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"What do you want? You've dragged me away from sorceries of the highest and
most difficult sort."
His face came visible in the sourceless light. It wasdrawn and haggard. The
eyes were surrounded by marks of strain. The Captal felt a new touch of fear.
Had he made an ally of a man incapable of fulfilling the scheme?
"We've got a problem."
"I don't have time for guessing games, old man."
"Eh?" The Captal controlled himself. He had just learned his status in the
easterner's thoughts. "The child. Your Prince changeling. It's a girl."
The Captal had been enthusiastic when Yo Hsi had first proposed the switch.
Couldn't miss, what with both Princes their creatures...
The Demon Prince flew into a screaming rage.
It was all the Captal's fault, of course. Or his minions had betrayed him,
or...
After several minutes of abuse, the old man could tolerate no more. The Demon
Prince had slipped over the borders of reason. The ship of alliance was no
longer sound. Time to abandon it and cut his losses.
With a slight bow the Captal interrupted, said, "I see I'll find no comfort in
the source of our embarrassment. You may consider our alliance dissolved." He
spoke the word that would return him to his own dungeons.
As he flickered away, he grinned. The expression on Yo Hsi's face!
The moment he materialized in Maisak he initiated dissociative spells to close
the transfer stream. To pursue the discussion Yo Hsi would have to walk from
the hold of his nearest secret ally.
ii) He bears the burden of loyalty
Eanred Tarlson was one man who never ceased worrying the mysterious exchange.
Following his encounter in the Gudbrandsdal there was a long period for which
he had no memories. His wife, Handle, said he had lain on the borderland of
death for a month. Then, gradually, he had recovered. Six months had passed
before he could get around under his ownpower. Kavelin spent that time under
intense pressure from its neighbors.
At home, in the taverns with his men, or maneuvering in the field, Tarlson
never stopped puzzling. Something kept ragging the corners of his mind. A clue
that only he held. Some memory of having encountered the old man before, long
ago. But his bout with death had left his mind unreliable.
"Maybe it's a memory from a previous life," his wife observed one evening, a
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year after the swap. She was the only one he had told. "I was reading one of
Gjerdrum's books. There's a man at the Rebsamen, Godat Kothe, who says the
half-memories we get sometimes are from other lives."
Gjerdrum had just finished a year in Hellin Daimiel, courtesy of the Krief.
Handte Tarlson, with a thirst for knowledge and little opportunity to indulge
it, had instantly begun devouring his books.
Eanred frowned. That reminded him of a problem he had to face soon. The
Nordmen were upset that a common Wesson, on state funds, was being sent to a
university considered a noble preserve.
It had begun without Tarlson's knowledge, during his unconsciousness. There
had been strong opposition, which was stronger now. Gjerdrum had outperformed
his classmates. Though Tarlson felt immensely honored, he feared he would have
to ask the boy to withdraw.
He felt a quirk of irritation. It startled him. It wasn't like him to feel
antagonism over accidents of birth. Still, they couldn't accuse him of
ambition. He had never asked honors or titles, only the opportunity to serve.
"Maybe. But I'm sure it's a memory from this life. I'll find the handle
someday." After a long pause, "I have to. I'm the only one who. saw them all."
"Eanred, tell the King. Don't take everything on yourself."
"Maybe." He considered it.
Weeks passed before he spoke with the Krief. The occasion was his induction
into the Order of the Royal Star, the Crown's household knights. The endowment
was hereditary and carried a small living.
The Nordmen were bitter. But their opposition remained muted. The ceremony
took place in Vorgre-berg, where Tarlson was immensely popular.
He could be put in his place when the mad King died. Afterward, in his
private-audience chamber, the Krief asked, "Eanred, how are you? I've heard
the pressure's bothering you."
"Fine, Sire. Never better." "1 don't believe it. You showed nerves today."
"Sire?"
"Eanred, you're the only loyal subject I've got. You're invaluable as
champion, but worth immeasurably more as a symbol. Why do you think the barons
hate you? Your very existence makes their treasons more obvious. They resist
honoring you because it makes you more promi-nent, makes your loyalty a
greater example to the lower classes. And that's why I refuse to let you take
Gjerdrum out of the Rebsamen." Tarlson was startled.
The King chuckled. "Thought you had that in mind. In character. Bring me a
brandy, will you?"
While Tarlson poured, the Krief continued, "Eanred, I don't have much time
left. Three or four years. If I do things that seem strange, don't be
surprised. I'm chasing a grand plan. So the scramble for succession won't
destroy Kavelin. Thank you. Pour one for yourself." For several minutes he
sipped quietly while Tarlson waited.
"Eanred, when I'm gone, will you support the Queen?" "Need you ask, Sire?"
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"No, but I don't envy you the task. My remotest cousins will be after the
Crown. You'll have no support." "Nevertheless..." He remembered his wife's
sugges-tion. "Maybe if we found the true Prince..."
"Ah. You know. I guess everyone does. But it's not that easy. There're facts
known only to myself and the Queen. And the kidnappers. Eanred, the Prince was
a girl. Fool that I was, I thought we could pretend otherwise..."
: Tarlson dropped into a chair. "Sire, I'm a simple man. This's a bit
complicated... But there's something I've got to tell you. It may help." He
described what he had seen the night of the abduction.
"The Captal," the Krief said when Eanred finished. "I suspected it. The
creatures in the tower, you know. But I kept asking myself, what did he have
to gain? Now I wonder if he was a willing accomplice, or under duress? I've no
ideas about your attacker. He must've been a Power..."
"You haven't investigated?" The puzzle had been answered. The old man had been
the Captal of Savernake. Eanred had seen him briefly during the wars.
"I had my reasons. For now I have a son, though he'll never be King.
Meanwhile, I keep hoping there'll be an acceptable heir..." For a moment his
face expressed intense anguish. "The girl's no more my blood than the
changeling."
"Sire?"
"Don't know how it was managed. But I didn't father the child. Haven't had the
capacity since the wars. No need to be shocked, Eanred. I've managed to live
with it. As has the Queen, though she wasn't told till recently... I'd run out
of excuses. And it was time she knew. She might find a way to give me an heir
before it's too late." He smiled a tight, agonized smile.
"I doubt it, Sire. The Queen..."
"I know. She's young and idealistic... But a man has to live by his forlorn,
twisted hopes."
Tarlson shook his head slowly. More than the knighthood, the Krief's
confessions were honors that showed the high esteem in which he was held. He
wished there was something he could do...
He returned home in a dour, bitter mood, silently cursing Fate, yet with a
renewed respect for the man who was his lord and friend. Let the Nordmen call
him weakling. The man had a strength they would never understand.
iii) She walks in darkness
Three times emissaries of the Demon Prince came to Maisak. Each time the
Captal sent them home with polite but firm refusals. Then he heard nothing for
a long time.
He considered going to the Krief. But temptation called. He might stumble into
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