in attendance, but several others who were not so closely attached to the Ducal household were present as well as some retainers rarely seen in the public eye.

Charlie found his father first. Malger Sutt was deep in an animated conversation with two others off in a corner of the box that was clearly visible to all on the field. Both of them stood on stools so that they could be readily seen. The first was the chief Exchequer for Metamor, Lidaman, whom the curses had reduced to a bright-haired boy of twelve. He spoke with rather exaggerated motions of his arms which made his voluminous green sleeves fall over his hands. Lidaman was a grandfather and in another five years likely to be a great-grandfather and preferred to tend to the affairs of his office in private away from the hustle and bustle of court life.

The second was far more enigmatic and almost never showed his face except in private conferences with the Duke. Charlie had only seen him a handful of times and had only once conversed with him. Disfigured by a series of crisscrossing bilious green scars down the left side of his face, chest, and wing, he offered a hideous appearance that made any who were unfortunate enough to treat with him distinctly uncomfortable. For this reason beyond even the rigors of his duties, Metamor's Spymaster, Andwyn the bat, kept out of sight.

And yet now he, Lidaman, and Charlie's father were engaging in a very public conversation that had the appearance of great weight. And even though his rodent ears heard them speak of the weather, the latest fashions from Kelewair, and in the bat's case, which visiting nobles were acquainting themselves with the seamier side of Metamor, anyone else looking at them would assume something very important was taking place.

Metamor's spymaster, the keeper of the treasury, and her chief diplomat recently returned from negotiations over a stolen bar of mithril – the conversation was a charade with one purpose in mind, to unnerve the true thief. Charlie caught his father's eye, smiled in approval, received a smile in return, and then turned to leave them to their task.

In the furthest corner of the High Box he saw the Magyar mage whose face was covered in burn scars kneeling down and speaking in a harsh tongue to the jerboa Father Felsah. The Questioner priest appeared to be laughing about something. Charlie wondered where his hulking reptilian knight protector was for the two were rarely separated, but doubted the High Box could have survived his weight.

Bryn was at the railing with his younger brother Philip and King Pelaeth helping the young colt see the early morning festivities. Pelaeth had hoisted Philip on his shoulders and was trying not to wince when the enthusiastic horse kicked him in the chest with his hooves. Seated a short distance behind them was Duchess Alberta with Princess Brygitta. The princess had one of Bryn's young sisters in his lap and was braiding her mane in the traditions of the Steppe. On the other side was his mother Misanthe and his sister Suria. The chief of the King's escort, First Hunter Horvig, sat awkwardly next to Suria with his bow in hand while pantomiming holding an arrow in the other for her instruction on Steppe techniques.

And standing around Duke Thomas were both Thalberg and Justicar Weyden. Thomas sat reading a letter with a look of years weighing down his brow. The hawk, chosen of Dokorath, practically beamed as he stood with wings barely held at his back. Thalberg had the appearance of a man relieved beyond measure. Charlie wondered what the letter could possibly be and why it concerned both the Steward of Metamor and the Justicar.

Before his attention returned to the seat provided for him on the Sutt side of the High Box, Thomas lowered the letter and let out a long sigh. Charlie's ears turned to hear. “That is good news. Thank you, Thalberg, Weyden. It's been too many years. I will write to Emily as soon as my duties will allow. You may tell the others the good news.”

“I shall,” Weyden squawked, unable to hold back his excitement. Charlie marveled seeing the otherwise stoic bird so flush with delight that he actually molted a feather or two. “And then we shall make ready for this afternoon. It will be Humphrey's first festival flight! He is so eager he can barely keep aground.”

“Give him, your wife, and the rest of your family our love and pride,” Thomas said with a broad smile and confidant mien. “And tell Humphrey that we'll be watching for him.”

Weyden cawed a laugh. “He'll make sure you see him. With your leave, your grace?”

Thomas wished the hawk well once more and dismissed him, before turning to Thalberg and clasping the alligator on the shoulder and saying with a whicker that almost became a whinny. “That is a weight that has been on my heart and yours for too many years now. Now smile, my friend, I know you wish to!”

“I fear that if I were to smile too broadly I might frighten our guests away, your grace.”

Even as Thomas laughed, and Thalberg joined him in his reserved way, Charlie chuckled at the jest and started forward toward his seat, Maysin close behind and ever patient. A few moments and many faces were enough to remind him that his was not the only tale unfolding at the festival. Life at Metamor was full of these long-held pains and the healing that came at moments unexpected. He likely would never know what the letter had said to Thomas, or what Felsah said to the Magyar mage, or even what Pelaeth said to Bryn, and just as likely they would never know or understand what Charlie had seen and endured. Sometimes it was best to leave it that way and not intrude on these private joys and sorrows.

He took his seat and asked Maysin to bring him something to eat and drink. Misanthe turned to him and smiled though the iron lingered in her eyes. “Did you have a good walk?”

“And a good talk with my mother. I have apologized to her.”

Maysin returned with a platter of fresh tidbits of meat, cheese, fruit, and some pasty sauce that smelled of cinnamon in one hand and a small glass of wine in the other. Charlie thanked her for both and proceeded to nibble at the cheese. Between bites he added, “She forgave me. I've been a fool. I should have trusted in their love for me.”

“As well you should,” Misanthe agreed.

“I will seek my sire out this evening after the festivities,” he announced while rolling a bit of cooked ham between two fingers. “They are planning to stay at Metamor tomorrow – to avoid the rush of foreigners trying to leave I expect – so I thought I'd spend the day with them.”

Misanthe nodded and her vulpine snout offered him an approving smile. “That is very noble of you, Charlie. But do not forget your responsibilities.”

“Maybe I can introduce Erick to Master Vidika.” He dipped the ham in the sauce and popped the morsel into his mouth before a glint of mischief could touch his cheeks. The reproof in his mother's glance was, for the first time in two days, filled with warmth and humor. “I shall not forget them,” he added after swallowing and deciding not to use as much of the potent sauce on his next bite, “but is not my true first responsibility to family?”

Misanthe inclined her head in assent. “I expect most of your tutors will be recovering from the festivities anyway and so your absence will be, by many, appreciated. I have nothing for you tomorrow, so if your father has nothing either, you are free to spend the day as you wish.”

He smiled, and breathed a long sigh,”Thank you, mother. I love you.”

Her smile broadened into one of actual joy. She reached her arm across the empty seat where Malger would sit once his charade with spy and banker was at an end and patted him on the arm. “And I love you, my son.”

No more was said between them and Charlie finished his platter and wine without further interruption. His eyes strayed to the field where various acrobats and dancers were hard at work showing their talents and hard-won techniques. He beheld a gaggle of jugglers, tumblers, and even some who were doing handstands on running horses – real horses and not animorphed Keepers. A few who were gifted with grasping tails were taking full advantage of these to juggle with 'three hands' or otherwise aid in tumbling or dancing.

At some point, Felsah must have left the box as had the Magyar mage for the mage Grastalko appeared on the field and joined in the juggling and tumbling with a reckless abandon and vivacity that astonished the Keepers already performing. But like a seasoned troupe they welcomed the foreigner into their ranks and all of the King's men applauded him with fervor.

And not long after that Malger returned to his seat and gave Charlie a dignified smile. “Good morning, my son. How are you feeling today?”

“Well enough,” he replied. “I have apologized to Maysin, Bryn, and then my mother, the Baroness. And then I came here.”

“Very good.” Malger nodded and then turned his eyes to the tourney field. Charlie shifted in his seat, tail curling beneath his toes, and tried to watch.

As the morning drifted past a variety of performers took the the field, performed to the delight of the Keepers and all their visitors, and departed to make room for the next group. Charlie found his mind wandering as the minutes turned into hours. He barely noticed the last bout in the archery contest, and by the time the last of the jousts between a heavily armored ram and elk he had little attention for their combat; his mind had turned inward.

Chin propped upon his fingers, Charlie ruminated on all that his sire had told him the night before, weighty and difficult to grasp, yet it seemed to the young rat to have absolutely no bearing on the deal that had been struck with Nocturna.

And about her Charlie did not wish to dwell. He had warded his dreams and studiously turned his nocturnal paths away from the Night Temple wherein he normally awakened to the Dream. In avoiding her, and the conflict that clawed at his heart, he knew he was ensuring that the reckoning between them could be extreme.

But She was a fey spirit, and held so little anger that Charlie was unsure how she would stand before him. When he was a child newly wandering the dreams she had come upon him in the fullness of her deific potency a time or thrice, when he had far overstepped himself or caused wrack in some hapless sleeper's dreams. That countenance had so frightened Charlie that he learned those lessons mostly clearly and never stepped beyond the bounds she set afterward.

At least, until he had wandered into Baron Matthias' dark dreams, further so when he had pushed him to recall them.

She would, as the saying went, have his hide for that breach of faith and trust.

He watched the tournament field where Sir Egland, once more astride the Oryx Intoran as his mount, was tilting against Sir Dupré. The Steppelanders did not have the practice of mounted lance in their style of warfare, which was mounted and swift, so had not entered any of the tilts. A few from beyond Metamor's borders, and the Curse, had come to join the tournaments but none had lasted. One was even being hastily borne south with a broken leg for his errors, albeit a break that had been aided with the healing magic of Metamor's healers before he left.

A roar of the crowds louder than the rumbling susurrus of rising and falling cheers broke through Charlie's inner turmoil and he focused his eyes. Dupré was leaning from his horse with an arm outstretched to help the fallen Egland to his hooves. The elk knight was laughing loudly and spitting dirt from his helm much as Charlie had done the day before. Oh, how he knew that feeling, Charlie considered. Vidika's training and sparring with Bryn had often seen his muzzle in dirt, grass, or wood shavings rather often. Not that Bryn escaped a similar fate almost as often.

Dupré's shield was split in twain, and his last lance lay shattered upon the dirt, but he was still upon his blowing mount. Intoran, saddle canted wildly to one side of his barrel, ambled over to stand next to Egland within easy reach. Clapping the cuisse of Dupré's leg, Egland said a few words that Dupré found hilarious. With the help of squires the ram dismounted to walk beside Egland, offering a shoulder while Intoran walked on his opposite side. Charlie noted that Egland was limping but, if the jocularity of the conversation below was any indication, had not been terribly harmed by his unhorsing.

Despite the fact he had not been mounted on a horse to begin with.

Charlie dutifully stood with the rest in the High Box to applaud Dupré's victory in joust, the two knights coming to stand before the Duke's high vantage and bowed awkwardly in their dusty, dented armor.

“The final melee dost follow,” King Pelaeth rumbled once the applause had died down and the two combatants made their way to their respective ends of the list. “Unless the lad dost wish to return to his position on the list?” He turned his gaze to Charlie, dark brows raised.

Charlie smiled in his rodentine way, unsure how the visitors might read it since the expression was markedly different on a muzzle, and shook his head. “No, your majesty. I forfeited when I left the field yesterday.” He chuffed self-consciously, “Especially having not offered my liege even the slightest respect in doing so without his leave.”

“Ah, the forfeit 'twas not thine, lad,” The steppelands king offered, turning toward his bodyservant hovering nearby. “'Tis why they didst allow me to stand champion in thy stead for the last contest of foot yesterday. The other rat didst break the rules of the engagement, it appeared.”

“He did,” Charlie nodded, “because I forced him to.” With a shrug he settled back in his chair. “But I would ill grace myself taking the field after such crass behavior. I cede the battle to you, your Majesty, if that is your wish.”

“Hah, my wish, aye? A warm hearth, warm woman, fine family, and peace art my wish. Leave the clashing of swords to contests as this.” His calloused hand waved at the field being cleared, groomed, and prepared for the next event. “Let us play at war, not engage in its bloodiness, aye?”

“Indeed, o' wise King!” Charlie smiled with a nod, bowing from his seat. “And, that said, I would feel more confident that you could wear the Summer Crown more regally than I.”

Pelaeth laughed and clapped Charlie heartily on the shoulder, rocking the youth in his chair. “In sooth, lad! For I art a King!” His hand left Charlie's shoulder to thump his broad chest. “Regal wearing of crowns dost come to us by nature.” With a wave of his thick arm to his retinue he made for the stairs at the back of the high Box. “I shalt make ready my armor.”

When his heavy footfalls faded into the depths below Charlie glanced over at Bryn, who sat beside the King's sister, far more relaxed than yesterday though his hide still shuddered as if he would rather be elsewhere, making idle chatter. “I have paid little heed since I disgraced myself on the field, but I believe that it is the merchant Goldmark whom yon King shall face?”

Bryn smiled hugely and Thomas nickered a hearty laugh. “The rat, Goldmark, aye,” the Duke answered before his son could speak. Malger, holding a lute in one hand that he had been idly playing most of the morning, trailed his fingers across the strings in a quick trill. Lifted from a common comedy the brief chord was easily read as a musical punch-line. “He managed to get Keleficks to take himself out of the running yesterday evening. On his first parry he batted the poor Lutin's truncheon into his brow and he knocked himself unconscious.”

Though he'd heard the tale from Suria that morning, Charlie still shook his head and chortled softly. “The poor guy doesn't stand a chance.” He observed. “The wagers are going to be steep.”

Malger barked a laugh and played another musical stanza from comedy. “I've put ten garrets on Goldmark all the same.”

“Five,” Bryn whickered behind his hand, his discomfiture at the admission causing the visiting princess to laugh brightly.

Charlie gaped, “What, do you want to bankroll the wager keepers?”

“As much as bankrupt them,” Thomas admitted with a shrug and a smile.

Charlie could only shake his head, having placed no wagers on any of the events.

Bryn leaned ever so closer to Charlie as if he were sharing a confidence though everyone in the High Box could easily hear him. “No disrespect is meant to his Majesty, of course. He is a fantastic warrior; a figure from legend almost! You should have seen his bout against Sir Intoran last night. You would have thought our Oryx a wounded animal and the King not just a man but a pack of wolves!”

In a much quieter voice, one meant only for his friend, the rat replied, “It is no wonder then your mother wishes to bind such blood to your own.” He was rewarded with a scowl followed by another laugh as they both settled back in their seats to watch the field prepared for one final bout.

Across the tournament field Charlie could see the seats given to the Matthias House and, beyond the stands, something of their pavilion as well. He could see the rat in question, Goldmark, in his massive 'taur form being caparisoned for the upcoming battle. He stroked his whiskers while a troupe of musicians took to the field to entertain the waiting crowds. A handful of acrobats capered around the periphery to the laughter and cheers of the throngs as they pantomimed knights at joust on imaginary steeds.

After a few minutes he quaffed the last of his mead and stood. “Maysin, please stay here and attend the Lady Misanthe,” he said hastily, handing the cup off to a waiting servant before he trotted for the stairs. Surprised by Charlie's sudden exit, Maysin could only gape after him, obeying the request after only a couple of steps to follow him.

“Charlie?” Bryn called in surprise, afraid to be abandoned to the attentions of his mother and the princess. “Where are you going?”

“To find a better vantage!” He called back, quickly descending the stairs, tail whispering along the wood behind him.

 

In the shadows below the stands Charlie found the King's retinue standing about the stables in a rough circle around Pelaeth, now in his full armor, and the skunk mage Murikeer. While the steppes king held out his steel and black sword the skunk traced the tips of his fingers lightly along the blade, head bowed in concentration. After a few moments he raised his hands and his one-eyed gaze.

“It is done, your Majesty. For the next handful of hours your mighty weapon will harm none, beyond the bruise of its weight knocking them on their rump.” The skunk smiled warmly. Charlie rather doubted, having seen Goldmark, that even that sizable blade would sit him on his rump. Pelaeth raised his weapon and gazed upon it dubiously, for there was nothing to indicate that the mage had done anything.

The group gathered as, above, they could hear the muffled shout of the crier calling forth the next combatants. Murikeer passed Charlie as he left, catching the youth's quizzical gaze. The magic of making weapons safe was usually left to lower ranked mages. “It's big, it's ancient, and a family heirloom,” the skunk offered while Horvig saw to the last adjustments to the King's intimidating wolf armor. “I thought it best to make a show of having Thomas' own court mage do the work.”

“Just because its size, hmm?” Charlie asked laconically.

Murikeer laughed brightly. “I would expect that your father might have something to say about comparing swords among men, but, well...” He leaned in closer and said in a lower voice, “It is a strange metal, that black, and did not take easily to magical blunting; perhaps it was safest that I tend this task in the first place. And...” he leaned back and resumed his usual voice, “perhaps it is best we retired and watch how he uses it.” His remaining eye glinted in the muted light as he slipped past the rat.

Charlie watched him go while the King's retainers fell in behind him and they moved as a well-coordinated group toward the exit of the stables; men-at-arms leading and bracketing, King Pelaeth and Horving shoulder to shoulder, squires bringing up the rear carrying the King's banner. Since there was no mounted component of the contest of foot no grooms or steeds were needed, though the golden-hued steppes steeds looked on with intelligent curiosity from their corral behind the stands.

“Your Majesty,” Charlie called, walking swiftly to fall in alongside the group, though outside the perimeter defined by the alter men-at-arms. “May I walk with you to the field?”

“Ah, young Charlie, aye! Come, come, let us walk.” Peleath held out an inviting arm, the open visor of his helm tilting the snarling wolf visage skyward. The guards let Charlie slip through them to fall into step beside the steppes King. “Tell me, lad, what be this ill will thou didst show the baron yesterday? His is thy blood, am I mistaken?”

Charlie winced at the blunt, direct question, ears and whiskers drooping for a moment. “It is... ahh, your lordship, it is not so much bad blood as... the confusion of youth.” He shrugged. At the King's opposite shoulder Horvig kept his gaze forward, only turning his head enough to scan the surrounding crowds for possible problems. “My sire and my father are fair friends, but... the issue of my adoption weighs heavily upon my heart.”

Pelaeth nodded his head slowly, the polished silver of the snarling wolf atop his head glinting in the sun. “Ahh, aye. Thou dost know both sire and father and the why of the choice doth rear its ugly head to chew upon thy spirit.”

“Yes, Majesty,” Charlie admitted. Ahead the pavilion at the end of the tournament field came into view around the brightly colored awnings and tents of other families and shops. “Moreso of recent than in the past.”

“Thou art upon the cusp of true manhood, lad, and hath a mighty name upon thy shoulder to account for thy noble station. But thy blood be of lesser station, and thou feel unworthy of the title given by thy adoptive father? He has blood of his own, unless the winsome red-furred lass be another so taken into thy House?”

Charlie snorted at the thought of the very human, very down-to-earth King, would look at his wolfish sister as 'winsome'. It took another wolf to see that, or one well used to the variety that was Metamor's animorphed population. “No, Majesty, she is truly of his lineage, whereas I am not.”

