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One last, powerful spasm cast the whole of it in the straw. The mare lay for a moment, breathing hard. Then she raised her head, peering along her body at the wet and glistening thing that had come out of her.
Her nostrils fluttered. The filly stretched out her nose. They touched.
Briana’s throat closed. Maybe it was foolish, but that first touch, that moment of tender recognition, never failed to melt her heart.
The Lady’s breath tickled her ear. She pressed her cheek to the broad, flat red-brown one and trailed fingers down the soft muzzle.
The Lady had foaled in her time, Briana knew without words. It was a great thing, a blessed thing. The gods were glad because of it.
But now Briana had to be empress. Her hour’s escape had stretched too long. The empire would hardly fall about her ears, but it did need her hand to steady it—especially now that she was about to be crowned.
The Lady offered her shoulder, then her back. It would be ungracious to refuse the gift. Briana caught a handful of mane and swung astride.
Bareback and bridleless, she rode out of the stable into the sudden glare of daylight.
The outer court was full of people and horses. Most of the horses were stocky and grey or white, and most of the riders were dressed in grey or brown. They rode with a particular grace and quiet elegance that persisted even after they had dismounted.
Briana laughed for joy. Two of the riders turned together. They were shoulder to shoulder, and they were almost exactly of a height. One smiled, warmth flooding into silver eyes. The other grinned as wide and white as a boy, but there was nothing male about her.
“Kerrec!” cried Briana. “Valeria!” She hardly remembered leaving the Lady’s back or leaping toward them until she found herself with arms wrapped around both of them, hugging them tight.
Her brother let her go first and held her at arm’s length, searching her face keenly.
She had last seen him broken and half mad, all but destroyed by hatred and pain. Now he was whole again. He was beautiful.
Not that she would say such a thing—he was vain enough already. She settled for a grin and a deceptively ordinary word. “You’re looking well,” she said.
“And you,” said Kerrec. “The burden of empire agrees with you.”
“Not always,” she said wryly. “I’m running away this morning.”
“It looks as if you were running back when we came in,” Valeria said.
As Briana nodded, Kerrec caught her glance and held it. “Have you found anything?”
“Nothing out of the ordinary,” Briana answered. “And you?”
“All’s quiet,” said Kerrec.
“They’re biding their time,” Valeria said.
“I’m sure they are,” said Briana. In due time she would find that troubling, but for the moment she let the joy of their coming overwhelm everything else.
The rest of the riders had hung back, but as she turned to face them, she met a circle of smiles and the occasional grin, with here and there an inclination of the head. Since riders never bowed to any mortal, that was as royal an obeisance as she was likely to get.
She bowed to them all as was proper and greeted the Master with deep respect. “Sir. You’ve come in good time.”
“So I gather,” Master Nikos said. “We go into seclusion in the morning, but tonight we’re still in the world. Perhaps, after all our day’s duties are done, we may dine together?”
“I’ll be honored,” Briana said.
“Tonight, then,” he said.
No other words were said, but as he withdrew to duties that she had no doubt were pressing, the rest of the riders scattered as well. Kerrec and Valeria stayed, but Briana could tell they were a little torn.
“Go on,” she said. “I’ll come back tonight.”
Valeria nodded and smiled, and embraced her quickly. Kerrec took more time about it, kissing her forehead before he let her go. “It’s good to be back,” he said.
Brianna’s eyes widened slightly. After all he had been through in or for Aurelia, that was remarkable.
It was wonderful. She kissed him back and sent him on his way.
The Lady was waiting, and so were her duties. This time Briana was glad to face them. The sooner she did that, the sooner she could come back to Riders’ Hall.
Chapter Twelve
Valeria should have been reassured. The city of Aurelia was warded with such strong magics that her head buzzed. Nothing short of a god could get through such protections—and whatever the barbarian priests were, gods they were not.
Now the white gods had brought the Mountain’s power to the city. The bay Lady had been there to welcome them, and she was stronger than all of them put together.
Everything that anyone could do had been done. The Dance would be safe. So would the empress.
And yet even in Riders’ Hall, with the stallions safe in the stable and the riders settled into their rooms, Valeria could not help feeling that they had all missed something. She could not begin to say what it was, but her mind kept reaching for some scrap of knowledge it could not quite find. Something, somewhere, was not as it should be.
