The Halls of Stormweather s-1 Page 30

  Now that it was over, Larajin's shoulders began to shake. She found herself crying: not so much at her near brush with death but at the fact that Tal had abandoned her when she needed him most.

  *****

  At first, Larajin didn't realize that anyone was in the library. The crackling of flames in the fireplace muffled the slight creak of leather, and the high back and wings of the armchair hid the person sitting there. She dusted the shelves, too distracted by her thoughts to replace the elder master's books in exactly the same order, even though she knew she'd catch a tongue-lashing from Mister Cale later for her carelessness. The books were all the same to her: musty, leather-bound tomes filled with stories about folks long dead. Elven folk. After being accosted by the wild elf yesterday, elves were the last thing Larajin wanted to think about.

  It was only when she moved closer to the fire to dust the chessboard and collect the empty wine goblets from the table beside it that she smelled a faint hint of sewage that wasn't quite masked by the smell of soap. She peered around the edge of the wing chair and saw the very person she'd been looking for all afternoon: Tal.

  He was staring into the fire with troubled eyes. His broad hands were knotted together in front of his face, his chin resting upon them. His face was clean shaven, and he'd changed into fresh clothes.

  Larajin rapped the duster down against the table. A pawn toppled over and rolled across the chessboard, then clattered onto the stone floor.

  Tal looked up, noticing Larajin for the first time. A series of emotions crossed his face: surprise, relief, guilt. He sprang to his feet and reached out to pull her into one of his bear hugs, but Larajin jerked back. Her leg struck the table, knocking the rest of the chess pieces over. She didn't even stop to worry about the fact that she'd just demolished a game in progress-another contest of wits between the Mister Cale and the elder master. Mister Cale's wrath seemed inconsequential, now.

  "Larajin, I-" Tal lowered his arms. "Thank the gods you're all right. Those rats-"

  "Why did you run away?" Larajin asked. She wanted to rage at him, to smack her hands against his broad chest and tell him how terrified she'd been and say that she'd nearly been killed. She'd suffered nearly a dozen bites, and though they were only superficial wounds, they stung.

  "I had to leave," Tal said. A desperate look crept into his eyes. "I couldn't take the chance that… I might have…"

  Larajin sat down on the table beside the jumbled chess pieces. Now that she was face to face with Tal, the hurt inside her was as chill and sharp as the point of the icicle she'd used to kill the rats. Wordlessly, she pulled up the hem of her skirt to show him the bites on her leg. The skin around the bandages was puffed and red.

  "Did you get them treated?" Tal asked, concern in his eyes. "Rats are diseased creatures. Their bites-"

  "You know how to use a knife," Larajin said. "You're one of Master Ferrick's top pupils. If you'd stayed to protect me, I wouldn't have any bites. I just want to know why you ran, Tal. Why?"

  Tal sagged into the armchair with a heavy sigh. He stared at the bandage on Larajin's wrist. This time, when he reached out for her, Larajin let him take her hand. For a long moment, they sat in silence, listening to the crackle of the fire as something warred with itself in Tal's troubled eyes.

  "Larajin," he said, leaning closer. "There's something I must tell you about myself. I'm-"

  The door to the library opened at just that moment. Master Thamalon the Elder strode into the room, then stopped as he saw Larajin and Tal seated by the fire. Dark eyebrows drew together as his penetrating eyes took in Larajin's hand in Tal's. Startled, Larajin jerked her hand away and hurriedly pushed the skirt of her servant's uniform back over her knee. The elder master's eyes narrowed. When Larajin realized what he must be thinking, her face flushed.

  As Tal stood to face his father, Larajin bowed her head and began nervously setting the chess pieces back on the board. They kept falling over, and soon black and white were jumbled together.

  Tal read his father's stern look instantly. "Father, I can explain. Larajin was… We-"

  "Tal, I want a word with you," the elder master said. He used his quiet voice, the one he'd always employed when Larajin and Tal were just children, romping through the halls together and running headlong into dignitaries and guests.

