She cares for Annarion almost as much as I. It has been a comfort to me to know that she can move freely at Court. There is very little she would not do in defense of her ancient friends.
Or her less ancient ones. A thought struck her. “If the price for failing the Test of Name isn’t death, does that mean that every Barrani will try it?”
“In all likelihood, yes,” the Consort replied.
“Won’t it get crowded?”
“I do not know. The test serves a purpose whileRavellonexists. But many who might have passed it did not choose to undergo it. I see changes in our future.” The changes that she saw didn’t shift the color of her eyes. “Come, Lord Kaylin. It is time.”
Kaylin hesitated.
“I do not think you need wait for Terrano.” This was the wrong thing to say in the hearing of any other member of the cohort.
Mandoran said, “We’re waiting.”
“You have not yet emerged as Lords of the Court, and he is your comrade. Waiting—or emerging—is, of course, your choice.” Which made it clear that Kaylin didn’t have the same option. “I do not know how long Terrano will be gone; you might wait a long while. But I’m sure the Tower will not let you starve.”
Three hours later, Kaylin was home. Teela and Severn accompanied her. Nightshade, however, did not, although she surprised herself by inviting him. He accepted Helen, and even appreciated the role she played in the protection of his brother. He was accustomed to sentient buildings—he lived in Castle Nightshade, after all. But he was not entirely comfortable within Helen’s walls, and he was clearly exhausted enough that containing his thoughts, hiding them from her, would require too much effort.
None of this was said out loud, of course; all of it, however, was accessible to Kaylin through the bond of name. It was more than she usually felt or heard; she could imagine that were he to cross Helen’s boundary, Helen would hear far more.
Helen’s Avatar was there to greet them at the door, although she had all the information she needed before they entered the house; her boundaries and control extended to the gates. Which were closed. She knew that the cohort had not accompanied them, but also knew that they were—relatively—safe. The High Court, with its politics and its general scheming, wasn’t safe unless compared to the Adversary. And even then, Kaylin thought she’d take the Adversary over the High Court’s political maneuvers any day.
Especially now.
Helen opened her arms and Kaylin walked into them, dropping her forehead to the Avatar’s shoulder. She mumbled.
“I don’t know if it was the right thing to do, dear,” Helen replied. “The right thing, the wrong thing—people get so focused on it.”
“I’m an officer of the law, Helen.”
“Yes, yes, I know. But think. The Hawklord’s decision, with regard to you, was right. It is not the only time a risk has been taken. You took that risk, to the Consort’s great displeasure, with the Devourer. It is not a risk I would have taken. If the Devourer had not been brought into the Keeper’s Garden, it would have been disastrous for our world. But because you could speak to the ancient behemoth, it is, once again, the right choice. Do you understand? Right or wrong is decided on the basis of a significant moment. Or perhaps, more accurately, wrong is. You should bathe,” she added. “And sleep.”
Kaylin nodded.
“Not that way. That’s the dining room.”
She was in a bath, thinking about what “bath” had meant in the streets of the fief, when the door to her room opened. Unlike Teela’s quarters, a bath here was, if a luxury in comparison to her old life, more contained. For one, there was a tub, not a pool.
She no longer had barred windows, and if her door was the same flimsy wood that it had been in her first apartment—now ash and splinters thanks to Barrani politics—it was vastly more secure. Her own floors creaked, but the halls outside didn’t. She found creaking comfortable; she could practically tell where she was in the room by the sound the floor made, which was useful when it was dark.
She therefore heard the door open. “Are they back?”
“Not all of them, dear,” Helen replied. “But there’s someone here who wants to talk to you.”
“I’m wet. And naked.”
“He’ll wait.”
Less dry than she would have liked, and armored with a robe that was admittedly full body length and thick, Kaylin entered her room. Terrano was sitting on the bed. Had he been Teela, he would have been lounging across it, but he was seated almost dead center on the side closest to the bathroom door, huddling in place, knees drawn up beneath his chin, his arms wrapped around his shins.
He did look up when she entered. She knew why he’d come. “Give me a second,” she told him, and proceeded to walk around the bed and crawl beneath it from the side he wasn’t occupying.
She pulled the small chest in which she stored her few remaining valuables out from beneath the bed—items that an Arcane explosion hadn’t managed to destroy, or things that had come to her after she had found Helen.
She pulled out a small box and pocketed it before she walked back around the bed to where Terrano was sitting, unmoving.
“What do you want to do?” she asked him.
