A slight tap on the door signaled another small triumph. That was Ancar, and Falconsbane had finally convinced him to announce himself before he came barging into Mornelithe's suite. Respect; the boy needed to learn respect, and he might even be worth saving and making into an underling when all this was over.
Meanwhile, the bitch needed to learn a little lesson, too.
'Enter,' he said aloud, and Ancar's ever-present escort opened the door silently. Two of the guards entered first, followed by the King, who joined Falconsbane beside his fire. The guards took their positions, one on either side of the door; Falconsbane found their presence rather amusing. Evidently the boy took no chances; he protected himself physically even in the presence of someone he - relatively - trusted. What did he do when he took a wench to his bed? Drug her so that he knew she was harmless? Feh, he was so unappealing, that was probably the only way he would get a bedmate.
Ancar poured himself a cup of wine from the pitcher on the hearth. For all that he took no chances, he was prone to acting very foolishly. Falconsbane was a mage; he could have changed the content of that wine without having any access to poisons. Or didn't Ancar know that was possible?
Falconsbane waited for him to speak first, since it was obvious from the King's manner that nothing urgent had brought him here. But from Ancar's faint frown, something displeased him enough to make him seek Mornelithe's counsel.
Finally, the young King spoke. 'I have tried to take power from those lines of energy you spoke about, which seem to be the same thing that Hulda called ley-lines. Something has blocked me from them.' His frown deepened. 'Although I could never use the nodes you spoke of because they were too powerful for me, I have been able to touch those lines in the past. But now I cannot, and I do not know why.'
So, access to the ley-lines had been keyed very recently. Perhaps when Hulda realized that Ancar had attempted a Gate. She knew he was experimenting and had chosen this way to place a limit on what he could do.
'It is none of my doing,' he pointed out. 'But I had noted this myself; I, too, have been blocked. It is one of the reasons why I can do so little to help you, other than offer advice. I think, however,' he added slyly, 'that if you would trace the spells that keep you at a distance to their origin, you would find it to be Hulda.'
Ancar sat upright. 'Oh?' he replied, too casually. 'Are you very certain of that?'
Falconsbane only shrugged. 'You may see for yourself, Majesty. You certainly have the Mage-Sight to do so. There is nothing preventing you from tracing magic back to its originator.'
Ancar sank back into the embrace of the chair, his frown deepening. 'She overreaches herself,' he muttered to himself. Mornelithe guessed that he had not meant to speak that aloud.
But Falconsbane chose to take the comment as meant for his ears. 'Then give her a lesson to put her properly in her place,' he said quietly. 'Which of you rules here? Will you let her block you from the use of power that is rightfully yours? The coercive spells you have placed upon me have certainly worked well enough. Set them on her! Let her cool for a time in your prison cells. Let her see the rewards of thwarting you. Tame the bitch to your hand and muzzle her that she not bite you.'
Ancar's jaw clenched and his hands tightened around the goblet. 'I do not know that those spells will hold her,' he admitted, reluctantly. 'She is at her full strength. You were weak when I set them upon you.'
Falconsbane laughed aloud, startling him so that his hands jerked, and a few drops of wine splashed out of the goblet. 'Majesty, the woman is a bitch in heat when she sees a handsome young man! Lay a trap for her, then bait it with one such, and you will have her at a moment of weakness as great as mine! Only choose your bait wisely, so that he will exhaust her before you spring it.'
Ancar brushed absently at the droplets of red on his black velvet tunic, and considered that for a moment. 'It might work,' he replied thoughtfully. 'It might at that.'
'If it does not, what have you lost?' Falconsbane countered. 'You are something near to a Master mage, and that should suffice that you can set those spells subtly enough that she does not notice them until she tries to act against your interest. Such things are either tough or brittle. If they do not hold, they will break. Few can trace a broken spell if she even notices that the attempt was made to coerce her. If they do hold, then you will have her.'
Ancar smiled at him over the edge of the goblet. 'You are a good counselor, Mornelithe Falconsbane, and a clever mage. That is why I do not lift the spells on you, and do not intend to until I have learned all that you can teach me.'
That came as something of a shock to Falconsbane, although he hid his reaction under a smooth expression. He had not given the boy credit for that much cleverness.
He would be more careful in the future.
Ancar left Falconsbane's chambers with a feeling of accomplishment. So, that was why he had been denied the power he needed lately! The traces that led back to Hulda were easy enough to see when you looked for them - exactly as Falconsbane claimed. He had not thought she would dare to be so blatant in her attempts to keep a leash on him.