At the pavilion Horvig and the men-at-arms stopped, while the King continued onto the tournament field. “Thou art lineage of the title given, lad. Count thyself fortunate that thou can know thy sire and dam as well, and by all appearances before thou didst trounce him, art well loved there.” The broad shoulders rose and fell beneath the upturned wolf's snarl. “Be it for whatever cause, it doth appear just to my outlander eyes. Satisfy thyself for having two families that offer their love. Most hath not e'en one. My own brother didst leave my family to join the Magyars many years ago. He hath become great amongst them, bosom friend to the scarred mage in my retinue, and between him, yon mage, and others of their ilk, hath done great deeds to heal the worst of their people that there might be peace on the steppes. Their band, thou dost see, hast not stolen a single mite in a dozen years.” The King paused and then laughed. “Well, at least not without returning said mite with a stern warning to careless townfolk on how to keep their wares!”

Charlie now regretted his foolishness from yesterday for a new reason as it had kept him from learning more of this foreign king and the many fascinating stories he could tell. “I wish I could hear that story, your Majesty. Do you ever see your brother again?”

“Every time their band returns to Cheskych. And a very happy time it be for all in our families.” With that the king raised his gauntleted fist and slapped down the visor of his helm. Abruptly the steppelands human became a snarling silver and steel beast, as much wolf as the Keepers of that species standing at the rail of the tournament field cheering him on.

Charlie accompanied the King out onto the tournament field, shoulder to shoulder, and none said aught of his unexpected presence. Upon reaching the center of the field Charlie looked up at the Marshal of the Field at his podium. The man looked down at Charlie and offered nothing more than a nod to acknowledge him. Turning, the rat made his way toward the far end of the field from where he had entered, approaching Goldmark as he went. The rat 'taur stood nearly two feet taller than he did, taller than the King himself, and looked at Charlie with both surprise and trepidation. In his hands he carried a staff as thick and stout as a wagon tongue, and almost as long.

“Why'd you let him stand in for you?” The rat, garbed in nothing heavier than minimally tooled boiled leather armor, looked past Charlie to the impressive – and daunting – human in his heavy armor and snarling wolf helm.

“Go easy on him, Goldmark. You're bigger than he is, and heavier. You have an extra set of hands, too,” Charlie chided as they drew abreast, tilting his gaze briefly down at the 'taur's large forepaws. Like all rats they were quite flexible, intended for pouncing and holding or clawing at walls. Had they thumbs they would have been proper hands. “Just... think like a rat, not a soldier. He'll never expect it.”

Goldmark chittered apprehensively and clutched his huge staff. “Go easy on him, he says,” the frightened rat quavered, continuing onto the field while Charlie turned toward the stands nearby. “But what about me?”

Walking along the inside of the rails defining the tournament field Charlie made his way to the front of the shaded stands set aside for the use of the aristocracy and lower nobility. House Matthias had a small section cordoned off and, at that moment, they were crowded with Matthias rats young and old. The Baron and Baroness sat in the center, just high enough to see above the common folk standing in the narrow space between the stands and the railing. Charlie ducked under the uppermost rail and the commoners quickly parted to let him through.

Mounting the stands he smiled at the gathered mob of Matthias and the retainers seated with them, but Erick's scowl spoke volumes. His brother and littermate was clearly still displeased with his actions the day before and Charlie did not blame him at all. Charles and Kimberly, however, smiled and waved him to come join them. Charles moved over a seat so that his son could sit between them.

“Hi Mom, Dad,” Charlie said, pausing to lean down and give the Lady Kimberly a warm hug. “I saw that willow switch, Mom. Thank you for sparing me.”

Kimberly tittered and wagged a finger at him, only to produce the same willow branch he had seen in their pavilion earlier. It had been propped against the side of her seat where he could not see it when he approached. “Oh, I'm still more than willing,” she chided, lightly tapping his hip with it. With a laugh Charlie sat down.

“You and Misanthe both, Mom, never fear. I may not escape its application, even yet.”

“Then behave,” Charles groused humorously as the Marshal of the Tournament took his podium to look down at Goldmark and King Pelaeth.

“What brings you, son?” Charles asked in a quiet aside while the two combatants shook hands. In his current 'taur shape, Goldmark's huge hand engulfed the human's.

“Politics.”

Charles turned his attention to his son with a quirk of his ears and whiskers. “Politics?”

Charlie shifted his attended as well, nodding. “All witnessed what transpired yesterday, so it's expected that the rumors of friction in the Matthias clan will be spreading rampantly.” Leaning back in his chair, his tail curling about the legs beneath, Charlie rested his hands in his lap. “It's best to put the rumors to rest before they become problematic, let them see that there is no acrimony between you and I, or with the family.” He tipped his chin toward Erick, who had turned his irritated scowl back toward the field. “Though I have much work ahead of me to assuage the anger of my siblings.”

“And your parents, young man,” Kimberly offered, though with a smile. Charlie bobbed his head to that and reached over to set his hand upon his mother's.

“With you two most importantly, yes, mother.”

“Hear ye, hear ye! Before us stand the final combatants of the Summer Tourney, to vie for the Crown!” A hearty cheer rose up from the crowd until the Marshal held a hand up for some restraint so he could continue. “His lordship, the young Sutt heir, has chosen to stand out for reasons of Honor. In his place the King of the Steppes, Pelaeth of Vysehrad, has graciously stepped in. Though he is a stranger to our lands, he is no stranger to contests of arms, and we of Metamor will show him our best.”

A snicker went through the crowd at that, for Goldmark was far from the best warrior Metamor had to offer. Nor, to be truthful, was he the worst, Charlie had to admit. He would not have wanted to face the rat 'taur with his daunting wagon tongue cudgel. While the crowd roared another hearty, deafening cheer Charlie leaned toward his sire.

“Are you well?” Charlie touched a hand to his own breast as he spoke over the tumult. His sire had donned a high collar and long sleeves so that no suggestion of any of his scars could be seen.

“I would have fared better without the trouncing, son, but I fare well enough for all that,” Charles admitted with a warm smile. “Your sleep was peaceful?”

“For the nonce, though I have not braced Her, yet.” Meaning Nocturna, whom he had carefully avoided since their last fractious meeting.

“I do not envy you that, Son. Her countenance is daunting.”

“At times.” Charlie turned his attention to the field as rat and human separated and moved to their respective posts in preparation for the Marshal's flag to begin. Peleath drew the huge black-streaked steel blade from its scabbard upon his back and made a few practice swings with the huge thing easily in one hand. Goldmark clutched his stave fearfully and looked on, his long tail lashing side to side in agitation.

Raising one arm the Marshal spared each of them a glance and swept the pennant he held in one hand downward. Pelaeth let out a mighty roar and launched himself across the intervening distance at a sprint, sword held high over one shoulder with both hands. Goldmark fell back a pace, visibly steeled himself, and met the clearly telegraphed sweep of the mighty sword with his stave.

The reverberating crack of sword meeting stout wood rent the expectant silence like a thunderclap but the sword was halted in its swing. Peleath let it rebound and danced to one side smoothly to dodge the downward sweep that Goldmark offered in riposte. The crowd let out a gasping cheer and lapsed into a hushed silence as the two squared off again.

Goldmark certainly had reach on the King with his massive weapon, keeping the feints of his blade well away from himself with short sweeps, each time wood and blade coming together with the sound of a giant chopping trees. The stave was certainly stout enough to weather the abuse without snapping as a normal quarterstaff may have, but the heavy swings made the entire 'taur's body shudder.

“He may last him on stamina alone,” Charles opined as the two circled, each looking for an opening to score a hit. Goldmark was not slow on the parries but he could not follow up his blocks with any strikes of his own for the human danced out of reach. “With all of that armor on I daresay the King is at a disadvantage.”

“With that sword only adding to the exertion,” Charlie added, attention focused upon the battle. “But he's a warrior born and raised to the weight of sword and armor, just as I have been. I can carry both against Bryn for almost as long as he had strength to counter me, and he's got size and strength and stamina on me.”

“How do you ever win, then?”

“Prick him like a mosquito until he loses a bit of his strength, just as I hope Goldmark can do.”

But the rat had other ideas, for the King was pressing him inexorably back. Due to the size of the 'taur he could not circle effectively so he simply pressed directly into the rat's wooden defense, whacking away at the stave sending splinters flying. The impacts were telling and, after over a minute of repeated strikes, the vibrations so numbed Goldmark's grip that he dropped the staff at his feet.

Pelaeth barked a victorious word and waded in, but Goldmark swept the stave up in his forepaws, which did have some manner of grasping ability, and reared up to his full height. Towering almost twice the height of the human, with the staff grasped before him, he strode awkwardly forward bringing the King up short. The rat dropped down and leaned his upper body forward, scoring a quick swat at the snarling visage of the steel wolf's helm before Pelaeth could retreat. Taking a couple of quick strides, dragging the stave with his forepaws, Goldmark reared up again.

And charged forward upon his rear paws with the awkward gait of a charger en'pesade, forcing Pelaeth back at a swift trot, his sword out to parry the awkward swings of the staff. The crowd roared its approval and stood, the Matthias clan joining in. Goldmark continued to press his charge forward with short steps and hops, quickly outpacing the King's retreat.

And then he simply fell forward, his forelegs and save bearing the sword down while his hands came down upon the human's shoulders. With the massive 'taur's greater weight suddenly falling upon him, Pelaeth lost his footing and fell backward to the explosive cheer of the spectators. The tumult was so unbridled Charlie backed his ears and gaped in astonishment as Goldmark sprawled his entire body down onto the King, pinning him ignominiously to the ground. He cast the stave aside before it became a bar across the man's breast and used one hand to swat at the awkward, ineffective swings of the sword that did nothing more than slap at the barding of his barrel and flanks.

Underneath him Pelaeth squirmed and kicked but could not marshal enough leverage to make any of his assaults effective against the bulk of beast sprawled upon him like a hunting hound upon a toddler. The crowd roared and, in the High Box across from them, Charlie could see the entire retinue of Metamor's nobility and Pelaeth's sister standing at the rail looking down in awed shock. Sig's jaws were open so wide a flock of birds could have nested on his tongue and rented out his fangs to their friends.

“Oh, by Yahshua!” Charles gaped, somewhere between aghast horror at the ignominy and laughter.

After a long count the Marshal took up the pennant and raised it above his head, calling the match complete. Charlie could not have expected the crowd to become any louder, but had to slap his hands over his ears before the roaring, whooping, howling cacophony rendered him truly deaf. Noting the raised pennant Goldmark raised himself to his legs and backed up, extending a hand toward the King.

Pelaeth slapped the hand aside irritably and bounced up, pacing in circles for a moment clearly in a fit of pique. The crowd slowly began to quiet wondering if the visiting King was about to become dangerous. Raising a hand Pelaeth flipped the wolf visor of his helm up and dropped his hands to his hips to glare at Goldmark for several seconds, the wary rat watching him with concern.

And then Pelaeth abruptly laughed, loud enough to be heard over the susurrus of the crowd. “I want him!” The King roared, striding to Goldmark and slapped him loudly upon the shoulder. “Never before have I been so soundly defeated! Truly, the peoples of this fine Kingdom are warriors to be respected!” The crowd resumed its cheer, rattling the stands and kicking up a cloud of dust. Grasping Goldmark's hand he raised it high. “To victory! To...” He glanced at the rat who muttered something. “To your champion, Goldmark!”

Charlie could only laugh along with those around him as the crowd took up the chant, “Goldmark, Goldmark, Gold – Mark!” The Marshal waved his pennant and tried to regain some semblance of order but failed entirely. Even as Duke Thomas and the rest from the High Box made their way down onto the field the roaring acclaim continued, much to Goldmark's clear chagrin. He truly never expected to win, or even make it beyond the first bouts, yet there he stood with a foreign King holding his hand aloft to proclaim him champion.

Only when Thomas raised an arm for quiet did the spectators accede, falling quiet after a few breaths. As the horse lord began a stirring congratulatory speech, Charlie chuckled lightly to himself and looked over the rest of the Matthias clan – his family. His litter-sisters, Bernadette and Baerle, were both seated on the other side of Kimberly. Bernadette, the bride-to-be, sat nearest their mother and caught his glance. While Erick was angry with him, his first sister appeared to harbor him no ill-will, offering him a warm, whisker-filled smile in return. His second sister Baerle had her eyes closed and appeared to be praying her beads besides so did not notice her brother's attention.

His eyes returned to Erick who sat forward a row and off to one side with some of their younger siblings. The scowl he'd offered Charlie on his brother's arrival had vanished in the thrill of the surprising battle and his ears were turned forward to catch every congratulatory word from the Duke. If there was any in his family he hated hurting more than any other it was Erick.

But Charlie waited while Duke Thomas gave a stirring speech congratulating not only Goldmark but the winners of the other contests as well. Just as Sir Dupré had been awarded the Golden Lance, Duchess Alberta came down to the field, and with King Pelaeth's assistance, presented the Summer Crown to the overwhelmed rat 'taur. Goldmak stood awkwardly with his round ears jutting out to the side beneath the circlet of faux leaves, berries, and golden ivy.

Another round of thunderous applause, hoof-stomping, hooting, and howling ensued when the Duke's accolades were complete. Both his wife and the foreign king made their way from the field and back to the high box as Goldmark, his grin triumphant, marched a victory lap around the field even as laborers rushed out to tend the grounds. He finally took his leave near the stands where the Matthias family sat and was immediately pounced by the younger rats, both his own children and those of the Matthias family and a few other rat families living at Metamor.

Thomas waved his arms once more to gather everyone's attention. “In a single mark of the candle a banquet shall be hosted here for all to enjoy. The Peoples of Mountain and Steppe will treat us to the food of their land, so all come, partake, enjoy! As we eat we invite you to admire the skills of flight by your fellow Keepers gifted with wings as they fly overhead. Then, in two candlemarks the Mages of Metamor have promised us a closing ceremony never before seen beyond the distant kingdoms of the South!” Even before the proclamation had been completed an army of laborers moved onto the field, fast on the heels of those who had just groomed it back into shape after the recent scuffles. Tables were marched in upon strong shoulders, quickly filling the entire field.

The final banquet of the summer festival was a riotous affair, with thousands wandering through the tournament field pacing the briefly immaculate earth flat and kicking up a clinging pall of dust that no one paid any heed to.

Charlie joined the Matthias family and retainers as they made their way into the milling throng, commoner and noble rubbing shoulders freely with only the most minor reflexive spacing between stations. Eventually they joined the Royal assembly, which enjoyed a measure of uncrowded space provided by a cordon of relaxed, but alert, men-at-arms. Despite being uniformed, armed, and strategically placed to provide that space the guards, too, enjoyed the banquet as freely as anyone. Ales and wines were provided in abundance, but so too were less intoxicating libations such as juices, teas, milk, and water. Charlie partook of the juice fortified with small quantities of wine, but not enough to cause his wits to dull.

King Pelaeth managed to harangue Baron Matthias into a lengthy re-telling of his southern journey insofar as it dealt with the Rheh, the foreigner's retinue surrounding the rat and human seated in comfortable chairs at one side of the tournament field. Charlie stood among the listeners, sipping his juice, while Bryn sat beside the visiting princess sharing small fruit and the occasional meat pastries provided by the Keep chefs.

While their ears inclined to listen to Charles weave his tale of the legendary, magnificent horses of the Åelfwood, their eyes marveled at the agility, speed, and variety of avian Keepers coursing, diving, gliding, and cavorting in the sky. Charlie spotted a flock of hawks all diving in formation and picked the Justicar's eldest son only as they turned out of the dive, swooping with an audible rush of air only a dozen feet above the tournament field. The story paused for a moment so that all watching could applaud such skill. A moment's breath and Charles resumed the story.

“That will never heal, you know,” A level voice muttered at Charlie's side, distracting his attention away from a length description of the Rheh's beautiful, and astonishingly swift gait. Turning his head Charlie found his brother and littermate, the rat knight Sir Erick, at his side. His brother held a mazer in one hand and was idly swirling the dark fluid within while his gaze was cast toward Charles.

“Pardon, brother?”

Erick shot him a sidelong glance, his ire writ stark in the hard stare of his dark rodent eyes. “The injury you left him with, Lord Sutt.” Charlie's whiskers backed against his muzzle and his ears twitched, one brow lifting at the unusual use of his title. “He tries not to let us know, but we see it. The small cuts and scrapes he earns helping the workers show what he was left with; the stone curse. Under the fur, small scars not of flesh, but rock.” Erick waved his mazer toward his father with a jerk of his muzzle. “And now you've left a lash across his breast that will forever be stone.”

“Something I would undo if I could, brother,” Charlie sighed with a frown.

“Why, then, did you assail him so?” Erick's voice was an angry hiss, the rat's hard gaze turned fully upon his brother. “What pique brought that about? Or does that father of yours grant you the freedom to trammel upon whomever you please?”

Charlie snorted. “Hardly, Erick. He, and my mother, upbraided me rather soundly for my deplorable behavior.”

All Erick did was snort derisively. “Oh, to have a spoiled brat sullying the house Honor, forsooth!”

“Honor?” Charlie chuffed incredulously. “That was never brought into their ire, Erick. Yes, I did act dishonorably, and for that I chastise myself. Their anger was in that I had injured my father, had it been done without witnesses or here on this field matters not. Truly, had it been any other who I faced and acted as I had they would have been as equally affronted by it – by my behavior, for that is not how they raised me.”

“You're still a spoiled snot, milord. You're angry at Father for – what, then? How has he wronged you that he deserved to be humiliated before the eyes of the entire bleeding kingdom?”

Charlie turned a scowl on his brother, looking down his muzzle from his slightly greater height. “How? Erick, he sold me away!” The young rat snapped, coming to Erick's level of ire. “Took me from my mother, my family; you, my own brother!” His hand waved toward Charles in his chair, beside which Kimberly sat in another chair, her fingers resting upon their father's arm. Their litter-sister, Baerle, stood behind Kimberly's chair, her chin resting upon her arms crossed atop the tall back of the chair, a smile upon her muzzle lifting her whiskers while she listened to Charles' tale. “For a ghost, Erick. A ghost!”

Erick scoffed. “Sold you? For what end? We have no alliance with House Sutt! Your father patrons that mage Murikeer's manor, but offers nothing to the family that gave him a son. Any you? Angry? What gives you the right!” The rat's voice was a low-pitched growl that did not carry to the keen ears of their respective families. “You live in a castle; I lived in a tree for my first decade! You get your fancy clothes and more servants than you can name, and what have we? One or two presentable wardrobes and no servants at all for most of my life.” Erick swept his hand out again with an angry jerk. “Even now you retain more staff, for yourself, than our entire House has between us! I've never traveled beyond this valley and yet you've seen half the world in your travels. What have you to be angry of?”

