Crown of Vengeance

Vieliessar’s warhorns sounded the victory, and the long, slow process of searching the castel began. Some of Laeldor’s Household knights had been taken prisoner; most had been slain. Some had been in the castel stables when Laeldor’s defenses were breached, and when the outer court cleared, they chose to ride out and die in battle. Prince Avirnesse’s older siblings and their households had used the concealed passageway to make their escape. But Nadalforo had discovered the horses waiting at the exit from the tunnel, and took Ablenariel’s children and the rest prisoner when they arrived to claim them.

Vieliessar learned these things piece by piece as the day unfolded, as messengers reached her and her captains made their reports. I must be grateful the casualties were no greater than they are, she told herself. A keep was not a battlefield, and for every lawful target presented to Vieliessar’s knights, there were a hundred that were not. Servants, craftworkers, Lightborn, the noble companions of the Lord and Lady of the keep—none of them wore armor or carried a sword. Most had not been injured, and those who were had escaped with minor injuries.

And my Lightborn are here to Heal them, and to Heal the Laeldor knights who have given their parole, and if we wished, we might all fight again tomorrow as if this battle had never taken place, she thought bitterly.

Tonight there would be a banquet, and she would play her part in the time-honored ritual, taking formal possession of the castel and the domain of the War Prince she had defeated in battle. She would give, if not justice, judgment, and celebrate her victory, such as it was. Every Lightborn here, whether hers or Laeldor’s, knew the Light had been used to breach the castel’s defenses.

Soon enough I shall learn whether today has been victory or defeat.

She stood upon the ramparts of the castel, watching the last glimmerings of sunset kindle in the sky. For now, this keep was Oronviel’s.

Hers.

“My lord.”

She turned at the quiet greeting. Ambrant stood at the top of the steps. The ruddy evening light turned the green of his robes to a dull no-color. She gestured to him to approach. “Did they send you to find me?” she asked.

“I sent myself,” he answered. “I would speak with you, but I do not know who my words may reach: the War Prince of Oronviel, or Vieliessar Lightsister.”

She closed her eyes a moment in weariness. “Both. Neither. Either. Say what you will, Ambrant. I swear that you will take no harm from your words.”

“It was you who breached these walls,” he said. Though his words were an accusation, there was no anger in his voice. “Some thought Celeharth Lightbrother had set the spell, for he lies now near to death, and there are those who thought it might have been his Great Spell.”

“I am sorry that he has taken such hurt. And I wish with all my heart Luthilion yet lived. But I will not evade nor set aside the purpose on which you have come to have speech of me. Yes, Ambrant. It was I who used the Light upon the field of battle, to gain advantage in war.”

Ambrant looked down at his hands, holding them out before him as if they were bloodstained. “I fought today, Lord Vieliessar. I used no Light, but … I fought.”

“You saved my life,” she answered. She did not know if that was true. But it was true enough.

Ambrant shook his head as if the act of thinking pained him. “It is forbidden. What I have done. What you have done. I … If it were right, if it were permitted, would I not have cast spells to save my Idronadan, who fell upon the field of battle? I let her die, when I might have turned the blade that took her life.”

Vieliessar crossed the space between them in two steps and took his hands in hers. “You did not let her die!” she said fiercely. “The Code of Battle, which sets the Hundred Houses to fight as if it is a game—that let her die! Hear me, Ambrant. Hear well. I will set into your hands a secret with which you can destroy me, if that is your wish.”

He looked up, and his eyes were wild and staring.

“The Song of Amrethion—Amrethion’s Curse. You know it. All who train at the Sanctuary know it. It speaks of a Child of the Prophecy. I am the one Amrethion foretold,” she said. “I.”

His hands tightened in hers. His mouth worked, but he could not force himself to speak.

Quickly—as if this were a thing she had told many times, instead of only once to one other—she told him of Celelioniel’s decipherment of the Prophecy, her trust in Hamphuliadiel, and Hamphuliadiel’s betrayal.

“So I must become High King, or Amrethion Aradruiniel’s warning will be for nothing. Against the peril of which he warns, all must fight—komen, Lightborn, and commons alike. But I do not violate the Covenant. I never will. Not even to save my life.”

She would have withdrawn her hands then, but Ambrant was clutching them tightly. “But this, if, if what you have said—what you promised.… Peace and justice, an end to Houses High and Low, to Lords and to Landbond—is it only so they will fight for you, so we will fight for you, when the day of the Prophecy comes?” He was stammering and the touch of skin upon skin opened his mind to hers without her willing it.

She saw a storm of images, a lifetime stretching back centuries before her birth, the injustice, petty cruelty, and lies Ambrant had been powerless against. He had faith in her—she was stunned and awed, humbled at the passionate intensity of his belief—and he had known, without truly knowing, that she was not merely War Prince and Serenthon’s daughter. He had seen her, and he had hoped.

“No. I have not lied. I promise justice always, and an end to High House and Low. I promise an end to war between House and House. But when the Darkness comes, we must fight or die. If we win, then—I promise you, Ambrant—peace forever. If we do not, that, too, is peace of a sort.”

His breath caught upon a ragged sob, and now she could slip her hands free and take him in her arms. She could feel him shaking.

“I do not know, I do not know,” he muttered to himself as if in delirium. “How can you make such vows? How can I believe?”

She could not ask for his trust, when she had violated it so utterly. She did not know how to comfort him, for no one had comforted her since she was a small child. Any whom she’d dared to love, or even trust, had been taken from her—by death, by betrayal, or simply by the destiny she could not avert. When she trusted now it was as if she gave up hostages upon a battlefield: it was done because she must, because it was the path to victory, not out of love or kindness.

“My father wished to be High King,” she said at last. “He scattered promises like seed at sowing time. To his favorites he offered power, and vengeance upon their enemies. And those enemies were afraid of what he might do, and even those who were neither enemy nor friend feared to have a High King who would let his favorites do as they wished. I am not my father. From the day I am crowned, I shall have no favorites. My justice will fall evenly upon the necks of those who are now great lords and upon the necks of those who are now Landbond. And my justice will fall like the rain that wears away the stone, and in the end there will remain only my people.” She took a deep breath and stepped back. “Speak to the other Lightborn and say that any who wish to leave me may do so, and I will not take vengeance upon any they may leave behind. But say to those who wish to stay that we must set the old ways aside, for this is not a time of peace.”

She didn’t wait for his answer, but stepped past him and walked back along the rampart.

* * *

Lord Luthilion’s body had already been laid upon its funeral pyre. The heads of all the castel guardsmen would be burned with him, their bodies buried so that they might never ride with the Starry Hunt. With Lord Luthilion’s death, Araphant passed to Vieliessar. Vieliessar confirmed each of lords of Araphant who had come to fight for Oronviel in their lands and their rank, and took their oaths of fealty.

Aradreleg Lightsister was the only Lightborn present in the Hall. It was she who set the spell of Heart-Seeing upon Oronviel’s new lords, but her eyes were dark and quiet upon Vieliessar when she thought herself unwatched.

It was customary to bring the prisoners in halfway through the victory banquet and make their fate an entertainment for the victors. Vieliessar refused to do that. There would be a banquet in Laeldor’s Great Hall tonight, but she would give her judgments before it.

Lord Ablenariel, Ladyholder Gemmaire, and their children were led into the Great Hall in chains. “You have lost,” Vieliessar said to War Prince Ablenariel. “Your lands are mine and your life is forfeit. Do you choose the