“Yes, where the assassination attempt was made,” Karl snapped. “Come.” And without another word he strode down the steps, toward the boathouse at the far end of the gardens.
There, he climbed into the same white-and-gold boat he had used to follow Jopps and Denson in the dark the night of Verdsmitt’s arrest. Teran climbed in behind him, picked up the oars, and began rowing them steadily, mechanically, across the lake. With only one or two glances over his shoulder, he drove the boat to within a few feet of where the assassin had died.
Karl jumped out, and strode up the grass to the Lesser Barrier. There he stopped. He reached out a hand to the barrier.
“Careful, Your Highness,” said Teran.
Karl ignored him. He leaned in with his outstretched hand…
… and it passed through shimmering Barrier as though it wasn’t there. He felt the icy nip of the outside air on his fingers.
Behind him, Teran gasped. “How…”
Karl withdrew his hand and studied New Cabora. Sunshine streamed down on the snow in the park today, which cast it back in a million diamond sparkles. The city, buildings black from decades of smoke, squatted on the other side of the parkland beneath a pall of ice fog, the contrast between its dark structures and the pure-white parkland making it look a dark and dangerous place indeed.
He turned around and studied the Palace. It shone like a jewel, white against the green of the lawns, windows sparkling, gardens awash in riotous flower colors. Karl listened. He could hear birds singing, insects chirping in the grass, even a distant, haunting snatch of music, though whether it came from living musicians or enchanted instruments, he had no way of knowing.
A butterfly, its wings iridescent blue, rested on the bright-red petals of a waist-high flower a few steps away. Karl knelt and examined the insect. It reminded him of the Palace in its beauty. Crushing such a thing would be an act of senseless destruction.
But there was one difference between the butterfly and the Palace. The butterfly was natural. Though it was out of season, in the real spring that would soon break winter’s grip on the world outside a million more just like it would appear. Its beauty owed nothing to magic.
Karl stood and gazed at the Palace again. Unlike the butterfly, there was nothing natural about it at all. It would not exist if not for magic. And yet, it too was beautiful.
Did he destroy it? Destroy all the wonderful things magic could do because some of those who wielded it used it for evil?
He turned and gazed at the Barrier again, and New Cabora beyond it. The city, black and ugly, was no more natural than the Palace. It had been built by men bending Nature to their will, just as the Palace had been, the only difference being the tools used. The Commoners’ tools were crude. Therefore, the city was crude and ugly. The MageLords’ tools were refined and powerful. Therefore, the Palace was refined and beautiful. But Commoners and Mageborn alike strove to impose their will on Nature.
The difference, Karl thought, is that the MageLords also seek to impose their will on others. But would Commoner rule really be any better?
Turning his back on the Palace, he stared out at the city again, pulled at by the desire to flee, to deny what he was-what Mother Northwind had made him-and simply refuse to act…
… except that by refusing to act he would be acting, and those actions would have consequences: for the Commoners, among whom Falk would surely seek him; for the MageLords, who would find Falk their King; and for the Outsiders, who would soon find themselves fighting the MageLords for their own freedom.
He remembered standing in this place the day of the assassination attempt, thinking how much he longed to be free of his imprisonment in the Palace. Now he was free; he could walk out on everything…
… and yet he felt less free than ever, for he had been given the unwanted power to decide the future of the Kingdom and the world.
It was too much. He put his hand through the Barrier again, held it there so long his fingers stung with cold by the time he pulled them back; but when he turned back toward the boat, he still had not made up his mind what to do.
But he did know one thing he had to do. Teran was staring at him, hand on his belt: not on his sword, but on one of the enchanted spellstones set into his guard belt. Karl glanced down, then up at Teran’s pale face. “Were you planning to use that on me?”
“Your Highness…” Teran licked his lips. “I thought… you put your hand through the Lesser Barrier… I… how? ”
“I could walk through it right now, Teran,” Karl said. “The Lesser Barrier is no barrier to me. It’s as open as that door into the maids’ bathing chambers.” He softened his voice. “Do you remember that door, Teran?”
A flicker of a smile on Teran’s face. “Of course I do.” The smile faded. “But I can’t let you do that, Your Highness.”
“Why?” Karl said.
“I am sworn to protect you-”
“Sworn to protect me?” Karl took a step closer to him and spoke his next words as though he were snapping a whip. “Or sworn to spy on me for Falk?”
Teran stepped back. “Your Highness-”
“Don’t bother protesting,” Karl said. “I know the truth.”
“You don’t understand,” Teran said. “Your Highness… Karl.. . Falk… he’s got my mother, my sister, they’re prisoners in a house in the Mageborn enclave…”
Karl remembered Teran’s sister, three years younger, as a laughing child with golden hair, playing with a ball in the Fountain Garden, and the hatred he had begun to feel for Falk flared higher. “Teran,” he said. “Falk’s days are numbered. You won’t need to fear him much longer.”
“Your Highness…”
“Don’t call me that,” Karl snapped, surprised by his own vehemence. But he didn’t deserve the title, had never deserved the title. He was not the Heir. He wasn’t even Mageborn. He was Commoner: Commoner, and something more.
Magebane.
“Forget I’m the Prince,” he said. “Forget you are a guardsman. Forget Falk. I’m Karl. You’re Teran. I’ve always counted you as my friend. I hope you have counted me as yours.”
Teran licked his lips, but his voice was steady as he said, “I have… Karl.”
“Then I ask you, as a friend, not to tell Falk what you just saw me do.” Karl nodded at the Lesser Barrier. “And to remember our friendship when next Falk gives you orders.”
Teran licked his lips again. “But, Your Highness… Karl… my mother, my sister…”
Karl smiled. “I am still the Prince. Falk is not in the Palace. Do you know where in the enclave they are being held?”
Teran nodded.
“If I order them freed from the house, can you get them out through the Barrier to somewhere safe, somewhere Falk can’t find them?”
Teran nodded again.
“Consider it done.” Karl held out his hand. “Now, old friend… will you keep my secrets? Will you serve me as loyally as I’ve already thought you were?”
Teran looked at the hand for a long moment, then turned to look toward the roofs of the Mageborn enclave, just visible through the trees past the bridge. He gazed in that direction for a long moment, then snapped his eyes back to Karl, grabbed his hand, and shook it. “I will, old friend. And beg your forgiveness that I have ever done anything else.”
Karl clapped him on the shoulder. “Then let’s go back to the Palace. I have orders to give.”
He looked back at the city himself one last time. And then, he thought, I have a decision to make.
CHAPTER 26