One of Charlie's brows crept up as Erick's diatribe gained vehemence, the raw pain and anger in his voice taking the young rat aback. “I'd give it up to have my brother, my sisters, and the parents of my blood, Erick. That is your legacy, your privilege, which I will never have. You have not seen how it pains me each time I walk into your House? Or even the humble tree we were both born in? I love that tree and missed it for years!” He finished off his wine-fortified juice and clutched the empty mazer, gazing into it for a moment. “Had I never learned that I was a bartering chip between a man and a god I would have lived with that pain, silently, until the end of my days.”

“But?” Erick snarled with a glare. “How could you be a chit in such games?”

“Because... ahh, Erick, would that I could tell you but it is a tale days in the telling and even I have not heard the fullness of it. Suffice to say, I was blessed – nay, perhaps simply cursed – with a rare talent that would have driven me mad ere my fifth year had I not been adopted by Malger.”

“And how, then, does that dark goddess of yours...” Erick asked flatly, his eyes flicking up and past Charlie's shoulder after a moment. Charlie turned, following his brother's glance, to see Maysin standing a short distance away, her ears erect and eyes curious. Seeing that she had captured their attention she held out a hand and Charlie quickly handed her his empty mazer. Taking it in her hand she transferred it to her empty hand and then reached out, this time toward Erick.

“I assume you wish to have more drink to fight back the dust, milords, and wet your throats before you growl yourselves dry?” Her dark equine eyes shifted from rat to rat, her hand steady, until Erick relented and surrendered his mazer. “If you wish to come to blows, I can ask the Duke's staff to clear the tourney field.”

After a long moment Erick shook his head and looked down, chagrined that their argument had caught someone else's attention. “Nay, t'is merely a disagreement between brothers.”

Maysin's merry bray cut into the tension between them like a boulder down a mountainside. “Betwixt I and my younger brother, such often did come to blows, until he came into his adult muscle and trounced me a time or three.” Saluting with the mazers she withdrew.

“So?” Erick prompted again, drawing Charlie out of the press surrounding the nobles and their stories of past valor. “How is it your tail is only now twisted into a knot about your adoption?”

The two of them relaxed against the railing near one of the competitor's pavilions at the end of the field where the press was not quite so tight. “Because – I learned something, unexpectedly. It made me feel that Father did not... did not value me, as a son, when I was a Matthias.” He sighed and shrugged, watching the Keep staff trying to keep pace with the ravenous appetites of the throng swirling through the tournament field and tables like a spring cataract through a too-narrow stream. Many of the birds had landed amongst the throng to take their refreshment now that their flight was finished only further swelling the tide.

Erick scoffed. “What, you think he just tossed you out with the bathwater, then? I know, somewhat, what it is you can do, but I cannot see how it put you between Father and that crone of yours.”

“She is not a 'crone'!” Charlie snapped in a moment of heat, glaring at his brother. “Get your nose out of that dusty book and look around, she and the rest of the Pantheon are a damn sight more real than your strung-up martyr. Have you spoken with Him?”

Erick held up a staying hand. “Peace, brother. Nay, you know well that I have not. None have, even his Holiness who stands closest to Him.”

Leaning closer, Charlie raised a hand to poke Erick, not lightly, in the center of his breast. “Well, brother, I have spoken with Her, and do so rather often. I have dealt with the taint of the Daedra in Her realm, and the careless leavings of the Aedra who care not that She maintains the balance between them. So cease with your vitriol, simply because I do not – I can not – bear that tree of yours around my neck.” He dropped his hand and paced away to lean his elbows on the top rail of the fence. “And, rest assured, She is as piqued at me right now as you are. The only one, it seems, who has forgiven my childish ire is Father. You would do well to follow his wisdom, as you grow into your House.”

“Would that I have those years to grow, brother, before someone leaves my father more stone than he is now.” With a last gimlet stare Erick turned and walked through the open tourney gate, disappearing into the festival crowds in ten paces.

Charlie blinked after he vanished and stretched forth one arm after his brother. “Erick, no, wait. I...” But his brother was gone. Charlie grimaced and lowered his head until his forehead rested against the top rail. “I am sorry I grew angry with you. I am sorry I spoke ill of Yahshua.” He grunted and bumped his forehead into the rail a few times as if he could jar loose all the tension. Over the years he and his brother had shared a few words of disagreement over matters of faith just as he had with Bryn. But where Bryn and he had come to an understanding and only teased each other lightly from time to time, he and Erick had never had the time to truly understand how each other felt.

And, in truth, if not for his gift – his curse – he would have remained a Matthias and remained amongst the Patildor in such matters. “I am such a fool,” Charlie muttered to himself and hit the railing with his fist.

“Charlie? Are you well?” A familiar and gentle voice asked.

The young rat stood and turned, breathing a long sigh. “Hello, Bernadette. I am well enough if an idiot.” His sister and litter-mate chuckled lightly. Her light-tan fur seemed to glow in the afternoon sun, and the white fur beneath her chin was crisp and clean, colored by a pink tourmaline in a simple brooch. Her soft lavender dress was presentable, as Erick had said, but simple and with fewer frills than Charlie's raiment. Still, he smiled to his sister and said, “You look lovely in that dress, sister. Your betrothed, Godfrey, is a very fortunate groundhog.”

Her whiskers backed in a pleased rodent smile, and her hands clasped at her waist where a simple ribbon had been tied into a bow above her skirt. “Thank you. You know he loves you. All he ever wanted was to be with his brother.”

“Erick?” She nodded, stepping closer to him until she could lift one hand to touch his arm. His whiskers drooped and a long sigh escaped his throat. “I love him too. I wish we had more time together. But... that's not how things are. There are... things between us.”

“You mean Her,” Bernadette noted, her soft eyes meeting his.

“That mostly, but now there is Father. And you, sister? Have you anything you wish to say to me on that score?”

“Nay,” she patted his arm and then gripped it so that he felt her claws through his sleeves. “I would forgive you even if Father did not. But Charlie, please do not be a stranger to your own family. I know it is harder for you than it is for the rest of us, but...” She loosened her grip and lowered her eyes. “But we still miss you.”

Charlie grimaced and nodded. “I haven't felt like I belonged there for some time now. I can remember feeling at home with you and Erick and Baerle at every visit when I was younger. But now...” He shook his head and slumped his shoulders, his tail thumping the dust at their feet. “Will you tell Erick I am sorry for what I said.”

“I will. His anger never lasts long.” She patted his arm one last time. “Will you be all right?”

He offered his sister a small smile, lifting his whiskers an inch. “I will. I'm beginning to see and understand things better now. And,” he lifted his arms and grasped her shoulders, “I cannot promise I will visit as often as we both would like, but I will visit more. And I will attend your wedding as your brother and not as a visitor. I'll even wear the Matthias colors because that is who we are in our blood.”

His sister's smile stretched her entire snout and into her cheeks. She dove into his chest and wrapped her arms tight about his back. “Oh, Charlie! Thank you! It wouldn't have been the same without you there.”

For the first time that day he felt a sense of peace fill him as he returned that embrace. All he could do was murmur into her round ear. “Thank you, Bernadette. Thank you.”

 

 

Charlie and Bernadette went their separate ways after rejoining the crowd flocking the banquet tables spaced around the tournament field. The young rat found his noble friend Bryn unattached – the princess had apparently retired to the King's pavilion to refresh herself – and so they began to peruse the delicacies prepared by their guests together. Each exotic morsel was washed down by a quick sip of a fermented liquor that Bryn told him was blended with the cream skimmed from mare's milk; despite the odd look Bryn bore with each quaff, Charlie found it smooth, tantalizing, and savored the warmth that accompanied each drop.

Sig, accompanied by Justin the Mage Murikeer's eldest son, joined them after their first table and soon the quartet laughed as they watched some of their fellow Keepers tumbling over their own paws after even a little sip of the foreign brews. They joshed each other as well as both Maysin and Argamont who followed after them over how much each of them could handle. Charlie tried to make sure that he did not drink too much for fear he would not be able to keep awake long enough to hear the remainder of his sire's tale, while Bryn did the same for fear of embarrassing himself in front of their guests; Sig, an alligator who had still not come into his manly growth, only took a sip mindful of what his mother might say and confessed to find it revolting anyway, as did Justin who recoiled at the smell alone. Maysin had one small cup and demurred any more, but Argamont seemed to enjoy more than his fair share.

Charlie made an off-handed joke that it was a skunk who would find the scent repulsive, earning him a brief scowl before the young skunk joined their laughter. Or, perhaps, they were laughing because for a few moments Charlie found himself the same hue as the viscid concoction, and as redolent. Justin let the spell fade after the jape, however, after the laughter of Charlie's quip was redoubled at his sudden discomfiture.

Before the strawberry roan could completely scupper himself, servitors began to clear the tables in preparation for the arrival of both mages and musicians. Charlie and his friends moved to the end of the lists to watch where they would not be in the way of either the Keepers leaving the field after enjoying their fill of Steppe-bred delicacies or the laborers scuttling about with the purpose and chaos of ants. Food, drink, and the tables they waited upon were carried off leaving a trail of delectable flavors in the air. Tools to straighten the field out for the hundredth time emerged, and behind them came benches for the musicians and raised stands for the mages.

“Are you going to be playing, Charlie?” Sig asked , swinging his long jaws toward the rat. He gestured with a short, green arm at the semi-circle of benches being arranged in front of the High Box.

Charlie glanced there, saw the workers following the instructions of a familiar blue-robed raccoon, and then shook his head. “Not this year. I've had my hands full and don't know the music.”

“As if there were a tune you could not improve as you learned it!” Bryn admonished with a bemused snort.

“I'm not quite as good as my father,” Charlie noted with a faint chuckle at the rebuke. “Still, let the guild and temple musicians shine. And what of you, Sig? Are you going to help the mages with their grand show?”

The alligator bobbed his head and thumped the end of his tail on the dirt. “Master Murikeer did ask me to assist; but he asked all of his apprentices to assist.” Sig's yellow eyes narrowed. “I will only be holding a small part of it together.”

“And next year you will do even more,” Justin assured him with a smile, resting his monochromatic hand on the young alligator's shoulder. “You are proving to be as apt a pupil as I, Sig. Your talents go to waste as a House Steward.” As with Charlie and Bryn's theological sparring, the young skunk and alligator jibed each other about their expected respective professions, with the same lack of rancor that the young royals enjoyed.

Charlie nodded agreement, casting another glance at the musicians starting to assemble. “Bryn, Sig, Justin, if you will excuse me, I want to go speak with Master Elvmere for a moment.”

Bryn patted him on the shoulder. “We'll be here or in the High Box.”

Charlie flashed him a rodent's smile and then started across the field to where the musicians were beginning to gather. The soft clop of Maysin's hooves followed him. Most of the Keepers who were not helping maintain the field had left not long after the remnants of food and drink had been carried away, so the rat was able to make a straight course for the blue-robed raccoon scrutinizing the benches, musicians, and their instruments. His triangular ears lifted at their approach, and with a half turn of his head, he saw them and smiled.

“Milord Sutt, I thought you were not going to be performing with us this year. Have you changed your mind?”

“Master Elvmere,” Charlie replied with a slight bow. “No, I have not changed my mind, I just wanted to take a moment of your time. First, congratulations on your appointment as Master of Temple musicians.”

The raccoon's ears backed, his tail flicked, and a look of sullen embarrassment seemed to cross his eyes. The position had been offered to the Lothanasi acolyte several times over the last few years but had, until a week ago, been refused each time. Rumor had it that Charlie's philosophy and history instructor had been ordered by the Lothanasa to accept the appointment; it was no secret that some of the raccoon's written musings on matters of the gods were causing some consternation in the Midlands and Sathmore. Charlie suspected even the rigors of managing the temple musicians and writing music for their performance would not dampen his theological inquiries.

“Thank you. I have your father to thank for this unexpected skill in music! And I have promised your mother that my duties will not impede your studies, young Charlie.”

Charlie's whiskers twitched uncertainly. Of all his instruction, Elvmere's was always the most taxing; not even Vidika's torture could make his brain hurt so much as philosophy. “There was one thing I hoped to ask you, Master. I have come across a couple of Åelvish words and I was wondering if you knew what they meant.”

Elvmere politely waved away an otter approaching him with a cornet in one paw, and then pulled Charlie a step away from the gathering performers. “It's been a year since I last reviewed the Åelvish language, but I can try. What words have you heard?”

“The first is Núrodur. I think it is a title of some sort.”

The raccoon lifted his eyes as if he were staring into a book only he could see. He scratched his chin with one claw. “Núrodur... I believe that it means a devoted servant. It is an honorable word. If you have pronounced it correctly, then it would also imply a degree of endearment between both master and servant. The Núrodur belongs to the master but is also treasured by the master.” Elvmere began nodding to himself. “Yes, yes, I believe that is correct. What is the other word you wish to know?”

Charlie thought a moment on his sire's tale. It had only been spoken once, but something in its use pierced him. He was not sure if it was the mystical quality of the Åelvish language or the emphasis his sire had placed on it that had impressed him so. He narrowed his eyes, concentrating on the last moments of the tale until the word came. “I believe... Nuruhuinë. Yes, that is it. Nuruhuinë.”

A frown darkened Elvmere's snout and after a moment he was forced to shake his head. “I fear I do not know that one. Some of the parts are familiar; I have probably seen them in other contexts, but as a word unto itself? No, that I have not seen.” Rising a gray and black striped paw Elvmere rubbed his jaw contemplatively, “Consider it as might master Rickkter when speaking of his written magical constructs, or Murikeer may. It seems to my recollection that there are distinct parts to the address, a triune that, individually, have small meanings and thus small potency. Yet, combined, form a greater and more weighty whole. Or, in the cases of those who practice magecraft, power.”

“What do the parts mean?”

“They could have many meanings, individual chords plucked from a bar of music. Alone, they define little. They may not mean the same thing as its own word and when used separately, but I believe that the first part speaks of loss. The inflection suggests loss of an intended, or was intended. I admit my Åelvish is not particularly polished. And the second half may be an image of some sort.” Elvmere wrinkled his snout and then shook his head again. “I cannot say exactly, but it does not seem like a good word to me.” The raccoon tilted his head curiously. “And again, it is a word, albeit one that does not sit well to my mind. A word taken from a greater context that would more clearly define its use.”

Charlie nodded slowly, chewing the inside of his lower lip as he let his whiskers droop. “And if someone were to be called Núrodur Nuruhuinë?”

“And therein lies the context,” Elvmere nodded. “It would seem, then, that they – the one being addressed by such words – would be a devoted servant by being whatever ill thing that strange word portends. And what being might such an ill thing serve with devotion? Young Lord Sutt, your question distresses me; I fear the moment I am free from my duties as Master of Temple musicians I will be seeking my books!” Despite his frightful words, the rat could see a twinkle of curiosity in the raccoon's eyes.

“I am eager to hear whatever you discover.” Charlie bowed his head and took a quick step back. “Now I'll leave you to your duties. I must find my friends again.”

Elvmere smiled and patted him on the shoulder. “Enjoy your Summer days, young Lord Sutt.” With a slight bow of respect, mirrored by the priest, Charlie withdrew. It was good that he did for the tournament field was beginning to grow crowded again. Not so tightly as it had during the feast, but with the addition of a mind-boggling assembly of instruments large and small, and with the requisite benches, tables, stands, and the central platform for whatever performers would be taking the focus it had become just as confining.

The throb and whine of instruments began to fill the air with a low, discordant susurrus as the musicians worked to tune their instruments. Brief chords lifted above the din as groups practiced. In the center, upon the platform, Murikeer stood with a group of guild mages before a crowded assemblage of apprentices. Charlie saw Sig and Justin standing with the greater group, mostly illusionists, who would be creating the spectacle which would entertain the crowds before the faire was officially ended.

Not, of course, that the end of the faire would be an end of festivities; it would only mark the beginning of very likely days of revelry before everyone trailed back to their homes and professions. For the world continued in its course; cows would need milking, crops tending, and mills grinding despite the midsummer pause.

To relax, if for a time, from the labors of simply living.

In due course, Charlie knew, he would be at the center of such things as Duke Thomas was now. Though an atmosphere of frivolity and revelry it was also – evidenced by the presence of the Steppes King and his sister – a time of intense politics. Thomas could not beg out to enjoy his own relaxation during the festivities, nor could Bryn, and Charlie could little escape it though his adoptive father was no longer on the throne that gave him his House. Even distant from the Western Pyralian kingdom that gave House Sutt its foundation Malger, and perforce Charlie, had to juggle politics and diplomacy, even within Metamor.

A narrow gate before the High Box allowed Charlie past the railing that defined the tourney field and let him through the cordon of alert Men-at-Arms from both Metamor and Pelaeth's retinue. Past the perimeter Charlie felt less crowded and relaxed a little, altering his path toward the table of refreshments laid out to one side. The stout fermented drink of the steppes was not distasteful to him; but it left a strong aftertaste as might a fine soft cheese; pungent and lingering, but not unpleasant. Nearing the table he saw a cluster of women, all of them human, garbed in various wardrobes from simple to fine. They parted smoothly, some of them with slightly frightened swiftness at being approached by a rat, while he made his way through them to the table.

Despite his upright stature, fine clothes, and ability to speak the fears and superstitions of outlanders held them strongly. Many it simply confused, such as the guards who accompanied the King, who were accustomed to strangeness in foreign lands. The servants, however, were less hardened and more flighty in regards to the stunning variety of Metamor's non-human peoples.

At the table Charlie spied the Steppeland Princess, Brygitta, sipping from a tall silver chalice while she leaned one hip indecorously against the table and looked out across the field. Charlie followed her gaze and saw that she was looking at Bryn, who towered over those near him along with Argamont at his side. The two were tossing some story back and forth regaling someone Charlie could not see with its obvious humor.

Bringing his gaze back to the princess Charlie caught a moment of pensive contemplation on the woman's face. Her ladies-in-waiting did not hover too close, but also did not withdraw too far away to not serve her whims, but provided just enough of a screen that she did not immediately notice the young rat nearby. The fact that Charlie was almost two hands shorter did not make him any more noticeable for that, either.

“Frightening, is he not?” Charlie asked offhand, casting his gaze down to the goblet he secured from a tray of them and filled it with mulled cider. Brygitta blinked once before turning her head to see who spoke nearby, as well to know if she was the one to whom he spoke.

“Milord Charlie, I'm sorry.” She lowered her chalice quickly and curtsied, casting her gaze down momentarily. “I didst not see thee approach.”