  Out of the corner of her eye, Larajin saw Tal's shoulders slump. Once again, the second son had proved a disappointment to his father. This time, he wasn't at fault, but he couldn't explain why-not if he wanted to keep Larajin's foray into the sewers a secret.

  Larajin knew exactly how Tal felt. Mustering up her courage, she straightened and met the elder master's eye, but the look in it silenced her.

  "Leave us, Larajin," he said, "It's time that my son and I had a little chat about self-control."

  Tal's expression was a mixture of frustration and fear. With one last look at him, Larajin hurried from the room.

  *****

  "Tal and I didn't do anything wrong!" Larajin said sullenly. "The master is lying if he says we did."

  As her father raised his hand, Larajin suddenly realized she'd gone too far. Defending herself was one thing, but calling the word of the elder master into question was quite another. She winced, but stood her ground, waiting for the sting of a slap against her cheek.

  Her father stood with his open hand trembling, visibly fighting to restrain his anger. Thalit Wellrun was a gentle man who had never taken so much as a whip to the horses under his care during all of his four decades of service to the Uskevren household. Even though he and his wife quarreled frequently, Larajin had never seen her father strike her mother. Now, as he looked at Larajin, his eyes were blazing.

  Thalit stared at his hand as if it had betrayed him, then ran a callused palm across his close-shaven scalp. He paced in frustration between the lines of linen, limping slightly on the leg that had been damaged years ago. The old injury only troubled him when the weather was changing for the worse. Outside the closed window, the evening air was still and cold, but Larajin could sense a storm of emotion coming.

  They stood in the drying room among the crackling braziers and clotheslines pinned with tablecloths, where Larajin had been folding the clean linen. Thalit had come straight from the stables and was still dressed in his leather apron. His white cotton shirt with its gold and blue ribbons was smudged with dust and smelled of horses and hay. Unlike the household servants, his work ended early in the eventime, after the horses were fed. However, he often worked late into the night. Larajin did the same-except that her extra duties were a punishment from Mister Cale, performed under silent protest, and not by choice.

  "You have to understand the consequences," her father said in a strained voice. Not once did his eyes meet Larajin's. "Affections between master and servant always turn out for the ill. Young master Talbot would be honor-bound to provide for the upkeep of any child resulting from such a union, but an illegitimate child would be an embarrassment to the Uskevren household. You could be unable to continue in your duties while you were bearing and nursing the infant and-"

  "Is that what matters most to you?" Larajin interjected. "The master's embarrassment? And my duty? What about the truth?"

  Her father turned to her with a pained expression. "Duty is sometimes more important than truth," he said gruffly. "Duty keeps households together-and families. If it wasn't for my duty to your mother, you-" He bit off the rest, as if he had said too much.

  "You care more about your horses than you do about mother," Larajin muttered. "Or me."

  She hadn't meant for her father to hear the remark. She'd half turned to unpin a sheet from the line, but now her father wrenched it aside.

  "I care for you," he said, in a voice trembling with emotion. "Even though you often disappoint me. Even though you are not my daughter."

  Larajin blinked in surprise. She opened her mouth to ask her father if she had heard correctly-if he had truly uttered those words. All that came out was a whisper: "W
hat?"

  "Ask your mother," her father said. He let the sheet drop like a curtain between them.

  Larajin stood, stunned, as her father limped out of the room. By the time she thought to run after him, he was gone.

  She walked slowly down the hall, her thoughts whirling. Suddenly, her father's long-simmering anger toward her mother made sense. If Larajin was another man's child, it was only logical that Thalit's jealousy had turned to bitterness over the years. Larajin could see that her father still loved her mother, but until now she'd never understood why he held back his affections-or why he sometimes stared at Larajin as if wondering who she was.

  Larajin already knew that she didn't look a bit like her father, nor did she share any of his mannerisms. While her father went about his duties as quietly as a horse bred to the bit, Larajin chafed at the very touch of her servant's uniform. They were as different as shadow and light.