She would mention it tonight when they were all together. Surely others had felt it, too. They were all mages of patterns here. If a pattern was out of place, one of them should be able to detect it.
In the meantime she had horses to help settle and Quintus to meet again and a new foal to marvel at. By the time that was done, her room was ready in the hall and she was ready to rest.
She was not sharing the room with Kerrec. Beginning in the morning, all the riders would go into seclusion to prepare for the Dance. Since she was not riding in it, like the rest of the lesser riders, she would sleep and eat and perform her duties outside the wards.
She took great pains to face the separation with disciplined calm. It was not even worth acknowledging the part of her that wanted to know why she could not ride the Dance, too. Could she not master all the stallions? Was she not a stronger mage than any of them?
She was all of that. She was also a rider-candidate who had not yet been tested for Fourth Rider’s rank. Last year the stallions had insisted that she ride in the Midsummer Dance, and Oda had come down off the Mountain to carry her. This year they were silent.
The Dance would proceed according to tradition—to the riders’ manifest relief. Likewise according to tradition, Valeria would care for the stallions, wait on the riders until they went into seclusion and, when the day of the Dance came, serve as groom and servant.
There was a kind of guilty contentment in it. For once she was an honest rider-candidate. After the Dance, before the Master went back to the Mountain, she would be tested. Then if she passed, there would be a new Fourth Rider in the world.
She went about her duties with as light a heart as she had had since she received Maurus’ message. She saw that all three of her stallions were comfortable in their stalls, looked in on Kerrec’s Petra and young Alea and paused by the mare’s stall to assure herself yet again that, yes, Sabata’s daughter looked exactly like him.
The sense of unease tried to come back when she left the stable and turned toward her room. She pushed it down. She needed to rest now—her whole body ached.
Her room was one of several along a nondescript corridor. It was tiny and ascetic, but it had a window that opened on one of the riding courts. The ranking riders had the floor above. This floor belonged to the lesser riders, most of whom, like Valeria, were taking advantage of the chance to rest after the long journey.
She lay on the bed, which was not as uncomfortable as it looked. Her insides felt strangely empty.
Grania was safe. No one not of the Mountain except Valeria’s family even knew she had a child.
That was the way she wanted to keep it. If Kerrec was a rare target and Valeria rarer still, she hated to think of what their enemies might do to their daughter.
She had been going to tell Briana. Now she wondered if she should. Briana would be furious if that of all secrets was kept from her, but if it kept Grania out of danger, maybe it was worth it.
As if her thoughts had drawn him in, Kerrec squeezed himself onto the narrow bed beside her. Guilt made her voice sharp. “Don’t you have a bed of your own to lie in?”
“Yes, and it’s wider than this one, too,” he said. He made no move to go. “What are you angry at? Grania’s better off where she is. Her grandmother loves her. I’m sure her grandfather adores her.”
“And my brothers and sisters are spoiling her rotten.” Valeria scowled at the ceiling. There was a crack in the beam just where the light struck it. “I’m not sorry she’s there. She’s well out of the way of whatever’s coming. But I’m thinking maybe your sister shouldn’t know about her. No one should outside of the Mountain or Imbria.”
“No one but Briana,” he said.
“But what if she—”
“What? You think she could betray us? She’s the last person who would ever do such a thing.”
Valeria could feel the heat of his temper though his voice was calm. No wonder, too. He was right. He usually was.
She did not have too much pride to admit it. “I know that. But if something happens to Briana and it’s forced out of her, you know where they’ll go. Grania is the last of your blood. Until Briana gets herself a consort, she’s the only heir the empire has.”
“She is not,” Kerrec said—a little quickly, maybe. “I’m no longer in the line of succession, therefore neither is she. She’s a rider’s child. Blood binds her to no one but us. The riders are all the family she has.”
“Maybe so,” Valeria said, “but will that matter if the throne is empty and there’s no one else to take it? Can you think of a more valuable pawn than a baby with that breeding?”
“All the more reason for my sister to know,” he said. “She’s entitled. She’s mage enough not to let it slip.”
Valeria barely heard him. She was just now realizing what she had said. She clutched at him until he grunted in protest. “Is that it? Is that what they’re plotting? Did they find out somehow, and they’re looking to get rid of Briana and put Grania in her place? That must mean—if it goes all the way to the council—if they’re plotting to seize the empire through a regency—”
“Stop,” he said quietly but so firmly that her mouth snapped shut. “If that is what’s happening, Briana needs to know more than ever. She’s in the best position to find and stamp out the treachery in her council.”