“Understandable, your grace.” Charlie smiled, offering a bow. “There are much better things to capture your attention, I wager.” He turned his gaze briefly toward the young Duke's son holding forth a stone's throw away amid a crowd of admirers. His gaze was not so focused, however, that he caught the momentary downturn of her lips and wary flash of her eyes when she followed his gaze.

“So many,” she concurred softly, both hands turning the chalice in her grasp. “Thy land art so... amazing. I canst truthfully say a tome could not justly embrace the scope of variety.”

“Ahh, yes, milady. And, for all that, such variety is remarkably the same.” Charlie bobbed his head with a smile.

“The same, milord?”

“Man, hare, rat, horse... nature follows a single underlying schematic. There is little different between myself and, say, a dragon. Arms, legs, head, tail.” He flicked the length of his tail around to let it slide across his upturned palm. “The only true distinction is size.” He raised his head with a warm, but playfully knowledgeable, smile. “Yon dukeling is no warhorse, milady. He stands to a head with your brother, and yourself. Worry not that he is different than any man, despite the silly ears and long muzzle. His physique, like mine, may be different, but overall the size is appropriate to any man of such stature. Have no fear in that regard.”

The princess stared at him for several long seconds and then raised her eyes to look across at Bryn, then blushed brightly and cast her gaze down quickly. Charlie smiled brightly and waited for her to regain her composure. Eventually she looked up from the silver chalice clutched tightly in her hands and sighed. “But – but, he art a horse. As thou art a rat, and she a... an assingh, I dost believe.” Brygitta nodded her head toward Maysin who stood a short distance away among the other ladies, conversing with a couple about what appeared to be braining.

“A creature of the Kitchlande plains called a zebra, I believe, but yes. She, I, yon Bryn are all changed from the human nature that you retain. Myself and Bryn, however, were born as we are. Maysin was as human as you, until the curse took her into her adolescence.” Charlie tilted his head, “That is what most frightens you, your highness? Not that your brother consider an alliance by marriage to a horse-like man, but the curse that made him so?”

Brygitta nodded, but not with conviction. “Well, he art a horse...” Raising her gaze to the throng and stallions at its center she sighed. “But aye, in a degree. The nature of this change curse dost leave the blood chilled in its contemplation.”

“It can. It does, I admit, yes.” Charlie nodded slowly. “It is a monumental change from what is known to something entirely unknown. Should you remain you could as likely become a man, like your brother but far better looking.”

“Or a child,” Brygitta replied with a slow nod. “Or as likely a swine, or – anything.”

“It is said, however, that the curse is not a completely fickle thing, milady.” The young rat offered reassuringly. “Master Murikeer postulates that the curse... listens, after a fashion. It responds to desire and belief. The Duchess Alberta, for instance, could have become a lioness, or once again a man, or a young girl. Yet she became an Assingh, a low beast in her – your – homeland; suited perfectly to the Duke with whom she had fallen in love. As with the sorceress Kozaithy, upon her arrival. She met her husband, Murikeer, during his travels south with my father, and learned that he was a skunk before ever coming to Metamor. Could it be that her burgeoning love for him led the curse to make her a skunk as he was, to suit the two of them so perfectly? And there is the champion of the lists, Sir William Dupré, exiled here nearly seventeen years ago; he and the son who followed him both became rams, the very symbol of their noble house!” Charlie quaffed the last of the mulled cider in his goblet, swirling about in his muzzle to banish the last lingering vestiges of the steppes drink from his palette.

The two flavors mixed most poorly, he noted.

“Would that 'twere true, milord, but I dare say it dost frighten me that I may become as the Duchess. Assingh are not highly regarded.”

Charlie nodded, slowly refilling his goblet, catch a glance of someone slipping beneath the stands at the front of the high box as he did, though the withdrawal was not furtive. “Such, she felt, was her penance for the many wrongs she had perpetrated against her would-be-husband. Thus, again, may the curse have known her heart? There are many in the lines equus as you of the steppes know so well. As like you could become Rheh, or of the mythical winged horses in the tales of Pyralia, or like my maiden Maysin there.”

Brygitta merely nodded, looking to her chalice. Nothing that the dregs were the same mulled cider that Charlie was drinking he raised the ewer with an inquiring tilt of his ears. She may not have been able to read the language of his body, but the offered ewer said as much and she accepted. “Fret not, your highness. The dance of diplomacy is long and involved, to say nothing of courtship, and we have not stepped beyond the entry hall of the ball in which this dance may be played out as of yet. Bryn dislikes you not, but has a lad's heart as do I. He is unsure if he is ready for matrimony and alliances any more than you may be. Years yet may cross the face of the world before fathers decide, or love does.”

The princess straightened her back and squared her shoulders after a moment, dipping her head to look down at him with a warm smile. “Thou art accurate in that, milord, and I thank thee most kindly for the words of wisdom beyond thy youth and mine.” With a regal curtsy she smiled. “I see that my brother the King and thy Duke have retired to the platform above, so perhaps we should join them?” Her eyes turned toward the field where Bryn's circle of admirers had finally begun to disperse. The musicians were beginning to assemble into a proper orchestra, signaling that the closing ceremonies would soon begin.

Picking up another goblet Charlie shook his head. “I must demur, your highness. Could you please kindly inform Bryn and the others that I will be below, admiring the fine golden beasts that came with you? I have seen sixteen summers of these ceremonies, and can see this one in the future at my leisure – one of the performers is an accomplished illusionist and my tutor, after all.”

He bowed, a full goblet held adroitly in each hand such that neither spilled a drop, and she curtsied in return. Turning away she was soon engulfed by her small circle of ladies and retainers as she went to meet Bryn at the tourney gate. Stepping around the table, Charlie cast a glance toward Maysin who excused herself from the company of the other steppe-born ladies. He waited for her and when the zebra reached his side he favored her with a warm smile. “Thank you for accompanying me this day, Maysin. I would like a little privacy for the nonce so you may enjoy the rest of the day as you wish.”

The zebra stopped and her ears fell flat against her mane. “Are you all right, Charlie?”

He nodded. “I think so. It is just... what I do now I must do alone.”

Her ears lifted again and Maysin's posture relaxed. “I leave you to it then, milord. Will you have need of my services tomorrow?”

He blinked and then laughed. “I have no idea. Surprise me!”

Her braying laugh echoed in his ears even after she had turned and headed for the main entrance to the High Box. Charlie slipped into the shadows beneath the box, still deftly carrying a full goblet in each hand, where the smell of hay and horse suffused his nose almost immediately.

It took a few moments for his eyes to adjust to the dim light and the coolness of the shadows was a welcome respite from the growing mid-day heat. His whiskers and toes led him without error around the many pitfalls and stumbles in the dim light until his eyes adjusted, so it was not difficult for him to find the goal of his search.

Standing upon a bale of straw and leaning upon the topmost railing of a stall box, Baron Matthias was idly scratching the brow of a powerful golden steed that appeared well pleased with the attention. Charlie made his way over and leaned against the stable wall nearby.

“They truly are magnificent creatures,” the young rat observed. Charles turned his gave from the horse and down to his son.

“They are not truly the same as those upon whose backs we crossed half of Galendor, however. Their blood is mixed with that of the Tagendend chargers.” Charles observed, accepting the goblet that Charlie offered. They sipped in companionable silence for a few moments, Charles turning to lower himself down onto the bale upon which he had stood. A saddle blanket covered it, making for a comfortable seat without the scratch and poke of naked straw. “I saw you and Erick have words. Is all well between you?”

Charlie continue to lean against the side of the stable, the inquisitive snuffle of the horse within stirring the short fur of his head between the slats. “No,” he offered honestly. “He is still displeased with me for injuring you. As he has the right to be.”

Charles sighed and nodded before looking up. “His anger will pass.”

Charlie nodded, crossing to another blanket covered bale and sitting down to face his sire. “It always does. He believes I have done his house a grave injury, and humiliation. I admit that, but it will take time for my apology to make its way through to him. And still,” Charlie dropped a hand to pluck at the mithril crescent moon that hung at his breast.

“Matters of faith,” Charles nodded with a moue of displeasure.

“Will pass, as all things do, in time, Father.”

Charles raised his gaze, one eyebrow quirked. “Father, now? Not sire?”

Charlie laughed, warmly; ruefully. “On pain of applied switch, Father, from mother and Mother and even Father. They demand my acknowledgment of our relationship, and I admit my error.” From his seat he bowed across at the Baron before him. “And my anger, even were it fresh and burning within my breast, would have to admit the same. You are my father, and that I do not argue. It...” He sought the words, taking a long breath and letting it out with a gusty sigh. “And yet, it discomfited me for all the years of my life, calling you sire or father, yet having another to whom I turned when I needed to seek a Father.” Leaning forward he rested his elbows upon his knees and clasped the goblet between his slender fingers just as the princess had done minutes before. “And, you know, it was the wine that really did it.”

“The wine?” Charles raised a brow, incredulous.

Charlie nodded. “On my last visit, you brought out a fine Lorland vintage. One that must have cost a fine bit, and certainly one you would not have had at table otherwise but for myself and Bryn.” Releasing one hand from the goblet he waved in the general direction of the Keep. A distant, rolling note filtered through the walls of the stable, bringing a sudden hush to the rumble of the crowds beyond the dim horse-scented shadows below the Duke's box. “As we may have found at table here, as a daily norm. It said to me – I am different, I am apart. I am a Lord, and you a vassal.” The herdsmans' horns, high upon the slopes of the mountains around Metamor, filled the valley with their booming, solitary notes.

“You are my son, do you not deserve what my House can offer?” Charles asked, almost defensively, though still curious at the direction Charlie took. Beyond the stables the notes of the distant horns changed, becoming a coherent musical movement. Even the echoes harmonized with the overall piece.

Charlie shook his head, “No, Father, I do not. I am your son, and I deserve what your son deserves. Erick, Baerle, Bernadette – my siblings; brothers and sisters of your House – do not sup so grandly save on Holy Days, and my visits.” Leaning forward, Charlie reached out a hand that was quickly grasped by his sire. “Father, I am your son, not a Lord to you. To act otherwise...” He sighed, releasing his father's hand and leaning back. Somewhere closer than the rolling throb of the distant horns a bell tolled. Once, deeply, a lingering tone that faded slowly before the same bell rang again. Charlie's ears told him that it was vaguely from the direction of the Keep; likely the largest of the bronze bells in Metamor's Follower Cathedral.

From somewhere in the opposite direction another bell answered the third ring of the first, its note slightly higher. Another chapel bell. The two harmonized almost immediately, slipping into the underlying theme of the horns smoothly.

“To act otherwise stands me apart, and reinforces that distance from you.” A third bell pealed into the growing chorus of wood and brass, from a different direction, another new note. Closer, however, within Keeptowne where the second bell rang from somewhere in Euper.

Charles tipped his head slightly, his goblet held lightly upon one knee. “Had you thought that it was brought to table for Bryn's sake?”

“No, for he would not – he did not – notice the distinction between a House vintage or one of Lorland's best. Any such are available to him on a whim, he does not think upon the burden of cost it would place on a House.” Charlie shook his head slowly. “He is a royal, and it has made him complacent to some things. But Malger has taken me upon his travels; I have been feted at the finest tables of the south as often as a mean trencher of whatever a roadside inn could scoop from its stewpot. He has purposely traveled as nothing more than a wandering minstrel, because he wanted me to understand the low as much as the high.

“That is why that wine cut so keenly, Father.” Charlie looked into his goblet for a moment before taking a swallow. “And then I found your dream, and that wrecked things entirely.”

Charles stroked a paw across his chest with a snort and a nod. “I noticed. But you should know one thing, my son; that wine was not brought out for either you or Bryn. It was brought out for us, to celebrate having you with us so unexpectedly.”

Charlie blinked and then lowered his eyes, claws scratching against the goblet resting in his fingers. “I... I had not considered that.” He shook his head back and forth, sighing in regret. “I had not thought of that.”

Both of their heads lifted, ears perked, as dozens of bells, booming from temple and chapel clerestories to the bright, brassy dinner triangles suspended from Inn doors, filled the air despite the muffling stacks of hay and wooden walls of the stands. The crowds had fallen deathly silent, caught in awe as the city around them sang as it never had before. Charlie found himself smiling; Malger had spent five years working with the peasants, priests, herdsmen, and craftsmen through Metamor in careful secrecy to prepare for just that moment. He almost regretted missing out, though he had witnessed the Singing City more than a few times during their travels. Malger made it a tradition to pass through Silvassa during their festival of music whenever he could.

An electric shiver raced up his spine as the first crisp, sharp note of a silver flute cut through the underlying theme like the blade of a fishwife's filleting knife. He saw his father shudder as well, whiskers back and ears up, his eyes closed. The first was soon joined by other winds; clarinet, recorder, more flutes in a rising rill. At the crescendo the music seemed to hover, the bells abruptly silent, everything fading into the throbbing echo of the distant horns. A cello began the descant; a slow dirge-like note into which the sibilant whisper of other strings slipped in and darted about, each improvising on that basic tone, distinct and individual bit in perfect harmony. Somewhere a tom thrummed a short tattoo for several seconds, following the sift darting theme of a single viola. Another drum, basso and deep, rolled in like a charging steed.

Piping, swift, sharp, playfully rising and falling the winds returned, each finding a theme among the many strings, undercut by the rolling rattles of tom and tambour and the heavy thump of bass drum and, washing across the entirety of the orchestral movement, the ringing of bells.

“Such was the raven and the rat,” Charlie said at length, during a long pall in the music where only wind and string sand a single sonorous note. He could only imagine what stupendous illusions were being crafted to accompany and accentuate what he heard. “A dark nightmare, weighing a single soul.” He leaned forward, his dark rodent eyes gleaming in the diffuse light of the stable. “What more can you tell me of it?”

Charles closed his eyes, thumbs tapping his nose even as one of the golden horses leaned its head over the wooden slats and lipped at the curve of his ear. “What can I tell you? I will tell you of what lies Beyond the reach of Daedra. Listen well, my son, for I will never tell this story again.”

 

 

Saturday, May 12, 708 CR

 

For a moment there was nothing. And then they arrived.

Charles stared out across a vast ocean that stretched to the horizon. Waves rolled across the surface in long, unbroken arcs. The air was bitter with salt, and beneath him he could hear the crash of waves upon rock. A sky bright and blue filled the heavens without a single cloud in sight. He clenched his eyes until only a slit remained, trembling in the fierce light.

His master's shadow stretched across him and kept the worst of the light at bay. After so long in the gloom of the hells it was only his longing for light that allowed him to see at all. Charles opened his jaws and sucked in the air, savoring the bite of the sea. His toes dug into the soft earth beneath his feet and felt his heart lift at its purity. He almost laughed as he turned, grateful to finally be free of the deadra and their demesnes.

Charles gasped and blinked, lifting one arm to shield his eyes as he stared up and up. Before him, impossibly tall, was a mountain. It rose up from the waves below and stretched beyond his ability to see. The crystal blue sky cloaked the summit, and far above the sun itself cast luminous rays that made the upper reaches glimmer as alabaster. He could only stare a moment before casting his eyes down and pressing his head against his master's chest.

You have been too long in darkness, Núrodur. His master's voice filled his thoughts and even soothed the misery in his eyes. Charles took a deep breath, hands gripping the Åelf's robes to steady himself.

Where are we?

Beyond. Beyond the imaginings of the Daedra lords and the souls beneath their gaze. Those souls that do not fall into their grasp, souls that slip by them as sand slips through fingers, and yet burdened by an evil of their own making, come to this place. You know of it, Núrodur.

Charles frowned and tentatively opened his eyes. His paws were still black, and they clutched at his master's white robes as a stain. “Purgatorio...” He gasped and trembled, slipping down until he stood on his knees. “How... how could we come here? We are not dead.”

Your son can only be reached from the mount ahead. You know this. You always knew this.

Slowly, the rat began to nod, even as he stared at the grass beneath him. Even in his master's shadow it bore a warmth and a simplicity that he liked. It felt like grass should feel. There was no hate bled into the ground, there were no murders or atrocities screamed within its substance. It was grass and it bore him up as it was made to do.

Blinking, eyes still smarting from staring at the brilliant mountain, Charles turned his head to stare back down his side and long tail stretched out toward the edge overlooking the sea. His flesh remained black so that he seemed a shadow himself. Against the backdrop of the ever rolling sea he felt a blemish.

Why am I still black? I thought we left all of that behind us?

It was not the Daedra lords who did this to you, Núrodur, but your own hand. You pushed the bird through the machine to open the bridge. You destroyed souls you found in Ba'al's domain. But remember what I told you – the soul tar cannot return to the mortal world. Your physical body remains where it sleeps; it has suffered no harm. You are safe. Do not be afraid.

Charles felt his master's presence touching his thoughts with a gentle assurance. There was confidence in that touch, a certainty that what was spoken was true. The rat breathed deeply and swelled his chest with the salty air. If his master believed it, then he, Núrodur, believed it too.

He remained on his knees for the length of several long breaths, blinking his eyes and letting them adjust to the brightness of the mountain and sky. When it no longer hurt to lift his gaze from the shadowed grass at his master's feet, the rat stood and stared at the world around him. They were situated on a small promontory overlooking a vast ocean that stretched around the base of the mountain. The mountain rose up amidst a broad swath of forest in full Summer bloom. While he did not see any animals moving within the field, he could hear the sound of voices and what he thought was distant singing.

The mountain was a towering spike larger than any he had ever seen; even the mighty peaks of the barrier range were mere foothills in comparison. The gray slopes that turned to alabaster white where they reached the sky were so steep that they were sheer cliffs cut through by terraced paths that wound steadily upward around the trunk. The angle was too sharp for him to see anything moving on the paths, but near the base and just above the tops of the trees between them he beheld what seemed to be a gathering of people milling about as they began their ascent.

Charles pressed his fingers against his snout and breathed across his claws; he yearned for something to chew. “We have to climb to the top of that?”

It is where you know you must go to find your son, Núrodur.

“Then we had best begin,” the rat said with a slight shrug. He took a deep breath and strode forward past his master toward the lush forest.

In the light he stepped and screamed. What had seemed a noon-time day became a blaze of light so fierce he felt as if he'd been hurled into the sun. Deep into his flesh the fire bore so that he was nothing but heat itself. Every part of his being was consumed in that flame and he felt his substance dribble like molted iron down across the ground, burrowing and blackening the sod.

And then a darkness swept over him and the wordless voice of his Master pierced the all-consuming agony of flame. You are still alive, Núrodur. I protected you from the evils amongst the Daedra's realm. Now I protect you against the fire of purification you cannot abide in your mortal flesh. You must remain in my shadow if you are to climb this mountain. You must remain in my shadow if you are to see your son again. Núrodur, you are not dead yet and cannot abide the fire that waits to purify the dead. I alone can shield you in this place. Núrodur!