  Larajin found herself in the doorway to one of the smaller kitchens. Her mother was the only servant in it. Shonri Wellrun leaned over a heavy wooden table, kneading dough. Behind her a fire blazed brightly in the oven, and the warm air smelled of yeast and cream. Her hands white with flour, Shonri rolled the dough into long, thin lines, then deftly braided it. She squeezed juice from a tart-smelling fruit onto the dough, then dusted it with a sprinkle of brown spice.

  Larajin stared at her mother, trying to see her through her father's eyes. Shonri had just turned sixty. Her red hair had faded to the color of pale ash, and her hands were creased with wrinkles. Even though she had been a servant all of her life, Larajin's mother had a hint of pride in her bearing and a gentle beauty that years of toil hadn't quite erased. She was one of the elder master's favored servants and was often summoned to the big table to be praised for her delicate pastries, made with rare spices from the four corners of Faerun.

  Had Shonri been summoned by one of the master's guests for attention of a different sort? Was Larajin the illegitimate child of a union like the one her father thought he was preventing?

  As if sensing Larajin's intent gaze, Shonri looked up. She smiled at her daughter and gestured at a mortar that held greenish nuts. "Larajin, if you've finished with the linen, would you crush those for me?"

  "Mother, I need to know…" The question died on Larajin's lips. But her expression conveyed it silently.

  Her mother covered the braided dough it with a damp cloth. "Something's troubling you," she said, gesturing Larajin closer. "Come tell me what it is."

  Larajin found herself unable to move from the doorway. She gripped the door frame tightly and spoke in a rush. "Father says I'm not his daughter. I believe him. I want to know who my real father is."

  A flash of anger crossed Shonri's face. An instant later it was replaced with an expression of resolve. She patted a stool beside her. "Sit down. It's time you knew the truth."

  Like a sleeper walking in a dream, Larajin slowly crossed the room. She sat beside her mother and waited while her mother carefully cleaned her hands on a rag. Then Shonri herself sat down.

  "You are a daughter to your father," she said in a careful voice, "as much as you are a daughter to me. Always remember that."

  Larajin nodded. She already knew that her mother and father loved her. She considered the relationship between herself and her mother a close one, even though it was to her Aunt Habrith that Larajin turned when she wanted to confide her secrets.

  Shonri stared at the oven, not really seeing it.

  "Twenty-three years ago, I lost a child," she said slowly.

  Larajin was confused. This wasn't what she'd expected to hear. "I don't understand."

  "You will," Shonri said. She continued. "I was accompanying Master Thamalon the Elder on a trip north to the Dales, a trading expedition. He'd asked me to come with him to evaluate the quality of the wild forest nuts and fruits he intended to purchase. It was a very important journey, a keystone in the household's economic well-being, and the meeting had been set up a full year in advance. It was a singular honor for me. So I agreed to accompany the master, even though I was pregnant and near to giving birth."

  Shonri's eyes grew sad. "Your father didn't want me to go. We'd been trying for a child for so long…"

  She sighed. "I lost my child on that journey. When the birth came, we were deep in the woods, far from a cleric. The child died."

  Larajin touched her mother's hand. "How-"

  "The trading expedition was not a success," Shonri said. "More than half of the nuts had been damaged in the harvest, and the fruits hadn't ripened properly. We stayed only a short time-long enough for the master to conclude that the yields would never be large enough to turn a profit.

  "While we were there, the folk in the place we were staying at learned that I had just lost a child and approached the master to ask a favor. One of their women had died in childbirth, and no other woman had milk to suckle it with. They asked the master if his servant would care for it. I took one look into your beautiful hazel eyes and immediately agreed."

  Larajin had listened carefully to every word her mother said, yet she still found them difficult to believe. "I… I am not your daughter, either?" she asked. "Who am I, then?"

  Shonri gave a slight shrug. "An orphan. The mother was unwed, and no one knew who the father was."

  Larajin wanted to know more. "Was my mother a Daleswoman?" she asked. "From what town?"

  "I don't know," Shonri answered. "We were deep in the Tangled Trees, far from any town. The meeting was held in a place where the nuts and fruits grew wild. The master never inquired as to the woman's name."