Valeria could not reasonably argue with that. It did not keep her from trying. “I still think—”
“I know what you think,” he said. “You never have trusted the highborn. Even me.”
“That’s not true,” Valeria said.
“You know it is.” He did not sound as if the knowledge caused him much pain. “Can you trust us just this once? Let my sister know.”
“She’s your daughter, too,” Valeria said.
His brow arched. “You admit it?”
She hit him—not nearly hard enough in such close quarters, but it got his attention. “You know what I mean.”
“Then I’ll tell her,” he said.
The knot inside Valeria, with the Unmaking inside of that, swelled so large she could hardly breathe. If she had had any breath left, she might have kept on arguing. As it was, she wrapped herself around him and pressed her head to his chest and let his heartbeat bring what calm it could.
His lips brushed her hair. “She’s a rider, too, remember. Or did you forget?”
Valeria had forgotten. She flushed so hot he must have felt it through his shirt. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I haven’t been thinking.”
“Not about that,” he said. “You’ve been overly focused. It’s a weakness we all have. All we can see is the Mountain. We forget there’s anything beyond it.”
“I more than anyone should know better,” she said.
He did not deny it. But he did say, “That’s why we’ve come here—to teach ourselves to look beyond the Mountain. I need you for that, and I need my sister. The three of us are notably stronger together than apart.”
Valeria nodded. The Mountain was the empire’s heart—that was the ancient tradition. Its magic and the emperor’s were two halves of a whole.
It was significant that in this generation, both an emperor’s firstborn and his heir had been Called by the gods. That had never happened before. What it meant, even Augurs and Seers did not know.
Valeria thought she could guess. The empire’s heart and its head had been divided for a thousand years. Now they were to come together.
Grania might be the key. Or she might not.
Valeria could not see her daughter on the throne. None of the patterns around her pointed toward the empire. She was meant for the Mountain. Briana’s heir must be the one who would do it—or maybe Briana herself.
First they all had to survive the coronation. Then Briana had to live long enough to take a husband and bear a child. Any plot against her would do its best to prevent that. It did not even have to kill her—simply keep her from doing her duty.
Or better yet, it could corrupt her. If she turned against the Mountain—
That would never happen. The Lady would not let it.
She might if it suited her divine and inscrutable purpose.
Valeria’s head had begun to pound. All these gods and emperors and plots and counterplots were more than her poor peasant brain could stand. Life should be simple. Death should be clean, not tainted with Unmaking.
It was her fault for stumbling into this world of power and princes. If she had stayed in Imbria as her mother wanted her to, none of it would be any concern of hers—at least until the darkness came and everything vanished into it.
That was the trouble with destiny. Sooner or later it swallowed everyone. Valeria could be simple mindless prey, or she could fight back. She had that choice.
She held on to Kerrec as if he had been a rock in a storm. His arms were secure around her and his magic blessedly safe around that. For this little while, nothing could touch or trouble her.
She was not a woman to submit blindly to any man’s protection. But she was also a mage, and she was learning to accept that the occasional power might be stronger than hers.
Kerrec’s certainly was. Someday she might be his equal in skill—as in raw strength she was his superior—but for now she was an apprentice and he was a master.
It was unusually humbling to contemplate that. Humility was a rider’s virtue. It was good for her to cultivate it.
Sleep was closing in on her. She fought it by reflex, then sighed and let it have its way.
Chapter Thirteen
After her morning’s fit of truancy, Briana found the weight of the day a little lighter. She had eluded a council and a session of the court, but one duty she was pleased to perform. It was the first rite of her coronation, the first step that would seal her to the empire.
It was also the oldest of the rites and the most nearly solitary, with no one to share in it but the gods’ servants who celebrated it with her. Part of its lesson was humility and part was remembrance—of who she was, what she was and where she had come from. Before every court and every gathering of the people, she was to remember that in her essence she was alone. No one else could be what she was or share what she had, either the good or the ill.
The rite began shortly after noon, as the long summer day began its slow descent into evening. Priests and priestesses of Sun and Moon met her in the palace, blessed and consecrated her and led her outside the city by a way that was only taken when the imperial heir was about to be crowned.