The anguish left him slowly. The comforting coolness of his master's shadow stretched outward around him as Charles lay in a crumpled heap at his feet. The grass had been charred by his touch, but already stretched up in fresh green blades that jabbed him with their solidity. The various pains lingered even after his awareness of arms, legs, and a tail returned to his nearly shattered mind. But his master's words guided him back to sense and with it purpose. Charles was himself again.

His limbs trembled as he pushed himself to his hands and knees. His tail lay heavily on his toes, nearly limp from anguish and exertion. Charles, fearing it might sway free of his master's shadow and be turned to cinder, grasped the tip in one hand and pulled it close to his chest so that its bulk hung in a loop at his side even after he managed to stand. His trembling and beastly whimpering did not cease either.

But his master's shadow was broad and stretched like a wedge behind him. Charles put his other hand at his master's back and gripped his white robes with both fingers and claws. There was an autumnal coolness in his thoughts, soothing and stilling his dream-time flesh. Charles gave no quarrel to his master, and when his master took a step, he lifted the same leg, unsteady though it may be, and set it down upon the sharp grass at the same time as his master set soft shoe to earth.

Each step felt an eternity, but by the time they left the promontory and reached the edge of the wood, Charles no longer trembled. The fire that had burned him still simmered in his flesh like a smoking wick that refused to be extinguished, but it no longer caused him any pain. The black rat felt soothed by his master's shadow, and kept his grip tight on the robe so as not to accidentally stumble from it again. His tail bounced against one knee as he pressed the tip to his chest.

Despite nearly clinging to his master's back, Charles was able to see the forest as they stepped beneath its leafy boughs. A brilliant panoply of green overshadowed them, blocking their view of the mountain for a time. And even though Charles had traversed much of the known world, the trees and the leaves were not familiar to him. The ground beneath them dipped and wove between each sentinel, their trunks thick with giant whorls and burrs that did not so much mar their bark but glorified it. Some of the leaves were so large that they could have been stretched with poles to make a tent for a dozen men. Others were mere pinpricks of a green so vivid they were impossible to miss.

The grass gave way to moss and stone as they ventured deeper into the wood. Charles was surprised when his toes would not breach the surface of the larger blocks thrust up from the earth. Where the rocks of Revonos had enticed him to succumb to their poison, these felt solid and unyielding as rocks had been before he'd become stone himself. Charles made seven attempts to commune with stone before giving up.

He was surrounded by a beauty of supernatural majesty and he could partake of none of it.

Do not despair. His master's voice was kind and filled with a gracious delight. This place is closed to you for now, Núrodur Nuruhuinë,but it shall not always be so.

When I must die?

He felt his master smile but nothing more was said within his mind. Merely a sensation that reminded him of his master's promise. His gaze swept across the forest with its beautiful trees, bushes, fronds, flowers, moss, stone, and profusion of grace, and delighted in it.

They passed into a broad valley with the forest on either side rising up to form a series of long walls each higher than the last so that there was nowhere for them to go but forward. Reclining on the walls he was surprised to find people here and there. Most were dressed well though some of their raiment seemed archaic if not ancient. None of them glanced at the rat or his master, their eyes turned toward the mountain with longing even though they could neither see it through the trees nor make any attempt to walk toward it.

Charles did not recognize any of the faces, and for a time found the strangeness of their clothes more interesting. Some styles he recognized from tapestries hung in Metamor depicting life in earlier centuries. There two men bearing Sondecki cloaks cut in a style unheard of for three centuries, with short cuffs on the wrists and flowing streamers from either shoulder each ending in a stitched emblem of their clan. To them he yearned to speak, but the light from above surrounded them and he dared not enter.

The forest valley eventually opened up to a wide plain that came to an abrupt end in the upthrust rock of the mountainside. Here many more humans reclined, and to the rat's delight he even saw a few Keepers though none were familiar. They walked about with apparently nothing more to do during their day. Some sang hymns. Others seemed to have their heads bowed in prayers. A few beat themselves with whips of cord. Some wept.

Who are these people?

They are many and varied. Some are excommunicate and must abide here a time equal to their separation in life. Others are merely those who let the mundane cares of the world strangle their souls. They could not be held by the Daedra, nor do they receive worse for the desire abides in their hearts. And so they are here; waiting.

Charles turned his head from side to side to try and take in the multitudes. He had never seen an army a tenth so vast. For what do they wait?

The path to open for them. There is no other direction that they can go anymore. Neither is there for us, Núrodur. Come.

Charles followed his master into the plain and into the throng. Even though there were more people gathered in the field beneath the mountain than he had ever seen before gathered in a single place, there was sufficient distance between them that they could walk in their midst without his master's shadow falling on any of them. Their attire was similar to those he saw in the forest, though many also bore garments fitting for his own day. As they passed through their midst he scanned their faces in vain for anyone he knew. He felt somewhat disheartened to see only strangers.

As they neared the base of the mountain Charles could finally see that unlike a normal mountain, there was neither defile nor gentle slope at its base. Rather the grass and trees of the field gave way to a vertical cliff that stretched beyond the reach of the largest tree in the Glen. At the top of that cliff he could see the lip of a terrace that wound its way up along the side of the mountain. But where that path began there was no sign.

They walked for what seemed many hours through the vast throng of penitents before they finally reached the mountain. People pressed their faces to its smooth surface and wept bitter tears, dried them with their hair, and then kissed the cold stone with tender affection and gratitude. His master turned before they could touch the stone and Charles followed him toward the right. So close to the cliff the sound of singing seemed to coalesce from a million voices into a single harmonious whole.

 

...

Non nobis Domine non nobis:

sed nomini tuo da gloriam.
Super misericordia tua et veritate tua:

nequando dicant gentes: Ubi est Deus eorum?
Deus autem noster in caelo:

omnia quaecumque voluit fecit.

…

 

Beneath it he felt another melody spinning and seeking. His heart trembled and he felt a desperate longing to hear the melody in full. It differed from the chant of the penitents; where their song was one full of understanding with all doubt stripped away, this other melody was jagged with uncertainty. Its tremolo was an anxious throb and its syncopation a sorrowful flutter of the lips. He lifted his ears, ignoring the hymn in hopes of capturing that other voice.

The gate is ahead, Núrodur.

His master's words brought his attention back to the mountain and he gasped when he beheld the gate. It was not like any gate he had ever seen in any city, nor even like the forest gates in Ava-shavåis. A portal of shimmering light rose up along the mountainside. It was framed by a stone arch but it was not the arch that created the gate; it was the light which upheld the arch. The gate was fronted by three long, stone steps. The bottom step was fashioned from a marble polished so white that no impurity marred it and no speck of dust could settle upon it. The second was black basalt and cracked through the middle from side to side and from top to bottom. The third was a deep red and fashioned from no stone that Charles recognized. Atop the third step was a being of iridescent light and covered in eyes. He could make no sense of its limbs, neither what they were nor how many he had, though it seemed to the rat that the being held a sword.

One of the penitents climbed the steps toward that fiery being. Though the steps were no taller than his knee, the man seemed as small as a mouse in a giant's abode as he mounted the three steps. Charles pressed against his master's leg as they stood nearby watching, eyes fixed on the scene. The fiery being seemed to sing as it lowered the sword point toward the penitent's forehead. A blaze of crimson light followed the sword point as the letter “P” was traced seven times.

Words, felt more than heard, emanated from the being of incandescent light. “Take heed that thou wash these wounds, when thou shalt be within.” Charles felt his earlier burn kindle in his darkened flesh and only his master's gentle hand stilled the quivering that overtook him. No sound came to his ears and the only scent his nose knew was the charring of his own flesh.

To the presence within he whispered his fear. Is there no other way?

There are many paths you can choose, Núrodur. But only one path leads to your son. We shall not be turned aside. Fear not.

As soon as the thought had settled upon him like a heavy cloak about his shoulders, his Master stepped forward and Charles crept along at his feet to remain in his shadow. They reached the steps even as the fiery being had turned two keys, one of gold and the other of silver, in locks upon the brilliant gate. It opened inward with a rush of harmony as a million voices singing some exultant hymn. Charles could make out nothing of the path beyond the gate, but watched as the penitent strode forward with head bowed past the gatekeeper. Into the path beyond he stepped and the gate pulled gently closed behind him, though it did not shut all the way.

A thousand eyes from the being of celestial flame turned from the penitent who vanished into the brightness beyond, settled upon Master and rat who stood but a short distance away. Its sonorous voice, somehow both doomfully thunderous and as gentle as a lover's whisper, spoke. “On this thy first climb no mark is given. Take heed thou dost not spurn this grace. Thy second climb shall be as the rest.” It turned and, without using either key, pressed open the gate. This time Charles could see a path of stone steps rising up through the mountain while light shone down into the fissure from above.

His Master ascended the steps with such delicate grace it seemed as if his feet pressed off the very air so that they never touched the stone. Charles crept along behind, uncertainly setting one paw upon the white step; the surface was cool and soft like new-fallen snow. Comforted, he pulled himself up the next step and felt a stab of pain lance into his heart. His darkened paws tightened their grip upon the crack sheared into the black step and forced himself upward, even as he felt a sorrow so deep nearly draw tears from the pitch of his eyes.

Just when he thought himself unable to continue he collapsed upon the red step just beneath the gate and the being of a thousand eyes. The stone was warm but not hot to the touch and he found a renewed strength upon it. He pressed down with his hands and for a moment thought he saw pink flesh where the black had covered his fingers. But by the time he stood and followed his Master through the gate the color had faded.

The fissure of rock beyond the gate stretched his Master's shadow at first so that Charles felt free to reach out and touch either side. But the more they climbed the shallower it became and soon he was forced to keep close to his master's legs to stay out of the light. He clutched the end of his tail tight in one hand and pulled it taut around his middle.

They emerged from the fissure onto a broad terrace. The mountain stretched upward on their left and the terrace wound upwards against it. To his right he could see across the top of the forest from a height dwarfing Metamor's tallest towers. The sea stretched in every direction and sparkled in the radiance of the sun.

The ground was lush with bright, green grass and little bushes but nothing taller than the rat's knees. Everything around seemed brighter than before and Charles flinched, shielding his eyes with his free hand as they emerged onto the grassy incline. His Master stared ahead with fixed determination and confident mien, only turning part way to rest a hand on the rat's shoulder and offer him an encouraging glance.

The brighter the sun, the deeper the shadow, Núrodur. You are safe with me.

The thought comforted the rat and together the two of them continued walking up the ever so gentle slope. At first Charles saw nothing other than the waves of grass and the small flowering bushes mixed in, but soon he noticed that there was far more to see on the mountain terrace. Emerging from the green sward were statues of exquisite craftsmanship, as if they too had been grown from the mountain's surface. Charles found himself immediately drawn to regard the nearest and seemingly largest of the group.

Before them was the image of a woman kneeling with her arms open before her as if she were accepting some great responsibility. Her face was tilted upward, her cheeks without blemish, her eyes open and gentle. Her features suggested youth but there was also a matronly quality to her. From her gaze, her posture, and her bearing, it seemed that she was listening and welcoming some message. Charles felt he should know her.

His Master did not pause to consider the statues and so the rat did not either. He offered each of them that they passed a brief appraisal but nothing more. All of them seemed to be people in positions that suggested they were either accepting some task or relinquishing something of great worth; and yet they never seemed to regret any of what happened. Charles felt dizzy from so many images and after counting more than two dozen lowered his eyes into the shadow at his Master's feet and pushed them from his mind.

But he found no relief there. As they climbed the grass gave way to more than just statues. Broad stone steps marred the path, each of them carved with some scene. Most of them were of people engaged in some activity, though he could not recall what at first it was that any of them were doing. But after a while, as his dark feet stepped over the faces, he realized that many of them were rulers or fantastic warriors. He saw priests praying with their eyes turned upward bearing self-satisfied smiles. He saw a man at the foot of a tree staring up at the faces of other men and women hanging from the tree like ripened fruit. Charles tried to find the grass again so that he would not have to stare at all of those images, but he did not dare step out of his Master's shadow again. Even thinking about it made his flesh simmer with heat.

After stepping across a depiction of a vast city and tower under construction, he lifted his eyes and noted that they were no longer alone on that vast mountain terrace. Men and women surrounded them on all sides, each of them laboring beneath the weight of a heavy stone that crushed into their backs. The stones were of such variety that the darkened rat could only marvel and name the names: basalt, granite, chalcedony, marble, flint, anthracite, gneiss, jasper, chert, limestone, quartz, pumice, and many, many others that he'd known from his days of living as stone. For a few moments his gaze fixed upon the rocks and some deep recess of his being yearned for the comfort and stability of mineral and the majesty of the peak.

The weight of each burden could not have been born for more than a few minutes by even the strongest of men; even some dragons would have struggled beneath such boulders. Yet these people, both man and woman alike, bore up the weight without collapsing. Their steps were slow, inching forward up the gentle slope with little shifts of each leg; their feet never left the ground and yet they left no trail either for the grass crushed beneath them sprang back up faster than they could move. Their faces were contorted in pain but as he watched them it did not seem to him that their greatest agony came from the stones. All of them had the letter “P” inscribed seven times on their forehead.

Like the people on the plain below, these were also dressed in a variety of attire yet each was marred by the constant shifting of the stones on their back. Garments rich in purple and crimson were now smeared brown around their back, threads torn loose so that they sagged along their arms and legs. Others bore priestly garments that tangled around their legs making it impossible for them to move, a tangle that they seemed reluctant to fix. A few had even torn the shirts from their chest, leaving a trail of finery dragging behind them. And then were many others whose garments were of the meanest sort and yet they moved as slowly as the rest.

His Master did not slacken his pace to allow Charles any time to study them as individuals and as his shadow did not touch any of them the rat was forced to note only these details about each in their passage. He lost count of how many they passed before he realized that every single one of them was talking. Their gaze was fixed either on the path before them or the ground with its grass and stone tablets, and yet each of them spoke as if trying to carry on a conversation with those around them. But none of them were listening to one another.

Charles inclined his head as they passed to listen.

“I was Pyralian, son of a great Breckarin. My father was prefect of the district of Aachen and scion of the great Martain family... I do not know if you have heard his name.”

“I am the great Tardini. My name was celebrated by all in Marilyth and my manuscripts admired by all learned men. Do you not know my work?”

“I have ten children. My eldest son is a knight of great renown. My eldest daughter married the Baron of Mitok. Stay and let me tell you of my other children and their achievements!”

“I commanded a legion of soldiers and won the battle of Vasks over the treacherous Hevagn!”

“No man knows the movement of the stars as do I!”

“I worked a miracle that healed a child on the verge of death. My name is still sung throughout Lavelock!”

Charles shook his head, unable to bear the words he heard, almost wishing that he would see some of them collapse beneath the weight that had already bent them over. The disgust flared in his skin until he felt the grass smoldering beneath his feet.

It is better not to listen to them, Núrodur.

He lifted his head and saw that his Master had half turned his face to offer him a thin smile. He did not form a question back to his Master, but merely opened his mind to his presence.

Each word they speak is pressed from them by the weight upon their back. A life-time of such thoughts and desires has created those stones and now it must be crushed from them. It is not for you to know and experience. You cannot add to their burden nor can you cause them any suffering which they would feel. Stay with me and we will soon leave them behind. You walk in their midst only as a stranger; a shadow within a shadow.

And it was true. Though they were all human and they spoke tongues he understood and in accents familiar, even mentioning places he had once lived or seen, none of them were familiar to him. They were not his concern. They could neither help nor impede his steps and so there was no reason to pay the slightest heed to them. His Master's shadow did not include them and so he turned them from his mind.

It was easier than he had suspected. He focused his gaze on his Master's back and followed after him up the long sloping terrace. His feet crossed over stone and grass and he could feel the different textures but he did not glance to see upon what images he trod. His side always took in that which passed him on either side and so the people with their stones pressing down their backs and ruining their clothes continued to slip behind him but other than the hue of their skin and the type of rock they bore he knew nothing more of them. Even when he saw that there was a wolf Keeper bearing a granite block he did not avert his attention nor listen to what lament slipped from his tongue. The question did arise only then, that he had not questioned through his journey; how did the souls of men, briefly changed to the forms of animals or children in the duration of their mortality, remain thus changed in the realms beyond life. Were Nasoj's curses so powerful that they warped the very soul as well as the flesh? Was that the reason the curse could not be undone – was it a change of the soul itself? His thoughts were troubled, waiting for word from his Master whom would have no answer for that curiosity, wondering only how far they must travel on their road before they reached his son. The question passed, as fleeting as a breath, before Charles' thoughts turned once more to the ever-dwindling shadow of his Master, and the goal ahead.

Ladero.

Into that silence his attention was only arrested by the faint echo of the melody he'd experienced on the plain. It tugged at him and for a moment he thought to turn and seek its source out. But even as the intention grew within him, something else caught his regard. Ahead of them on the path was a familiar face bearing up under the weight of a few dozen heavy slabs of limestone stacked like a monumental deck of cards. His garments, once a rich and luxuriant blue, were now sullied and torn so that his pasty white flesh was visible, preserved from the burning of the sun only by the shadow in which he travailed.

To the rat's astonishment, his Master's shadow passed over the shambling man, where it had never before touched another loitering below or toiling up the endless path.

Yes, Núrodur, I know the thought you wish to have. To this one you may speak for a moment. He is known to you. But remember, he may not understand who you are for the weight upon him is all he truly knows.

Charles did not step ahead to reach the man faster, but waited the few seconds until his Master stepped along-side him, bringing the rat close to this other. His face was lined with strain, and his aquiline nose stretched from each intake of breath. The seven letters drawn across his forehead were twisted under his burden so that they seemed to flow with his blood. His eyes were lifted to the ground ahead, but his feet moved only the width of the rat's finger and then not again.

“Marquis Camille du Tournemire,” Charles murmured, his voice almost a hiss as of stone grinding together. “How are you here?”

The Marquis's voice seemed to have a bit of fire to it as he replied. “I defeated the slaughtering hand of the conqueror Handil Sutt in battle, man to man alone. I would see the Marzac swamps reclaimed from evil. None could best my hand at cards; with nothing more than cards I was as much a conqueror as Sutt and his legions. I would bring an end to famine in my lands and would make them as rich as any the world has ever seen!” He groaned and for a moment buckled beneath the weight of the stacked limestone.

Charles lifted one arm to steady him but the Marquis, despite his burden, managed to avoid his touch. “You were wrong,” the rat noted with a sigh. “You became evil. You did horrible things. This is all the punishment you receive?”

