Not yet, she told herself. But soon. Too soon, it must come.
Which meant that she needed to take only one thing on this trip: Fallion’s legacy.
She raced up to her treasury above the throne room, where she kept hundreds of forcibles under lock and key.
6
No man ever truly leaves home. The places we have lived, the people that we know, all become a part of us. And like a hermit crab, in spirit at least, we take our homes with us.
Sir Borenson was loath to tell Myrrima that they would have to leave Castle Coorm. It is no small feat to uproot a family and take your children to a far land. Even under the best of circumstances it can be hard, and to do it under this pall of danger…what would she say?
Borenson’s mother had been a shrewish woman, one who drove her husband half mad. Privately, Borenson held the belief that nagging was more than a privilege for a woman, it was her right and her duty. She was, after all, the one who ruled the house when the man was out.
Sheepishly, he had to admit that his wife ruled the house even when he was home.
Myrrima had become entrenched at Coorm. She was a favorite among the ladies and spent hours a day among her friends-knitting, washing, cooking, and gossiping. Her friendships were many and deep, and it would be easier for Borenson to cut off his own arm than to cut her off from her friends.
So when he went to their little house outside the main keep, he was surprised to find the children already packing.
“We’re leaving, Dad!” little five-year-old Draken shouted when he came in. The boy displayed a pillowcase full of clothing as proof. The other children were bustling in their room.
Borenson went upstairs and found his wife, standing there, peering out the window. He came up behind and put his arm around her.
“How did you know?” he asked.
“Gaborn told me. It’s time that we take care of his boys. It was his final wish…”
Myrrima peered out the window. Down in the streets, a group of peasants had gathered outside the Dedicates’ Keep. The facilitators were gathering those who would grant endowments to Mystarria’s warriors- attributes of brawn, grace, metabolism, and stamina.
The peasants were excited. To give an endowment was dangerous. Many a man who gave brawn suddenly found that his heart was too weak to keep beating. Those who gave stamina could take sick and die.
Yet this was their chance to be heroes, to give something of themselves for the good of the kingdom. To give an endowment made them instant heroes in the eyes of family and friends, and it seemed that the darker times became, the more willing folks were to give of themselves.
Myrrima felt inside herself. She had not taken an endowment in nine years. In that time, several of the Dedicates who had granted her attributes had died, and with their passing, Myrrima had lost the blessing of their attributes. Her stamina was lower than it should be, as was her brawn and grace. She still had her endowments of scent, hearing, sight, and metabolism. But in many ways she was diminished.
In the parlance of the day, she was becoming a “warrior of unfortunate proportion,” one who no longer had the right balance of brawn and grace, stamina and metabolism, to be called a true “force warrior.”
Against a more-balanced opponent, she was at an extreme disadvantage.
She caught sight of a light in the uppermost tower of the Dedicates’ Keep. A facilitator was up there singing, his voice piping in birdlike incantations. He waved a forcible in the air, and it left a glowing trail. He peered at the white light, which hung like a luminous worm in the air, and judged its heft and depth.
Suddenly there was a scream as the attribute was sucked from a Dedicate, and the worm of light flashed away into the bosom of some force warrior.
Myrrima felt a twinge of guilt. It was more than the act of voyeurism. She’d always been on the receiving end of the ceremony. They said that there is no pain on earth that compared with giving an endowment. Even childbirth paled beside it. But it was equally true that there was no greater ecstasy than receiving one. It wasn’t just the rush of strength or vigor or intelligence. There was something primal and satisfying about it.
Borenson was watching, too, of course. “Are you tempted?” he asked. “We’re going into danger, and we’ll have the king’s sons in our care. Iome would feel more confident if you were to take further endowments…”
But Myrrima and Borenson had talked about this. He’d sworn off endowments nine years ago, when his Dedicates were slain at Carris. He’d had enough of gore. Dedicates were always targets for the merciless. It was far easier to kill a Dedicate who lent power to a lord than to kill a lord himself. And once a lord’s Dedicates were slain, and he was cut off from the source of his power, killing him was almost as easy as harvesting a cabbage.
So a lord’s Dedicates became a prime target for assassins.
No longer was Borenson willing to risk the lives of others by taking their endowments.
He had children to care for, and he couldn’t count on Myrrima. She was aging faster than he.
Myrrima’s endowments of glamour hid it, and her wizardly powers would probably extend her life, but the truth was, Myrrima suspected that even without taking more endowments, she would pass away years before him.
And like her husband, Myrrima wanted to be a commoner.
It should be our chance to grow old together, she told herself. It should be our time to fade…
She didn’t want either of them to take endowments. But there were the children to worry about.
“Are you sure we can protect them, even without endowments?” Myrrima asked.
“No,” Borenson said candidly. “I’m not sure that we can protect them even if we take endowments. I only know…that I’m done. Many a peasant raises his family with nothing but his own strength. So will I.”
Myrrima nodded. She still had some endowments, and she had a few wizardly powers to lean on, small as they were. They would have to be enough.
In her room, Rhianna drifted through dreams of pain, a recurring dream in which a strengi-saat carried her in its teeth as it leapt through the woods, landing with a jostle, then leaping again, landing and leaping. Each time that she closed her eyes, the dream recurred, startling her awake, and she would lie abed and try to reassure herself, until her eyes succumbed to sleep once again.
So it was that the strengi-saat bounded, twigs snapping between its feet, the darkness of the woods all around, a soft growl in its throat like thunder, and for an instant, as happened each time that it landed with a jar, Rhianna feared that its sharp teeth would puncture her for certain this time.
She came awake with a cry and found Sir Borenson trying to quietly lift her.
“What are you doing?” Rhianna asked.
“I’m leaving,” he whispered. “I’m going to a far land. Do you still want to come with me?”
He let go of her, laying her back in bed. Rhianna opened her eyes, and in her drug-induced haze, reality felt oily, as if it would slip from her grasp, and she had to look around the room and focus for a moment, reassure herself that this room was the reality, and that the strengi-saat had only been a dream.
She realized that Borenson had decided to let her make up her own mind. She wasn’t used to having the freedom to choose.
She felt terrified at the thought of leaving the security of the castle.
“Is it through the woods we’ll be going?”
“Only for a little way,” Borenson said. “But you’ll have me to guard you.”
She didn’t want to tell him, but she didn’t believe that he could do much to protect her. Still, he must have
