mine.'
'Can you borrow this stuff?' Vanyel interrupted dubiously. 'I mean, I don't have any Mage-Gifts or anything.'
'Not active; you've got something, you've got the potential, but it's locked. I wouldn't have known, but I think we're linking a little, on a deeper level than Savil and I have - or even Gala and I. It's more like what I had with my twin; it isn't conscious, but - I know you know when I'm - '
' - unhappy,' Vanyel finished for him, thoughtfully. 'And other things. Uh-huh, I think you're right. I thought it might just be because I'm worried about you, but it seems to be going farther than that. Like last night, when I woke you up before you'd barely started to nightmare.'
Tylendel nodded. 'So I think we're linking, I think it happened some time between when I started the fit and when I came out of the backlash coma. I can feel - something - in you.. Something very deep, but very strong. That's when I thought about the Gate-spell, and I used OtherSight on you. I sort of felt the link, and then I saw you had Mage-energies I could tap into using that link.'
'Gods - 'Lendel, don't tell me I'm going to turn into a Herald-Mage,' he said, alarmed by the very idea.
'If you haven't by now, it isn't too bloody likely,' Tylendel replied, to his profound relief. 'Savil says a lot of people have the potential, but nothing ever triggers it. You've just got the potential.'
'So don't trigger it,' Vanyel replied, shivering with an unexplained drill. 'I don't want to be a Herald or a Herald-Mage, or anything like them.'
Tylendel gave him an odd look, but only said, 'I doubt I could, even if you wanted it. There's stories that there's a couple of Mage-schools that know how to trigger potential, but nobody I know has ever seen it done, so even if it's possible the people that can do it are keeping the means a deep secret.'
'Good,' Vanyel replied, still fighting down his chill of apprehension. 'That's exactly the way I want it. So - you make this Gate thing. Then what?'
'When we get to the other side of the Gate, we'll be on Leshara land; right on top of the keep, if I can manage it. I'll use the other spell I'm looking for - and that will be the end of it.'
Vanyel suddenly knew, without knowing how he knew, that he did not want to know what this 'other spell' was.
'Fine,' he replied shortly, turning another page. 'You keep looking. Just tell me when to stop.'
Eight
Vanyel stared nervously at his own reflection in the window - a specter, pale and indistinct; ghostlike, with dark hollows for eyes. Beyond the glass, night blanketed the gardens; a moonless night, a night of wind and cloud and no light at all, not even starlight.
Sovvan-night; the night of celebration of the harvest, but also the night set apart for remembering the dead of the year past. The night when - so most traditions held - the Otherworld was closer than on any other night. A night of profound darkness, like the one a moon ago when Staven had been slain.
Savil was with the rest of the Heralds, mourning their dead of the year. Donni and Mardic, having no one in need of remembrance, were with some of the other trainees at a Palace fete, indulging in a certain amount of the superstitious foolery associated with Harvestfest that was also a Jpart of Sovvan-night, at least for the young.
Lord Evan Leshara had gone home to Westrel Keep. Presumably well satisfied with himself. There was no doubt in Vanyel's mind that Lord Evan had somehow extracted enough good information from what had been fed to him to deduce exactly what bait would serve best to lure Staven to his death. They had tried to use him - and had ended up being used by him.
And that was a blackly bitter thought.
Tylendel and Vanyel had been left alone in the suite -
Tylendel and Vanyel would not be mewed up in the suite much longer.
'Are you ready?' Tylendel asked from the door behind him.
Vanyel nodded, and pulled the hood of his dark blue cloak up over his head, trying not to shiver at his own reflection. With the hood shrouding his face, he looked like an image of Death itself. Then Tyiendel moved silently to his side, and there were two of the hooded figures reflected in the clouded glass; Death, and Death's Shadow.
He shook his head to free it of such ominous thoughts, as Tyiendel opened the door and they stepped out into the cold, blustering night.
This morning he had slipped out into Haven and bought a pair of nondescript horses from a down-at-the- heels beast-trader, using most of the coin he and Tyiendel had managed to scrape together over the past three weeks. He'd taken them off into the west end of the city and stabled them at an inn just outside the city wall.
Tylendel had told Vanyel that before he worked the spell to take them within striking distance of the Leshara holding, he wanted-to be out of the easy sensing range of the Herald-Mages. They needed transportation, but it didn't matter how broken-down the beasts were; their horses only needed to last long enough to get them an hour's ride out of the city. After that it wouldn't matter what became of them.
Obviously, riding Gala was totally out of the question. They weren't taking Star or 'borrowing' any of the true horses from the Palace stables, because if their absence were noticed, Tyiendel didn't want any suspicions aroused until it was too late to stop them. Vanyel had concurred without an argument; if they couldn't force their mounts through Tylendel's Gate - and the trainee had indicated that they might not be able to or might not want to - they were going to have to turn them loose to fend for themselves. He didn't want to lose Star, and he didn't want to be responsible for the loss of anyone else's prized mount, either.
The ice-edged wind caught at their cloaks, finding all the openings and cutting right through the heavy wool itself. Vanyel was shivering long before they slipped past the Gate Guard at the Palace gates and on out into the streets of the city. The Guard was preoccupied with warming himself at the charcoal brazier beside the gate; he didn't seem to notice them as they hugged the shadows of the side of the gate farthest from him and took to the cobblestoned street beyond.