“I did defeat Handil Sutt! I brought peace to Western Pyralis! You were there, Sondecki of the Black! You were there at my beck and call.”

“And you betrayed us in the end. You destroyed so many...”

“I had such power... such terrible power.”

“With which you tortured us. You murdered my friends before my very eyes.”

“I raised a beautiful son.”

“You abandoned your son for Marzac!”

“I stopped the evil. I kept the card to the Magyars from being burned. I tricked him for you, Dazheen! I tricked him for you!” Briefly the overburdened man's eyes lifted, seemed to focus upon Charles if truly aware that he was there. “Darkness requires light; I could touch it – a little less at a time, but that is where I laid one card; in the Light.” His shoulders rose, lifting the stack of weighty slabs briefly, and then fell. “Where I could not, in the end, touch it. But you, the others, ahh, my armies of conquest in a handful of painted cards!”

“You brought pain and anguish to my friends. You stole me from my family!”

“Oh Dazheen, only you could touch cards as I could. You alone were my joy in the darkness.”

Charles tightened his hands into fists to keep himself from clawing at the man. His voice deepened and poured a hot wind against the Marquis's face. “You murdered my friends and countless others! Why are you not burning with the rest! Why did I not find you curled like a little beast in the blackness of Ba'al domain! You sadistic monster!”

The Marquis did not even look at him, his eyes lifting upward along the path, and a tear dribbled down his cheek. “Dazheen, I am guilty. I am. I was wrong to think I could cure the jungle. I was wrong.”

The stone slab at the top of the stack slid backward and crashed into the ground behind them. It shattered so thoroughly that not even a remnant of dust remained. The Marquis slid one foot forward a few inches. His leather boots had worn away enough that his curled toes could be seen, and these glimmered a pearly white as they slipped free of his Master's shadow.

Charles felt a hand rest upon his shoulder and the anger he felt at seeing the man who had brought him so much pain subsided. He could still feel a fire across his flesh, but now it seemed a cool flame, one that soothed rather than seared. He lowered his arm and tightened his grip on his tail as he stepped away from the Marquis. His Master sensed his purpose and the two of them continued walking, leaving Tournemire forever behind after only a few steps.

This does not accord with your sense of justice, my Núrodur Nuruhuinë?

Is this all he must do, carry a bunch of stones around?

That is no mere collection of pebbles, my Núrodur. It is not your choice as to what comes to those who have died.

But he killed you, Master! Do you not wish more for him?

We must each of us fulfill the purpose for which we exist, Núrodur. To some more is given than others. To you this has been given. That one accomplished much of what he had been given but not all. His decisions were not always best, and his reasons created that stack of stones which bear him down even now and will do so for a time longer than you can imagine. Yes, he should not have had a hand in killing me, but now that we have seen him, spoken with him, and stepped past him, he is no longer our concern. He plays no further part in our paths. Put him now from your mind, Núrodur. We must continue.

I will, Master.

The terrace continued its slow spiral around the towering mountain that loomed on their left like a brilliant white spike piercing the sky. The only heed Charles paid to the men and women laboring beneath stone was to note their presence on either side as they passed. The further they walked the fewer in number they seemed to be. The swards of grass and the statues that rose up from them seemed to become wider and more diverse but they never lingered in any spot long enough for the rat's interest to be piqued.

His thoughts were still as the moments slipped away. The Núrodur's pace matched that of his Master's step for step as they climbed. The path angled upward but he felt no fatigue for all of their exertion. There was nowhere else to go and nothing else to do but to follow and wait. His son was ahead and his Master guided him to his son. That was all that mattered.

The slope eventually became steep enough that the rat had to climb on all fours to make the ascent. He tucked his tail through the sash around his waist to keep it from slipping out of the shadow and then stretched in its depths as they rose the last course of the terrace. A vigilant light shone ahead and in the midst of the brilliance he could discern figures waiting. What few others remained on the path with them were burdened by mere slivers of river stone though they too crawled like animals.

The hill leveled out only when they reached the source of the light. Another being filled with eyes and wings in a profusion that was impossible to make sense of appeared to guard a narrow passage in a sheer face of rock. No other path continued the ascent and no gate barred entry, but the cleft was so narrow and the ascent so steep that none who still bore the heavy stones could ever hope to slip through.

An older woman who had finished the climb before them presented herself to the being of eyes and a gentle brush of its gossamer wing swept across her forehead. One of the letters inscribed there disappeared as a brush cleaning away a cobweb. Her eyes brimmed with joy as she tilted back her head and sang. The being joined his voice to hers and the rat trembled as the sound washed across him like a river flush with rain.

 

Beati pauperes spiritu...

Beati pauperes spiritu...

 

The old woman, garbed in rags torn down her back from the rock that had once been fixed there, folded her hands before her and with head bowed stepped into the passage and was lost to sight. The song, only three words but repeated with such conviction and depth, echoed in his mind for several long seconds before they too faded, leaving only a memory and a suggestion of something deep and lost. Charles rubbed one finger across his smooth forehead half-expecting to find letters of his own. But he felt only the sultry warmth of the soul tar fused with his flesh.

His Master had not slackened his pace once during the invocation and so together they strode past the being of eyes who regarded them in a way that the rat could not even comprehend. The eyes both followed them and ignored them. Its wings were stretched to welcome others but not them. They stepped beyond and to the narrow passage within the face of rock. As they passed within its confines the last memory of the song that gave him pause was lost.

Charles felt the walls pressing tightly against them, but there always seemed just enough room for them to slip through. He did his best to ignore the walls of the chasm as they wended through its depths; his Master showed no concern for the tightness and nearness of either face of rock. But to the rat there was a strange threat in its substance. He felt a vague sense of trespass with each step and fear that at any moment the walls would shut out the glimpse of sky overhead and collapse upon him.

The fear burned within him and he drew his arms and legs in more tightly to the center of his Master's shadow. The path was coated with lush grass beneath them despite the ascending walls, and these blades sizzled at his touch. He did not even turn to see if they would grow back as the grass beneath the feet of those crushed beneath stone had done for fear of his snout brushing against the stone cliff.

Like the previous chasm, this one ended without warning. They stood at the beginning of a new terrace. The edge of the mountain was framed by a line of bushes and trees whose branches stretched overhead in a profusion of autumn colors mixed with blossoms that sang of spring. The leaves and blossom petals lifted from the branches to dance in the air, brilliant and unbearable in the sun's penetrating light, until they painted a palette of color through the air richer than any tapestry or painting could conceive. Both descended to the ground which was lush once more with grass and fitted with stones gradually ascending another incline. Yet despite the abundance carpeting the ground it never seemed deep enough to drown the grass, and the trees only seemed to produce more of both. Their generosity could not be exhausted.

With them and through the air the sound of delicate voices reached them, and Charles strained to understand the words uttered in a language he had so often heard.

 

Et die tertio nuptiae factae sunt in Kanna Galeanae et erat mater Yasua ibi.

Vocatus est autem ibi et Yasuas et discipuli eius ad nuptias.

Et deficiente vino dicit mater Yasua ad eum vinum non habent.

Et dicit ei Yasuas quid mihi et tibi est mulier nondum venit hora mea.

Dicit mater eius ministris quodcumque dixerit vobis facite.

 

He knew the words and had heard them many times before, yet their sense escaped him. Charles felt that their meaning had somehow been stolen from him. He knew he heard each syllable correctly even if there was a subtle inconsistency in tone and delivery as if the wind itself were carrying the words, each one arriving a moment too soon or a moment too late. They were important words, words that framed and gave purpose to the terrace upon which they now stood. In his frustration, he grasped the back of his Master's cloak and pulled the fabric tight in his hands.

You trod upon mysteries sealed from time immemorial, Núrodur. You will not understand many things you see because it is not for you to understand. But I understand and will guide you. Do you fear what it is you hear?

I should know it, Master. I... remember it but cannot see it.

It is a story, beloved Núrodur. It is one where the good of another is celebrated and rejoiced. It is the surrender of the good of the self for the good of another. It is giving beyond all measure. It is the example and pattern for all who pass through this place. For those who abide here have spurned the good of others, have seethed at their blessings, and looked with grudging hatred on the benefits and good fortune of others, taking every opportunity to run them down or deprive them of their happiness. Such is not your self, Núrodur.

Charles felt the thoughts come to him so seamlessly that he could no longer discern his own from that of his Master's. And yet he also felt a deep sense of unworthiness. How much had they come through already, and how much had his Master risked for his benefit? He trembled and fell to his knees, a blaze filling him so that the ground smoked beneath him.

Nor you, Master. You have given so much for me to bring me thus far. I fear I can never repay you what is your due.

But you do, Núrodur. Now come. Let me guide you and lead your steps. Our ascent must continue.

He rose to his feet once more and the grass, darkened to cinder by his tainted presence, spread forth its green again; even the leaves gold and red that had shriveled spread forth as if they were fresh fallen from the branch. With his first steps the sound of the voice in the air faded until there was nothing but a pleasant silence. The terrace stretched forward around the mountain, always turning to the left as it coursed its way upwards, though the angle was so shallow that it seemed the horizon claimed the path before it made its turn. With the trees lining the edge he could no longer see the vast ocean; only the rich blue of the sky and the burning sun within were visible apart from the mountain itself.
They did not travel far before another voice began whispering in the air. Only four words, but they repeated over and over again. Each invocation was subtly different than the last as if they were being spoken by every soul that abode on that mountain one after other.

 

Vobis diligite inimicos vestros...

Vobis diligite inimicos vestros...

Vobis diligite inimicos vestros...

 

The words made him look to his Master and his snout creased a smile. Despite the shadow casting a gray pall over him he felt he could see his Master more clearly and with greater detail than the surrounding path. His long black hair was smooth and shimmered with silver; each strand was so perfectly aligned that it did not seem a collection of thousands of fibers but a single piece that graced his back. His ears came to sharp points that were aligned with a precision that was the envy of any geometer. His skin was smooth and pearl white that reveled in its own illumination. Though he gazed forward the rat knew the priceless blue of his eyes and savored it as the only blue he loved. His garment, touched by the rat but unburned, was an effervescent white with no seam or stitch to mar its perfection.

In whose shadow would he rather be?

The voice in the air continued its recital, though the words shifted so that his own attention wandered about the sward. Their ascent had finally brought them into the company of others making their way upward. Sharing the terrace with them were more people than he could count, each of them draped in a long gray cloak and each of them fumbling their way forward, arms outstretched to feel at the air, while others had collapsed on the ground and crawled. Some managed to head in the right direction, while others bounced off the mountain's face, and others tangled themselves in the trees. Yet none managed to slip past the trees and fall down the steep slope to the terrace below. They had arrived here and could not go back, despite their fumbling steps and blind groping.

It took the rat a few minutes to determine why the people here stumbled about. One of them was crawling in their direction with head lifted and ears turned at the sound of the sizzling grass beneath Charles's toes. Like the rest he was covered from head to toe in a heavy gray cloak but it was not the cloak obscuring his vision. Much like a falcon in training his eyes were sewn shut by iron wire. The letter “P” was inscribed in his wrinkled forehead six times. Charles almost tripped over his own feet as he stared at the man's face, noting the way his muscles twitched and lips moved. Words came from the man's tongue, words in a language that he knew and understood without his Master's aid.

“The fields on the other side of the stream always grow fresher and lusher! My field is strewn with rocks! How I wish to heave them all across the stream. How I wish to spew salt from my lips at his crops. The sight of it makes me livid for all to see. Livid!”

Others spoke as well and the rat flinched from their voices, grateful that grasping blind man was left behind as they continued. But the multitudes would not be silent and he could not shut out their voices.

“How could he be accepted as a knight! He has no skill only family to speak for him!”

“I spit on every stone he has ever stepped upon!”

“I will never take a coin from that one's hand; they must be ill-gotten for a wretch like he could never earn it on his own.”

“Ah, to have lush fur like she; I cannot see it without wanting to shave it all!”

This last made the rat's head turn, for it could only be spoken by a Keeper, but in the midst of so many bodies moving to and fro up the gentle incline he could not find any sign of beastly countenance. But even with that he knew none of the voices and soon he felt himself drowning in them. Charles put his hands to his ears and pressed them tightly against his head.

Unlike the previous terrace the stone steps showed no images. Nor were there any statues but there were several large rocks that rose up in the midst of the path; if there were rhyme or reason behind their position he could not tell. One would block a section of trees from view, while another seemed to be a boulder fallen from the heights above. None of them were directly in the path his Master chose, and so Charles could only see them from a distance.

The terrace itself seemed to narrow and widen as if the mountain itself were breathing. Yet the number of gray-cloaked blind men and women did not diminish, and they pressed close to his Master's shadow many times though not one of them ever fell within it. Charles hissed at those who came close and whose voices he could not keep out, but slowly the sound of them began to wane. His ears felt hard beneath his grip, though they yielded to his touch and obediently remained against the top of his head, even after he lifted his hands.

A long stretch of the terrace was strewn with upthrust rocks that seemed fingers pointing to the sky and into this they finally had to weave. Against one of the rocks was a woman with long, dark hair. Her eyes, sewn shut like the rest were sunken against her protruding cheeks so that she had a skeletal appearance. There was a menace to her face. Her lips were contorted with a bitterness that seemed to cling to her much as his Master's shadow swept up around the rock and to her feet. Charles gasped when he recognized her.

She will not hear you but you may try, Núrodur.

Charles stepped toward her who fell beneath his Master's shadow and lifted his gaze. Around the iron wire sealing her eyes shut tears pressed forth. The scars that had once gouged hideous gaps in her cheeks were no more but he still knew her. His voice broke the stillness of the rocks and almost made her head turn. “Agathe.”

Her lips pursed and a moan escaped them. She dropped her head forward, hands grasping at the rock against which she pressed herself. “Why? Oh why? Men.. Men have everything. Power, privilege, freedom to decide and choose everyones' fate; all of it belongs to men. Women are left to their whims, powerless beyond the House, voiceless against the least of men! No woman is ever good enough for the world, only the House. Only men are given the World!”

“Agathe! How can you be here?”

“No, do not stand for me! No, do not stand for me you filthy man!”

Charles grimaced, as her attention seemed to be on something else in the distance. It was only her eyes sewn shut, not her ears. How could she not hear his voice? “Agathe! You murdered Wessex! He suffers under the hideous rule of Tallakath!”

Her voice almost cackled before it began to shriek with such ferocity that the rat almost stepped back. “I do not want your kindness! You boorish man! Stop it! I am not feeble! I am not!”

“Wessex was a good man! He will never know peace. Why are you here? Why you!” Charles lifted his arms and felt his hands sizzle in his fury. But before he could reach out for her he recalled his Master's words from before. There was nothing he could do and it was not his place to do it to bring anything more to this woman. He let his arms fall to his sides and shook his head. “My friend Wessex will never know peace. And here you are bemoaning some man? You are pathetic, Agathe. You are to be pitied.”

“I hate man! I hate him! Hate him! Hate him! Hate...” Agathe's anger seemed ready to explode in some violent eruption. Charles remembered well seeing the frightening power she once wielded as she chased them across the frozen wasteland of the Barrier Mountains. It was her spell that had left him living stone for nearly five months.

But there was no more power in her. The anger fell to anguish as more tears squeezed between her sealed eyelids and her face fell into her hands. Her choking sobs wracked her body with spasms. Charles blinked in astonishment at the words babbled in that dereliction. “I hate being a woman. Why wasn't I a man? Why was I so much less; just a woman? Oh, Zagrosek, why? Why?”

And then like a wisp of air, she slipped down from the rock and crawled away and upwards weeping. Charles stared at her until he lost sight of her in the midst of the stones and the other penitents trapped and blind. For a moment he felt something stirring in his essence, some measure of pity and not derision. But then he recalled Wessex who spent every waking moment keeping away from the monstrous gardeners in the zoo of pestilence that was Tallakath's domain and all sympathy for the Runecaster was erased.

“May you remain here until the end of all ages, Agathe.”

She is not your concern, Núrodur. Do not allow yourself to seek a justice beyond you. For though justice is your call you are not permitted to strike beyond certain boundaries, is this not so?

It is, Master. Forgive me for my anger. But this one hurt so many that are dear to me. And those she hurt suffer worse. You saw what Wessex endures!

Do you believe she gave willing consent to all that her hands wrought? Or was she controlled by another?

Charles sighed and lowered his gaze into his Master's shadow at his feet. He could not see where the shadow ended and his toes began. It was the will of another doing all that I blame her for, Master.

Without consent can you find her worthy? No.

Charles thought nothing more as he followed his Master through the remaining rocks and up the incline. The many people surrounding them no longer crawled about but reclined against the few rocks and the side of the mountain. The stone was a uniform gray that matched the color of their cloaks. Even the trees, once delightful in their colors, seemed muted and did not offer forth their bounty with such abandon.

While the incline did increase, the slope never became so steep that the rat was forced to all fours to navigate. But he did crouch lower as they ascended step by step upward. The terrace narrowed until all that remained was a path no more than ten steps across. The trees dwindled until they were only bushes overlooking a perfectly smooth descent toward the previous terrace and the plain and forest below. Charles peered over the edge for a time wondering why it was that he only ever seemed to see one side of the peak. What was on other side, or was there truly only the one side and the curve of the mountain a necessary illusion masking its infinite extent?

Though the people in gray cloaks were not as numerous, they still huddled against the mountainside. Not a one of them was spared the iron wire holding their eyes fast, though from all tears seeped forth and darkened their cheeks. Their bodies were frail and yet there was a suppleness to them that gave their motions a certain purpose and elegance. As he studied them he saw two rise up from the wall, each gripping the other on the shoulders, and then the pair helped each other scale the stone steps toward the lip overhead. Neither gained an inch on the other, despite their best efforts to push each other ahead of themselves.

Voices filled the air again, but this time Charles could not make sense of what they said. His Master seemed not to hear the voices; and if he did he paid them little heed. There was a strange but beguiling melody that coursed through them and for a moment he tried to lift one ear to capture it but the flesh was stuck fast to his head. By the time he raised one arm to pry it lose the song was gone.

The path flattened as they came over the lip of the incline and before them stood another fissure and another being of light wrapped from bottom to top in a wreath of eyes and six silken wings. The rays of light scattered across the grassy field, reflecting from every stone at the same angle with which it struck. The two men who had climbed before him fell down on their knees before that strange being of eyes. Its wings brushed across their faces each in turn and both gasped and sang with joy. Another “P” vanished from their foreheads.

His Master and he walked past the being of eyes without pausing. The creature – something Charles knew he should know but could not name – noted them but made no effort to stop them from reaching the fissure leading upward to the next terrace. Charles shrank from what little gaze it offered and clutched to his Master's robe. He shut his eyes as they stepped into the gap and felt only the shadow at his feet.