  Even though she was firmly seated upon a stool, Larajin felt as if she were floating. Her mind groped for something-some as-yet unspoken detail-then seized upon it.

  "You never told Father that you lost your own child, did you?" she said. "He was just guessing when he said that I wasn't his daughter. He didn't know how right he was."

  Shonri rose from her stool and picked up a metal tray. Lifting the cloth away from the bread, she carefully eased it onto the tray, then opened the oven and slid it inside.

  "Have you finished folding the linen?" she asked in a businesslike voice.

  Larajin suddenly realized that her mother wasn't going to tell her any more. The familiar distance between mother and daughter was back. The time for confidences was over.

  "Not yet," Larajin answered.

  "Well get back to it, then, before Mister Cale finds out."

  *****

  Larajin stood quietly, listening to the lap of the water against her ankles. The Temple of Sune was quiet this early in the morning. Its priests tended to serve the Lady of Love with nightly revels, then sleep late the next day. Only on mornings when there was an especially beautiful sunrise did they rise to greet it.

  It was snowing again outside, and a chill wind was blowing, but the waters of the great fountain that filled the temple's courtyard were as warm as a stream on a summer day. Powerful clerical magic kept the temperature balmy at ground level. The snowflakes that were falling into the open central courtyard, with its beautiful natural rock formations and magically animated fountains, gently melted away before they hit the ground. Driftglobes floated just above the surface of the main pond, filling the temple with soft-hued light.

  The only other occupant of the temple at this hour was a young girl about eleven years old, wearing the crimson robes of the temple. She was an auburn-haired child, one whose high cheekbones and long eyelashes suggested that she would grow into a great beauty one day. Like Larajin, she was of uncertain parentage. The priests had found the girl on their doorstep one day and taken her in.

  Larajin had been worshiping at the temple long enough to know the serving girl's name: Jeina. She knew little else about her. Was Jeina as tormented by questions as Larajin was? Or had knowing ever since her birth that she was a foundling allowed the girl to come to terms with her unknown ancestry?

  Larajin watched Jeina tip a bowl of pale yellow rose petals into the wat
er. For a moment, their eyes met. Jeina smiled, then shyly turned away.

  Larajin waded through the ankle-deep water to one of the pools near the center of the fountain. Formed over decades by pebbles that had gradually worn a boulder into a natural bowl as the water swirled them round, the pool was one of those used by lay worshipers who wanted to ask questions of the goddess. Its stone was veined with gold and tufted with velvety mosses that were blooming in the unseasonable warmth.

  Larajin stared into the clear water that filled the pool, watching the pebble trace a lazy circle around its bottom and the ripples flowing across the pool's surface. They distorted her reflection, softening the rust-colored hair that straggled out from under her turban and blurring a face that was too long and angular to ever be considered pretty. Usually a petitioner would ask the pool to reveal the face of a future beloved. Larajin had other questions on her mind.

  "Who am I?" she asked. She dipped a finger in the water, then touched it to her heart, leaving a damp spot on the gold fabric of the vest of her serving uniform.

  Larajin felt a tickle on the back of her neck, like a lover's breath, and smelled the unmistakable fragrance of Sune's Kisses. A moment later, a tiny red flower petal slid down the trickle of water that was falling into the pool, then another. Even though water was still falling into the pool, its surface became still.

  Larajin looked down upon a reflection that she only half-recognized. The face was her own, but the turban was gone. Her hair was tucked back behind her ears. Her ears were…

  "A golden morning to you, Larajin."

  Larajin started, and her hand fell into the pool. Ripples covered its surface once more, distorting her reflection. She whirled around and saw the one person in Selgaunt she'd least expected to see. Diurgo Karn, a young noble about her own age, was a priest of Sune. He wore holy vestments: tight-fitting crimson hose capped by a thickly padded codpiece, and a shirt slashed to reveal his muscular arms and chest. His features were every bit as handsome as Larajin remembered, with fair hair containing just a touch of red swept back from his high forehead and forest-green eyes. Not so long ago, Larajin had thought herself in love with him and had dreamed that the goddess would smile upon this "impossible" match between servant and noble.