“It is not always clear to me when information is relevant; I have been mistaken in the past.”
“I am willing to trust your instincts. I will take no offense at all at any interruption.”
Kaylin tried not to grind her teeth.
“I am not in my library, Private. Nor am I immersed in somewhat delicate experiments. I am a guest here; the scope of my responsibilities while I am within your domicile are largely social.”
This caused the Consort to chuckle. “I feel that Lord Kaylin visits you more frequently than she visits the High Halls.”
“To both of our regrets, I am sure.”
The cohort relaxed slightly. Ynpharion, however, did not, and Kaylin chose—for reasons that weren’t clear even to her—to take her cues from Ynpharion.
“Yes. But we have interrupted Lord Kaylin.” Or from the Consort, as it happened.
Kaylin cleared her throat. “The Shadow beneath the High Halls can take the names of those who fail the test. I don’t know how. I don’t understand the mechanism. But... It doesn’tdestroythe names. If the names were consumed, the Consort wouldn’t be here.”
“I might well be,” the Consort replied, although technically Kaylin hadn’t directed the comment at her. “Anything that destroys those names lessens the future possibility of my people. It depletes the Lake. But it is my belief that you are correct. The words are not consumed; they are contained. They are caged.
“But they are not always caged. Although we have been limited in our studies and our research—for obvious reasons—it has become clear that at least in one or two cases the Shadow allows its victim to leave. The victim is, in effect, name-bound. The control is not perfect, but the influence itself appears to be strong. I believe the Shadow is substantially different from us; its attempts to exert control are not successful because of that large difference.”
“You mean it doesn’t fully understand people.”
“Yes. It doesn’t understand our limitations. Some of its commands—and this is entirely theoretical—instruct the name-bound to do things that cannot be done. By us.”
Teela was now the color of wax. The rest of the cohort, buoyed by the typical arrogance of Barrani, were not. But they were quieter now, as they considered the relevance of the Consort’s words.
Kaylin did so, as well. Mandoran and Annarion could already do things that Barrani—and mortals like Kaylin—couldn’t.
Her familiar, draped around her shoulders like an afterthought, lifted his head and squawked relatively quietly in her ear.
“Fine. And other mortals who aren’t Chosen. Better?”
The familiar made a whiffling noise and lowered his head again. After yawning.
“Attempts to destroy the Shadow—and perhaps Shadows similar to it—failed in the past. We have historical records of some of those attempts, and I am certain that the Dragons retain some, as well. But it is our—no,my—belief that the reason those attempts were failures was the nature of that Shadow itself. What we can destroy is physical; it is the portion of Shadow that exists where we exist—possibly in order to interact with us, to entrap us.
“Kaylin—Lord Kaylin—has entertained, as a guest, a Shadow.”
Kaylin hesitated. Everyone noticed. To Helen, she said, “I think she means Gilbert.”
“She does, although she was not aware of his name. And yes, Lady, Gilbert was a guest, but only briefly.”
“Did you understand his thoughts?”
“Yes.”
“All of them?”
“All that I could hear, yes. There were some things that he could not explain to Kaylin—but I could not explain them, either. Nor do I think they were relevant.”
“And could you explain them to Annarion or Mandoran?”
That was the heart of the question that the Consort had come to ask. Helen did not reply. Not directly. But after a moment, she said, “You might ask Spike.”
Kaylin had forgotten about Spike. To be fair to herself, Spike had only been in residence for a few days, and the time had been extremely stressful. The cause of the stress—if one didn’t count the cohort, and as they were guests, Kaylin was trying hard not to—sat at the open-air table, beneath an early evening sky.
“Who is...Spike?” the Consort asked.