Yet in a way he still saw the path before them. His Master's thoughts gently intruded into his own, and what he saw was, after a fashion, also visible to the Núrodur. It was not the same but akin to gazing out of a high window. He could see a border of darkness around the scene as if he were set back from the window by a few paces, but the path with enclosing fissure was clear. A quiet determination guided his steps and he allowed himself to be carried along by it. No discomfort touched him as the walls pressed inward.

But when they reached the next terrace, Charles only opened his eyes a moment before shutting them tight again in pain. A choking smoke filled the air of the terrace, leaving all a vast plain of rock. The acrid smoke made his nose squirm and so clouded the air that it seemed darker than night. Yet the scratching pain the roughness had inflicted on Charles seemed to matter not a whit to his Master who kept his eyes open and gazed with unrivaled calm upon the scene. They had arrived at the third terrace and its environment was only one more through which they must pass. His Master did not slow his pace and Charles, after rubbing his hands across his face and pressing his eye lids firmly down across his eyes to keep out the least particle of smoke, hastened to follow him.

Yet even the indeterminate window of barren rock beneath the choking blanket was only one vision that came to him. Slipping into his consciousness with an even greater vivacity was a scene set in a massive temple with intricate stone-work below, columns as wide as a horse was long, and a heavy ceiling far overhead. A group of men with long beards and flowing robes argued with a young child not yet entering into maturity who was dressed in the garb of a commoner. There was nothing about the child's physical appearance that distinguished him – though all had the bronzed skin of desert life that Charles himself had once borne – and yet there was something indescribably beautiful about him. He glowed with this inner glory as he dealt with the incredulous and sometimes ill-tempered men.

Charles felt a strange sense of loss as his mind was captured by the vision, a seeing that was error but not false. Who was this child? Had he not known?

Into the vision another two figures stepped, a woman and a man, both also dressed in common clothes that seemed poor compared to the beautiful robes garbing the bearded men who disputed with the child. The mother and father, Charles knew, but there was more. He had seen the woman before. Her beauty was deeper than her sun and sand-roughed skin. In regarding her the rat felt a measure of the comfort and simplicity he'd experienced when stepping upon the white step just before the gate.

Her voice was the first to join the images with sound. Fili quid fecisti nobis sic ecce pater tuus et ego dolentes quaerebamus te.

There was anguish in the voice, but no anger. No recrimination in the question. Merely a desire to understand. The response was offered with a love that made the child seem the wiser and the one with authority. Quid est quod me quaerebatis nesciebatis quia in his quae Patris mei sunt oportet me esse.

The boy then stood and took his mother's hand and left the bearded men to argue amongst themselves. And with that the vision faded leaving him alone with his Master's gaze of smoke. Charles tightened his grip on the cloak and followed after, gasping for breath, his voice wheezing through the choking fume. Though the taste was bitter and made him yearn to cough, he seemed able to breath it in anyway. He lifted his head toward his master though the view that filled his mind did not change.

Did you see it too?

I did, Núrodur. It is an example for those dwelling in this place. There are many others that they continue to see. Were we to remain here for a time we would see them and also the reason why they must pass through this place of smoke. It pains you, Núrodur?

It does, Master. Even as the admission came to him he felt the fire in his flesh simmer.

His Master's presence soothed the pain from the heat though the heat remained. You know this place, Núrodur, for you have crafted it of your own. It is a heritage that you share with many others. Through my eyes you may see them again ere we leave here for the terrace above. Do not be afraid. Do not waver. The light will return. In my shadow you remain. No harm can come to you.

Together they walked across the stony path. Unlike the previous two terraces where the grass sward had smoothed out the path so that they made a gentle climb even when the road became steep, here the rock was jagged with numerous faces so that they would be climbing up one moment and then crossing level ground the next. Charles briefly attempted to slip his feet into the stones but the soul tar permeating his flesh prevented him from even wiggling a claw through its substance.

Though even with his Master's vision they could only see a short distance ahead before the smoke became too thick to penetrate, they still began to glimpse other people in the murk. They witnessed mostly men but women too wandering and blindly groping about the stones, their faces contorted both from the pain without and some interior anguish that Charles assumed came from some vision they experienced but which they were spared. Their attire was a mix of styles from tunic and breeches to robes to heavy fur-lined cloaks. Some wore the ruins of bronze armor and others dented plate.

The first whose shape captured his attention was a Keeper in the shape of a squat thistle-furred boar. His snout was twisted and wrinkled with a sullen fury as he cupped one arm over his belly. He stumbled toward them and so in the few moments before they continued past he could see that the flesh was split there as if he'd been disemboweled. Charles wished he could remember the boar soldier's name.

Nor was he the only Keeper or fantastic creature they passed as they struggled through the smoke and up the disjointed face of rock. A bear Keeper also stumbled by them, though his back was to them so Charles saw only his outline. And then he glimpsed as a silhouette in the form of a falcon spreading his wings and tilting back his head to offer a screeching lament. Crawling across their path was a man cursed into the shape of a lizard with a mottled brown scales and a blunt snout; across his back, completely stripped of any garments so that he more resembled a beast than a man, were several cuts from a blade that seared deep and exposed pearl-white bone. Chasing after him was a child of no more than twelve who waved his arm about as if he were swinging a sword; he tripped over the lizard's tail, smashed his face into the stone, and then climbed back up and ran off into the darkness.

It was only as they stepped past a strange creature with long tail, sharp claws, and hunched posture that was covered in both scales and feathers who cried a chittering wail as it beat its head against the stone that Charles first noticed men in tattered robes bearing a heraldry he remembered. Though there robes were of various colors and most were shredded and hung in strips, the symbol they bore on their breast appeared untouched by the ravages they had suffered. He saw a red shield in which had been inscribed a upturned hand; nestled with the palm was an alabaster sword whose tip reached into the fingers.

Sondeckis.

Charles felt his heart pound in his chest and warmth filled not just his skin but his whole being at the sight. Through his Master's eyes he noted their faces, hoping to find some he recognized. But the Sondeckis order had lasted for millennia and every year a dozen or more would suffer violent deaths. In times of war there would be hundreds who would fall in battle. How many of them still walked this terrace, stumbling in the smoke of rage that choked them and kept them here? None of those he saw were of the Sondeckis of his day. All of them were brothers in the order but strangers still.

Their faces were set in a rictus of pain as they clenched shut their eyes. Scowls of fierce anger as of a Sondecki untrained were frozen there, and he felt a terrible pity for them. Could they not find their Calm? For a moment Charles thought to seek his own but could not remember what it had been. A wave of frustration filled him and his flesh simmered; he could feel the scorch marks beneath his Master's shadow left behind by his every step.

Do you wish to feel as they?

His Master's thought was curious, or so Charles sensed. He wanted to take a deep breath to help still the torrent of his own Sondeck denied peace, but hacked on the smoke as soon as he tried. He swept one arm before his face to clear the air but there was nothing to clear. The very air and smoke were one and the same.

When he finally stopped coughing he willed his thought to be clear. They are of my order. They are family to me. They are Sondeckis! Like my son! Why are they here?

Because they must be here. Do you see all Sondeckis here?

No. But there are so many!

There is one you know. See.

Charles almost blinked open his eyes but allowed himself to sink deeper into the window through his Master's gaze. Ahead of them along the path, just visible through the smoke and darkened subtly by the lay of his Master's shadow, stood a man garbed in a tattered black robe. Disheveled hair just as black hung down to his neck and fell across his ears. Long-fingered hands were pressed to his chin as he bowed his face, lips moving as if he were praying. His broad face, marked by the letter “P” five times, brought back memory after memory to the rat and tears tried to force their way through his eye lids.

“Krenek!” He cried, his voice piercing the thick cloud and echoing back to him from the mountainside. His fellow Sondecki lowered his hands and lifted his head though he did not turn toward them. Charles stretched out an arm beyond his Master, stepping so close that his face brushed his robes.

This one you love, do you not, Núrodur?

There is no greater pain I received from Marzac than having to fight this man, Master.

We shall wait while you speak to him. Say what you must. But we cannot bring him with us nor move him a step closer to the next terrace until it is his time.

Charles waited until they had reached his childhood friend and dearest brother among the Sondeckis. His Master turned slightly so that Charles could look Zagrosek full in the face through his Master's eyes, but he could not see himself in that gaze. Zagrosek's eyes were pressed shut but there were no lines of pain as there had been in the others. It was not peace but a strange resignation that lurked there behind his friend's countenance. “Krenek! Can you hear me?”

“Charles.” Krenek almost seemed to smile as he lowered his fingers from his chin and folded one hand into a fist and wrapped the other about it. “Charles, how I wish I could have found you before... before...”

“It wasn't your fault,” Charles assured, trying to reach out an arm to console him but only able to see through his Master's eyes he could not find him. “You had no idea that the Marquis had been corrupted by so terrible a force. You could never have suspected it. What happened after was not your fault!”

“Oh, Charles. There is so much we have done. There is so much that we were wrong about. How I wish I could tell you.”

“I am here, Krenek. There is nothing for you to tell. We are Sondeckis. We did our duty.”

Krenek tilted his head forward as if he were looking down at the rat with fondness. His voice was soft beneath the choking smoke; it did not seem to have the same stifling effect on him as it had on the others they had passed. “Charles, we thought we were servants of justice. We turned our rage to that end. We did, oh we did. But did we? Oh Charles, did we truly serve justice?”

“Of course we did, Krenek! We feel it in our bones. Every injustice makes our blood boil and our Sondeck fill with indignation!” Even mentioning it made the rat's body swell. He could almost feel himself sinking into the stone as his feet burned them.

“Justice... justice..” Krenek struck his chest three times with his fist and shook his head. “How strange it appears the same as vengeance when our gorge rises and our ire blossoms. Charles, do you remember when we sought Totzesond for Soud?”

The scene returned to his mind as if he had been transported back to that moment. Still garbed in Red, he and seven other Reds, his friends Zagrosek, Ladero, and Jerome amongst them, had been on a training mission south of the Darkündlicht mountains guided by two blacks. On their return journey they had become aware that they were being followed by an unseen group. For a week they had slept but two hours each night in a vain attempt to outdistance whoever pursued them. Exhausted and miserable from uncertainty, they continued onward to the mountain pass that would lead them back to the Sondesharan desert and the safety of home.

“I remember it,” Charles replied with a nod. His words hissed through his teeth like steam from a kettle. “Kankoran!”

“Oh, Charles, do you remember our wrath against the Kankoran?”

The day before they entered the mountains it became clear that they would not escape those who chased them. One of the two blacks who had guided and protected them on their journey through the fields of Makor, Soud, volunteered to remain behind to learn who followed them and promised, if it was innocent to rejoin them later, and if it was not to provide them as much time as he could. They never saw Soud again but heard the clamor of his battle from the treacherous mountain pass.. The other black, Brothus, urged them to continue on. Zagrosek felt the sting of Soud's death for their sake more deeply than the rest.

“I remember it, Krenek. I remember that night about the fire. I remember your passion, your thirst for justice for Soud's sake. I remember you calling for Totzesand! My heart burned with fire to hear it. I stood by your side and joined you in the call even when Brothus, the coward, told us we went to our deaths.”

Zagrosek shook his head and unleashed a long sigh, his dark hair falling into his face and obscuring his features. “Charles, Charles, I cannot believe that I let myself be guided by such wrath. I called for Totzesand, but why did I do so? Justice? Soud gave his life that we might escape. I destroyed his death.”

“You destroyed his murderers!”

Though they failed to convince Brothus the black to seek the justice of death for Soud's murder, all eight of the Reds agreed and they backtracked to an outcropping to prepare an ambush for the Kankoran who'd killed him. Five Purples followed them, one bearing Soud's Sondeshike as a trophy. The very sight of a Kankoran brandishing a Sondeshike made his flesh burn deep into his bones. The rat clenched his hands and gaped his jaw, his words coming not in even tones but in cries.

“You destroyed those thieves and murderers! They needed to die!”

“I put all of our lives at risk for the sake of bloodlust. For the sake of wrath. Oh Charles, what evil I did to you to convince you to join me in that fight!”

The first of the Kankoran was thrust from the ledge before they even realized the Sondeckis were there. The other four fought with a ferocious tenacity matched only by the zeal of Zagrosek. Charles had yearned to watch his friend grapple with the Kankoran wielding the Sondeshike but he had his own life to defend. One of the Kankoran had forced him to the edge of a deep chasm and with another series of punches and kicks or blows of magic would have sent him hurtling to his death. But Ladero had come and struck from behind, saving Charles from the fall. A few moments longer and they had been victorious in the fight, and every Kankraon lay dead at their feet or at the bottom of the chasm. Even Brothus, assuring them that they went to their death and refusing to join them in the call for Totzesand, was there to help protect them as was his duty, but no fire of justice burned in his veins.

“They were going to kill us, Krenek! They were murderers and would have killed us too.”

But his friend could only shake his head. He beat his chest with his fists and wept. “My dear Charles. I thought I loved justice. I did. I know I did. But that day I let it become vengeance. I let justice be led by wrath. I celebrated by taking Soud's Sondeshike for my own. What other evils have I done with it? How much blood has it shed?”

“No, Krenek! You saved our lives! I will not believe this about you!”

“I hated the idea of a Kankoran holding our weapons...”

Charles saw in his mind a image of a raccoon holding a long staff. He snarled, slashing with his arms until the image was torn apart.

“I hated it so much..” Zagrosek lifted his head and for a moment it seemed as if he would open his eyes. But though the muscles in his face shifted, his eye lids never lifted. “And taking that Sondeshike... what did it do to me? Oh Charles, what did it do to you whom I loved more than any other as my dearest brother! Have you learned yet? Have you?”

“Learned what, Krenek?”

But he turned his face away and pressed his hands against his cheeks. His fingers trembled and dug at the skin of his forehead as if he would tear it free. But the flesh remained intact. Charles stretched out his arm but could not find where to place it to touch his friend.

“What do I need to learn, Krenek? Why are you speaking like this? You were a good man and a great Sondecki!”

When he lifted his gaze there was a look of peace on his features, though one filled with melancholy. “Oh Agathe. Despite what it made us do, I did love you. I wish you would have accepted that.”

“Krenek! It's me, Charles Matthias. Talk to me here! That... that... woman cannot help you!”

“Agathe, forgive me for not doing better. I wish I had been stronger. I wish... it is past now. All of it. All of it gone from us. I only hope you have a little love for me.”

“Krenek Zagrosek! Listen to me!” Charles slashed his arms in front of him but could not find purchase. Had he even been talking to his friend at all? Had anything he said been heard? He screamed in protest and blinked open his eyes, determined to find him.

The smear and touch of smoke lanced into his brain and he gasped from the pain. The only glimpse he had before he fell down to the ground scratching at his face was of Zagrosek several feet in front of him turning and walking away at an angle from their path. Even his Master's vision could not penetrate the cloud of ash that obscured him after a mere five paces.

Charles continued to scream and beat at the ground with his hands and arms when he wasn't clawing at his face. The pain in his eyes was more than just having a gust of smoke blown into them. He felt as if a handful of still hot ash had been smeared into his eyes and even now sizzled away the delicate flesh. A brief memory of something hotter than a forge striking his face and marring it forever ran through his mind.

A gentle touch rested upon his back and he felt a wall settle down in his mind between him and the pain in his eyes. The pain did not diminish, but no longer did it control him. He remembered his Master and his purpose, and though his frustration at being duped by his friend and this place through which they journeyed remained, his thoughts regained their clarity.

He did not know you. He hears only the voices of this place. Hear my voice, Núrodur. It is time we continued our journey.

But why can they not see me? Why can I not speak to them? And, Master, why does he say such things?

Because you are not here in the way that he or any of the others are, Núrodur. I have let you speak to them only so that you could understand this. That is the only thing you need to learn from them. This is not your place, Núrodur. We come only to claim your son. Do you understand?

Aye, Master.

We are near the passage to the next terrace. Come.

Charles lifted one hand to find his Master's robe and felt a small relief when his fingers curled about the soft fabric. He stepped from the small hole his rage had rent in the rocks and followed blindly after his Master, seeing only that which his Master's eyes provided. But there was nothing but smoke and ash choking the air and so he lost interest, allowing even that window to dim in his mind. He breathed in and out, feeling the little pinpricks of flame catching in his lungs. The heat suffusing his limbs swelled and receded the same.

Somewhere in the distance he heard a familiar song. He listened for a time but could not remember any of the words. Eventually he glimpsed another being of light filled with eyes and a cleft in the mountainside. He moved his legs and followed into that cleft, allowing nothing to come into his mind to disturb him. The journey would go faster that way.

When they passed beyond the cleft Charles could see another path of stone climbing up along the mountain. The air was clear again and the sun shone bright. But when he tried to open his eyes he saw nothing but darkness. The ash had scoured him blind.

Master! I cannot see!

Be not afraid, Núrodur. The injury is not serious and will be healed. For now, feel through which you abide and trust in what I show you.

Charles tightened his grip on his Master's cloak and let his eyelids droop closed. Through his Master's gaze he could see the new terrace upon which they stood. The stone path stretched a good dozen paces from the side of the mountain to an abrupt edge overlooking the cliff down. On every side he could see and feel the rush of people as they darted to and fro. Some ran up the path and others ran down. Some would run toward the edge and then bank at the last moment only to bounce back off the mountain face to do it again. Not a one of them paused in their running to even try to catch their breath.

In the chaotic mix his Master stepped and Charles followed. The angle of the path was not steep but he could tell that they were climbing upward. Each step required him to lift his foot just a little from the pool of shadow beneath him. And despite the fact they walked in the middle of the path, not a single one of the souls running rampant about them came close enough to step in that shadow. Charles could feel the reverberation of their pounding steps but of them he could not catch more than a brief glimpse.

Into his mind he saw a beautiful woman with determined gaze traveling through a hilly country. But the image slipped away from him before he could study it more.

The pounding of feet on rock was so loud that it took Charles a moment to realize that not only was everyone running about but that they were also shouting as they ran. Their voices were clear and overlapping. Not a one of them sounded fatigued from their ceaseless activity. But their passage was so quick he only caught snatched of what any of them had to say.

“I lingered too long when my friends were in need.”

“Why go today when we can tomorrow?”

“I should have acted! I should have...”

“The Mother acted in haste.”

“Why do anything? It never works...”

“Pelain did not hesitate at the mountain!”

“Loose the arrow! Loose the arrow!”

“To sleep and to dream! What else have I done!”

“Benedicta tu inter mulieres et benedictus fructus ventris tui!”

