“Tell Teela that I’m not dead yet.”
“She considers this proof of the miraculous.”
Kaylin nodded, but continued. “If you feel this way about the High Court and the Barrani,whyare you going to the High Halls to take the Test of Name?”
“Because Annarion is going,” Serralyn said. It was the first time she’d spoken out loud, and her answer overlapped Terrano’s, but without his eye-rolling disgust.
“Annarion chose,” Sedarias said, confirming Serralyn’s words. “He was always more tied to this world than I. He wants his family line back. He wants his ancestral home. And he wants his brother free of the fiefs.”
“I don’t think his brother wants to be free of the fiefs.”
“Not noticeably, no. I didn’t say he was smart; I said it was what he wanted. It’s what he feels his duty is. His upbringing was faulty,” she continued. “He won’t survive in the High Halls, even if he passes that Test.” She winced. “I have not been idle since your departure from the green. My own contacts are a shambles, but I have sources of information; I have a better understanding of the current political structure, and I believe with our aid, he might survive.”
“You seem to be more of a target than Annarion.”
She inclined her head. “My sources will, of course, have other contacts as well.” Her smile was slender and cold. “The sister I killed was not the head of our family, as the family is currently constituted, but she was not working on her own. I did not expect that she would be foolish enough to willingly take on Shadow elements in order to increase her power.”
“For all the good it did her.”
“For all the good it did her,” Sedarias agreed. “We do not intend to disrupt the High Court; we intend to see Annarion through the Test of Name, and pass it ourselves. Becoming Lords of the High Court will provide us with options, should those options be required.” She held up a hand as Kaylin opened her mouth. “We are aware of the risks. With the help of Alsanis, we have been taking the same lessons Helen has been forcing Mandoran and Annarion to take. We’re aware of what happened with the ancestors; we’re aware of what happened with the Shadows. We have been trying, with very limited success, to hear what the Shadows hear.
“And yes, Lord Kaylin, we’re aware that whatever was sent into the outlands was sent hunting us. We believe they expected to find us as easily as they found Annarion and Mandoran. But Helen is a good teacher, if perhaps a bit too lenient; we could have walked these pathways without detection. We did not expect—I did not expect—to encounter either my sister or the High Court here. We did not expect to encounter a war band—I will confess that I am impressed.
“We certainly did not expect the Consort to come to the Hallionne. We did not expect—oh, many things.” She then turned to Terrano. “We didn’t expect to see you, either.”
He was silent.
“We were happy for you,” Sedarias continued, voice soft and almost—almost—pensive. “But there is a silence you once occupied that we cannot, quite, fill.”
“I heard you.”
Sedarias smiled. “You were listening. That would be a first.”
“I gave you my name,” he said.
She nodded. “And now, the risk is rendered irrelevant; you did not resume that name; did not choose to remain, bound and chained, to the world of your birth.” She spoke in a tone that implied envy or yearning. “You should go. We can’t take you with us. I didn’t resent your decision. I didn’t consider it a betrayal. What you wanted, you always wanted. We could see it. I can still see it now. It’s bright, Terrano. It’s shining. You at least escaped this.”
“You could.”
Sedarias shook her head. “Not anymore. Sometimes we are only offered one chance.”
Winston was fidgeting. In his case, that meant lengthening his fingers and tying them into literal knots.
“What will you do?” Terrano asked of Sedarias. Of all of them.
“We will go to Elantra. We will go to the High Halls. We will take the Test of Name. In as much as we can, we will live as our people have lived for millennia. I will take my family. Annarion will regain his. Mandoran will do the same.”
“Mandoran’s not going to like that,” Terrano said.
Sedarias raised a brow. “We will become what we were meant to become, before our lives were interrupted. And when it is time, Terrano, when it istime, we will turn our gaze and attention into the heart of Ravellon, and we willbreakit. We will reclaim what was lost to our people.”
Terrano’s brows had risen into the line of his falling hair. “How, exactly, do you intend to do that?” Clearly, this plan was a new one, made after his departure from the cohort.
“We don’t know. But the Shadows appear to be hunting us—us—and I intend to make certain that they can never do so again.”
He surprised Kaylin; he laughed. His laughter was almost joyful. He then crossed the distance that separated them, and threw his arms around Sedarias. Kaylin, even at her most comfortable, would never have dared. Sedarias was not a huggable presence.
“You really don’t change,” he said; she endured his embrace, but did not return it. On the other hand, she made no attempt to disengage, either. To Kaylin he added, “They didn’t originally intend to take on Ravellon. Sedarias is angry at the thing that’s hunting us, so it’s become personal. No one can hold a grudge as long as Sedarias. No one, ever.”
