Storm Breaking

:If we can make him believe in earth-sense,: she replied, with some pessimism. :Still, you're right. It isn't just the best opening, it's the only opening he's ever given us.:

:You, or me?: he asked.

:Me first, just to open the subject. I'm the local royalty, the local Herald, and the local expert in mind-magic. I could be expected to know about these things, and know if the Hardornens were just making something up. You pick up if you see an opening to insert something you know.:

He folded his hands on the table in front of him as she cleared her throat. 'Duke Tremane,' she said, 'I may have a solution to that particular problem, and oddly enough it is a part of a proposition that the Hardornens outside your domain wanted me to make to you on their behalf.' She smiled apologetically. 'I think you probably were anticipating that the loyalists might ask us to serve as their envoys as well as envoys for the Alliance. We promised we would put their proposal before you at an opportune time, but we promised nothing else; that seemed harmless enough.'

He looked up sharply, and a little suspiciously. 'A proposition? What sort of proposition?'

Elspeth bit her lip and looked down at her strong, well-muscled hands for a moment. They were hardly the hands of a pampered princess, and Darkwind had a suspicion that Tremane had noticed this. 'Well... it's a rather interesting one. It seems that they've been watching how you manage things here, and you've frankly impressed them. There seems to be a general consensus that under certain very specific circumstances, they would not only be happy to arrange a truce with you, but they would be willing to offer you the crown of Hardorn itself.'

He looked as if she had hit him in the back of the head with a board. It was the first time he had ever actually shown surprise. 'The crown? They'd make me their King? What about their own claimants?'

'There aren't any,' Darkwind said crisply. 'Ancar was very thorough when it came to eliminating rivals. We were told that there weren't even any claimants on the distaff side; apparently he didn't in the least see any reason to exclude his female relatives from the purges, nor children, nor even infants. From all anyone can tell, he went back to the fourth and fifth remove of the cousins. By the time he was finished, well, you have as much right to the throne as any of the natives, that's how thin the royal connections are.'

We learned most of that when we were here last, but I don't think it would be politic to mention that little trip.

Tremane didn't exactly pale, but he did look a little shocked. 'And I thought that politics in the Empire were cutthroat,' he murmured, as if to himself. Then he blinked, and collected himself. 'So, just what are these specific circumstances you were talking about? And how will all this give me intelligence about what is happening to the land?'

Elspeth toyed with her glass of water. 'This is where I am going to have to ask you to stretch your imagination a bit, Tremane,' she replied. 'You know that mind-magic exists, now that you've seen the members of our party use it.'

He nodded cautiously.

'You also have your own Healers who use Healing magic, which is similar to, but not identical with, mind- magic,' she continued, 'And you know that neither are affected by the mage-storms which are disrupting what we in Valdemar call true-magic.'

'I'm following you so far,' Tremane said with a nod.

''Well, as near as we can tell, there is another form of magic which is like mind- magic and like Healing-magic, but isn't exactly either of them,' she told him, leaning forward earnestly. 'It's called earth-magic, and it seems to have entirely to do with the land, the health of the land, and restoring that health. We think that's what hedge-wizards and earth-witches use, rather than true-magic; people who are trained in those disciplines—so they tell me—also refer to their power as earth-magic, and they call what you and Darkwind and I are accustomed to using by the name of high-magic.'

:Right. So you tell him about Hawkbrother Healing Adepts while I figure out how to segue this into the earth-binding ritual.:

Darkwind nodded very slightly and caught up the conversational ball. 'We Tayledras have specialized Adepts, called Healing Adepts, who have the ability to sense the poisoned places, the places where magic has made things go wrong, and fix them again,' he told Tremane, who was sitting back in his chair with an odd expression that Darkwind could not read. 'And if you need evidence of how well this works, it is in the fact that we have restored so much of the land to the pre-Cataclysm days. The special ability that makes this possible—Elspeth's people would call it a Gift—is something we all call the earth-sense.'

'It's not just Tayledras Healing Adepts and earth-witches that use this. Both the King of Rethwellan and my stepfather Prince Daren have earth-sense, in fact,' she said, taking the narrative back. 'It seems that the Gift has always been in the Rethwellan royal line. They haven't needed it for generations, but it's obvious how useful it is when you know that even though Daren was not familiar with Hardorn and not ritually tied to the land here, he could still sense what Ancar had done to it when he came here to help Valdemar drive Ancar out. That actually proved to be of tactical value, since it gave us an idea of where Ancar was finding all the power he needed.'

Tremane nodded, his brows knitted intently, and seized on the phrase that they had both hoped he would.