Charles wished he could shut the voices out but no matter how he turned his head over covered his already folded ears their voices continued to intrude. What was worse was that he heard many of them speaking in languages he neither knew nor recalled ever hearing before. Their voices especially came to him as if taunting him to understand.

He also attempted to swipe his arms at any of the people running past, but as he could only see through his Master's eyes he never even came close to anyone. His hands constantly snatched at empty air. He felt like a caged beast on a cart swiping its paw through the bars at any who passed by or stopped to gawk.

The only thing he could touch was the shadow at his feet. After several minutes of flailing his arms like a fool he let them fall to his side and drag along the ground. Around him he sensed the running and cavorting of the souls no matter which direction they went. He could feel his Master's feet stepping one after the other. They were measured and unhurried and yet their pace was a challenge to match. The shadow stretched and shifted with each step, covering this rock and then that, moving forward to meet his feet and then sliding to one side and then the other as the rocks shifted their angle from the sun.

Charles could feel the cool of the rock and the warmth of the sun that had touched them as the shadow passed over each. Little snatches of grass that clung to the mountain that had yet to be trampled underfoot by the souls in their zealous rush, bent beneath the flow of shade as if it were not merely a lack of light but a tangible film of its own. He marveled at the sensations and in that astonishment for the first time since he had heard the stomping of the runners was no longer distracted by their cacophony.

He felt a strange elation at knowing where his Master stepped without having to hold onto his cloak. He lifted his arms for a moment before crouching down and putting them on the ground too. He followed after on all fours, submersing as much of himself in the cool shade as he could. For the first time since entering the gate he felt the heat in his flesh abate. He did not even need to see with his Master's eyes and let the vision there fade until it was a mere glimmer of light. But it was always there as his Master was always there.

Núrodur Nuruhuinë.

I am.

Núrodur Nuruhuinë.

I am, Master.

He sensed a hesitation then in the presence about him, as if a question were being asked that he could never be privy to. And then he felt a moment of solitude as the hesitation and with it his Master's focus left him. Their pace quickened up the side of the mountain and the rat scampered after as low to the ground as he could.

Though he did not hear the voices of everyone shouting around him anymore, he still felt the thumping of their feet on the rock. But even that was a pleasant thrumming like a gentle massage after a weary day of labor. To this he allowed his thoughts to wander even as he felt through the shadow, pushing it to reach out to those many feet.

In the sound he surprised himself to hear a pattern begin to emerge like a ship from fog. There was a meter and a rhythm that repeated over and over again, gaining in strength and clarity. And as the rat twisted his head back and forth in time to the beat, he heard something more within it. Not only was there a beat but there was also a melody. As the individual notes blended together into both song and harmony, Charles felt burdened by a great sadness. It spoke of loss, a loss he himself felt. But it was not the son that was lost. Charles turned his head toward the edge of the path and the sea below that he might better hear it.

Behold, Núrodur. We approach one that you once knew.

Charles stood from the shadow and, with one last blind glance toward the edge of the cliff, let his focus return to the window of light he received from his Master's vision. The path swelled into view and the sun's illumination gave it warmth and color. His attention quickly found the one of whom his Master spoke. Running in a circle and chasing his own black-and-white striped tail was the Weathermonger Yonson. Even in death he retained the shape of the lemur that he'd born for but a single year of his life.

Yonson's golden eyes were wide disc as large as plates and his arms stretched outward to grasp at the end of his tail as he dashed in an ever tightening circle. How he did not fall down from dizziness the rat could not imagine. Upon his brow the letter “P” was inscribed four time and like the rest he shouted with every breath in his lungs. Curious, Charles listened to what words came from his short snout.

“I did not do enough! I thought I was clever but I was frightened! I did not do enough! I thought I was clever but I was frightened! I did not do enough! I thought I was clever but I was frightened! I did not do enough!”

On and on he continued repeating those same words. Charles opened his mouth to interject, but then shook his head and dropped back to all fours.

He will not hear me anyway, Master.

No he will not. Very good, Núrodur. You have learned.

Yonson ran a circle about them without ever touching them, his paws dancing through the shadow for a moment before they left him behind. The rat sank back into shadow and remained there trailing obediently after his Master.

He was not sure how long it was that they walked before they reached the top of the terrace. He shrank as far into the shadow as he was able as they stepped past the being of eyes and wings. Though he could only see him through his Master's vision, he felt as a bit of parchment shriveling as it was consumed by flame in its presence. He hissed and seethed as they entered the fissure, until his Master's voice touched his mind once again.

You have done well to come this far, Núrodur. Three terraces more await us. And then we shall have your son.

Charles scraped his claws against the stone, searing it as he did, eager to finish the journey at long last. As they climbed through the fissure he pondered what his boy looked like, trying to remember every detail of his little Ladero. His fur had been dark on his head and down his shoulders as if he wore a black cloak and hood. His chest and arms had been covered in white fur and his claws were the same. He had dark eyes like all his other children, but alone of all of them his seemed brighter than the soft, black fur around them. His tail had been a piebald mix of both as if at the last he couldn't decide which color he preferred.

He felt a small smile grace his snout as he recalled the sound of his son's voice. He had not even been two months old when Charles had been forced to leave his family behind at the Glen, and so he had no words to offer his father. But each of his children had already learned to squeak and those squeaks were as unique as their fur. Ladero's had been pitched high, but with a little curl at the end as if he were going to dip into song. Charles yearned to hear it again.

The next terrace was all a road of stone rising upward at an angle even steeper than the last. The stone was shaped to offer little steps and landings on the way up around the mountain, and now Charles could see through his Master's eyes that the path definitely curved about it. The mountain itself was finally narrowing.

Along the rock at the base of the cliff wall lay men and women in boundless number. They lay face down with their arms prostrate before them. Their lips moved to speak but no other part of their body seemed capable of motion. His Master walked well clear of each of them as they ascended the path. Charles could feel the edge brushing against the shadow and the depth beneath them should they fall. And yet he knew that they could not fall. Those who ran below had never tripped and hurtled downward. It was not possible for the souls here to ever go back; they could only go forward and so it was for Charles and his Master.

As they slipped past the prone figures Charles felt their words touching the ground, and through the shadow felt their shape. It took some time for him to distinguish between the voices for they did not speak in rhythm. Rather each spoke at his or her own pace, which garbled the words into what seemed a senseless morass. But eventually, focusing his feelings on only parts of the shadow, he was able to make out what it was they each said.

 

Adhaesit pavimento anima mea

Adhaesit pavimento anima mea

...

 

As he made himself listen to the words and try to make sense of them, an image other than what his Master showed him flowed into his mind.

He peered into the deeps of a cave set in a desert hillside, where only a feeble lantern brought light. A cold night was without, the heavens sprinkled with stars. Within the warmth of animals and their stink pervaded. Straw rested upon the stone to give them a meager bed. Wooden slats had been arranged to keep them from escaping. A man and a woman reclined within, their faces filled with a rapturous joy. Something small stirred within the feed trough filled with bundles of coarse wool into which they gazed. In the distance song filled the air.

Charles felt an ache in his heart and a fire in his flesh as the scene slipped away from him. He knew the story, and he knew he had loved the story. But it was gone and he held only scraps. Why could he not remember any of these things anymore? What had happened to him?

The rat burrowed deep within himself to find whatever he had lost. And yet, just as there was a wall in his mind to keep the pain tearing his eyes apart from overwhelming him, there seemed only to be empty shelves were once his memories had been stored. His journey had been long, and each step had crowded out more and more of what had been there before. How far had he come? Where had he even begun? He knew he had not always been climbing the mountain. He knew he had seen friends in terrible anguish before this. Their names? Wes... no, it was gone too.

But there was one thing he knew he could find. At the core of his being it still remained, a fist clenched tight and marked with a sword. Perhaps all that he had forgotten lay within its grip.

False. He...

The word came unbidden and startled Charles. It had not come from his Master. The voice was different and yet familiar.

He scampered through the shadow, concentration destroyed, and stared out through his Master's eyes at row after row of people. Men and women of all shapes and sizes muttered their prayer into the ground. He could feel their want, their desire, their groping and grasping need for something, anything. It fixed them more firmly than any bindings could upon the ground, faces turned from the light that did not burn their backs.

Charles pondered them for only a moment before sinking back within his own thoughts. He touched each of the empty shelves where memories had once been stored. Nothing had changed. The journey up the mountain was all he could find, and even then details were uncertain. How long had he been climbing? There were only three terraces more but how many had they already ascended?

He felt his Master's presence filling him and with it the determined focus and purpose to which they had undertaken. Charles lowered his snout to the shadow and snorted hot steam against the stone as he crawled up the stone path. The cries of the people sounded now like moans through his paws and through the shadow film. The view of the path grew in clarity with that presence, but this time no words were shared. Charles wished he would hear some. Any words at all. They had once mattered so much to him, but now he did not know why.

Does Núrodur need them for this?

I... I do not know, Master.

They will return. Be not afraid. Abide in my shadow and you will be safe, Núrodur Nuruhuinë.

He remained on all fours and allowed himself no thoughts for a long time even after the presence of his Master receded from his mind. There was nothing in it to find anyway. Only the hand remained there for him to inspect. It seemed to him that it was sinking into a well where it could no longer be seen. The rat, turned his thoughts from the vision of the path and the people strewn across it and let his arms and legs move him forward but nothing more.

The clenched hand. The sword. These he pondered. What were they? Why had he born them in the center of his being all his life? Questions and questions circled his thoughts until even they were lost in a maelstrom of insensibility.

Beware.

The vision of the path receded to a single mote of light. All that existed was a plain of endless darkness surrounded by walls of stone that stretched to the heavens. In the midst of that plain was a single well with a single rope descending into its depths. A small, brown rat circled the rim of the well, gazing downward at the clenched hand marked by a white sword that rested at its base. The rat gripped the rope in its tail and claws and scrambled down into the damp well that stank with putrescence.

A miserable sheen of slime coated the bottom of the well, and the rat rubbed its paws back and forth to rid itself of that muck. It scratched its ears with a hind paw, and brushed out it whiskers until it felt an acceptable measure of cleanliness restored. And then, curious at the brightness of the hand, it nibbled at the fingers and clawed with its little nails to pry up even a sliver of flesh.

A light, warm and crimson exuded from beneath the fingers. A sound like a drum throbbed within. The rat pulled and bit with all its little strength until something slipped free.

 

The sun-warmed man garbed in purple robe kept one eye on the boy as he spoke with the father. The father bore an unpleasant moue as he attempted to arrange his wares on the demonstration table for the people in the small fishing village south of Glazebrook. The boy tried not to look like he was paying attention to the affairs of grown-ups by staring at the mighty towers of Glazebrook and beyond them the southern reaches of the low-lying Amrigane mountains still green with mid-Summer trees.

“How long, Master Matthias, has your son demonstrated such remarkable strength? He carried this table by himself. He should not be able to do so at his size and age.”

The father grimaced, his brown mustache twitching and his arms trembling with the urge to rush the robed man away. “He's always been a precocious lad. Now if you'll excuse me I...”

“Just a moment more, Master Matthias. I do not mean to be a burden to you. But I must ask, does your son have difficulty controlling his temper?”

The boy scowled at the suggestion and then turned his head to watch the fishermen prepare their boats for the evening on the nearby wharf. The robed man, the Sondecki, had been watching him!

The father scoffed, “He has a temper, but many boys his age do. No I must insist...”

“Forgive me but I have another question. Does your son like to fight?”

“Of course! Of course! He has silly dreams of being a knight one day. Now please!”

The boy cast a quick glance back and saw that the man in the purple robe had lifted his hands in a calming gesture. “I will take up only a moment more of your time, Master Matthias. I would like to ask something of your son if you would permit me.”

“Fine! Fine! But stay out of sight of the wares; you'll frighten my customers.”

The robed man slipped behind the table and smiled to the boy. “Do you know what I am, young man?”

He liked being called a man and so smiled. “You are one of the Sondeckis, Mern.” The last was a title of respect given in those lands when another was not known. The boy had never met a Sondeckis but he and all in those lands knew of them; they were warriors for justice and defenders of the down-trodden.

“How right you are. Now, what is your name?”

“My name is Charles!”

The Sondecki took the boy's hand in his own and held it gently. “Well, Charles, I would like you to do one thing for me. Close your eyes and imagine your heart. Can you do that?” The boy nodded and closed his eyes, picturing his heart beating in his chest. “Now, put everything you know and love into your heart. Imagine everything filling it to the brim. Fill it up, leave nothing outside of it. Everything you are, everything you know, and everything you will should be inside this heart.

“Now, enclose the heart with a single hand. Close it tight and let nothing escape. Can you do that?” Again, the boy nodded, willing everything he could think of, and everything he loved, his father and mother, their horses, their wares, the green trees, the grass, the mountains and rivers, and all the stories he yearned to hear about the evening fire when his family shared its nightly meal. Everything went into his heart.

“Now I want you to put a mark on that hand. You choose the mark. Have you done that? Good. Do not tell me what it is just yet. Keep the secret just a moment longer. Now... open up the hand.”

The boy did as he was told and a smile crossed his face.

“Do you feel calm?”

“I am, Mern. I feel calm!” For the first time in ages he felt no anger or frustration, no sense of disquiet to make him anxious or disagreeable. He was calm like a morning lake touched by fog. He was as still as the mountain rock. He did not even yearn to boast of this joy to his mother or father to whom he had always told every little triumph.

“Very good. I am glad to hear it. Now, Charles, tell me... what mark did you choose for the hand about your heart?”

“A sword! I chose a sword, Mern!”

The robed man smiled and stood, patting the boy on the head. He turned back to the father and coughed to get his attention. The boy's father grimaced beneath his mustache. “You should be proud of your son, Master Matthias. He is of the Sondeckis!”

 

Charles blinked and willed the hand to close tightly again. The well and plain were no more. The pinprick of light swelled back until he felt as if they were his own eyes. The walls pressed tight against his mind and he felt his limbs sloshing through the shadow as if wading in an ankle-deep pond. He blinked open his real eyes and for a moment saw light fill them. There was the mountain path and its parade of prone bodies all moaning their sins and their prayers into the rock. The shadow touched none of them.

His Master stopped and turned to face him. Núrodur... are you all right?

But Charles ignored the question for a moment, his eyes, his true sight, marred by the cloud of ash, nevertheless beckoned him toward the figures of men. One in particular called to him. The sound of the voice, rough and impatient, the blonde of the hair now gone white at the edges, the mustache filled with gray, the arms once thick from lifting and carting goods from village to village now weak and empty, all of it was known to him.

“Father?” Charles called to him, turning in the shadow to stretch out a hand toward the man who he'd only known for seven years. “Father? It is I, Charles, your son! Father!”

He does not hear you, Núrodur. Núrodur! The shadow!

But Charles could not hold back. He jumped out of the shadow to where his father lay prone, eager to touch him one last time. Eager to tell him of his love one last time.

And then writhed on the ground, his flesh a living flame and his scream echoing in his mind until all he could hear and think was the shattering of glass. Brilliant crimson plumes engulfed him and then everything went black and all went silent and only the flame abode in him.

Núrodur?

Flame! Pain! All is dark!

Núrodur? You are safe again. Listen to my voice.

He did not move so much as shift, awareness following the voice back through a maze of flaming walls on every side. But the flame gave off no light; it was too hot for even that to escape the burning.

Núrodur Nuruhuinë. Follow my voice. Follow me. Abide in the shadow. You are safe there and only there. Come, Núrodur.

And he did. Núrodur followed the voice, the command, the call that he received. He knew the path beneath him again. He knew the sensation of bodies prostrate against the cliff wall. He knew the pool of shadow beneath him. He knew the sound of his Master's voice.

It is only a little further, Núrodur. Your son awaits.

Yes. That he knew too. His son. He followed after, his touch scorching the stone black and sending up rivulets of smoke. His voice hissed and wheezed, his mouth hanging agape. All else had been effaced. Núrodur Nuruhuinë followed his Master.

 

 

Wednesday, June 23, 724 CR, Early Evening

 

To Charlie's astonishment, his father crumpled atop the saddle blanket and bale of hay, tears streaming from his eyes. The golden horse stabled behind him lowered its head and nudged him with its muzzle. Charlie set the empty goblet aside and took the few steps to where his father wept. He knelt and put a hand on his father's shoulder. “I... I'm sorry. You saw... you saw your father there...”

Baron Charles Matthias let out another gasp and then shut his eyes tight. He rubbed his hands across them, fingers trailing through the scarred rent over his right eye. “I did. I saw my father.”

Charles looked up slowly, anguish writ plain upon his rodent muzzle, whiskers backed and ears flat while the golden horse brushed its broad nose against the back of his neck. “Until that moment when I raised my eyes and saw him as he had become, I never realized that I had forgotten what he looked like! Charlie, I had forgotten!” With a shaky hand Charles rested the pad and claw of one finger against his temple. “But, to this day, I have only to close my eyes and I see him as I saw him in that moment. Not the man who stared with anger at the Sondeckis who took me from the market stalls, but the frail man of age and weariness. And I wonder; did he know what became of me, Charlie? What became of his son?”

He lifted one arm to pat the horse on the snout and then pushed himself back up. He offered Charlie a feeble smile. “I had not seen him since I was seven years old. In the Southlands, when a child with the Sondeck is discovered, they are sent to Sondeshara for training. Some families will go with them, but mine did not. I never saw him again. Nor my mother.”

Charlie had seen into the dreams of many a Keeper who had lost father or mother to war, accident, or illness. It was a misery that always drove him to find a good cup. He had never imagined his own sire suffering from so bitter a loss.

“Have you never searched for her?”

But his sire shook his head. “If she lives she is somewhere in Kitchlande. That country is vaster than the Steppe. It would take me years to search it and I have not the time. Nor can I leave family for it. I can merely hope and pray for her sake. And my father...” his voice choked up again but he took several deep breaths and stilled the tremor. “For my father I pray every day. I have Liturgy offered for him.”

“Does the rest of the family know?”

“Only your mother. Do you.. have any more of that wine?”

Charlie glanced at the cup he'd left on the floor and shook his head. “I can fetch more for you, Father.”

But Charles shook his head. “No, it is fine. There is not much left to tell. Let me compose myself and I will continue. Sit, my son. We're almost there.” Charles cast his gaze down, folding his hands upon his lap, and took a long breath. “When I was seven, Charlie, a man took me away from my family because of the power that was born to me.” Charles spoke without raising his gaze. “I have the Sondeck; you have the Dream. In that, are we – you and I – so very different?”

Charlie ran his fingers along the golden horse's mane for a moment as he gazed at his father. He did not know what to feel anymore. With nothing else to do, he took out his chewstick and gnawed while he sat and listened.