Umber

Wars are won but struggles, as ever, continue.

Sir Geoffrey strode down a dim, cold hallway of Greyhawk’s temple of Wee Jas, a black-robed, hooded attendant trailing in his wake. He paused before the third door from the end, on the left. “I’m still not convinced this is the right way to go about it,” he said.

“I want to know her mood,” the figure within the robes replied, “before I decide.”

Geoffrey cast the attendant a reproachful glance, then opened the door. It was a small, spare interview room, furnished with a table and two chairs. Light shone upward on the ceiling from two copper sconces on opposing walls, but the rest of the room was quite dim; when the robed figure took up a silent vigil just inside the door he was little more than a shadow among shadows. Brin, dressed in the robes of a senior Jasian priestess, half-rose from her chair when they entered, but Geoffrey waved her back into her seat. “No reason,” he said, “until we’ve settled the question of allegiance.” As he removed his cloak he reached into an inner pouch, withdrew a folded piece of cloth and tossed it on the table between them.

The arms of Dunthrane stared up at her from the surplice, and she frowned. “Did Keraptis give this to you? I thought he would keep a better confidence. Usually he likes secrets. His own or someone else’s – he’s not partisan.”

“I was something of a father to him, for a time,” Geoffrey said. “He still won’t lie to me if I ask him a direct question.” He took the remaining chair. “I assume you remain undecided, or this would be in the king’s possession instead of Keraptis’.” Brin refused to meet his questioning gaze. “It’s been two months. No one knows why you left, no one knows whether you’re returning.” He tapped the surplice. “It’s time for answers, child.”

“I don’t have any for you.”

“The tragedy,” he said quietly, “is that you don’t have any for yourself.” For the first time since he’d entered she looked at him. “Keraptis flooded Drellin’s Ferry and the surrounding valley to slow the advance of the goblin armies. The next morning, you were gone. Dryden and Vayel thought you’d left for the North Kingdom with Corwin. Corwin thought you’d remained behind. Keraptis kept everyone dancing a merry shell game for you, for much longer than I would have believed possible. I’m not here to scold you, child,” he said as her gaze dropped back to the table and remained there. “I’m here to try and understand.”

“Drellin’s Ferry,” she murmured. “I haven’t had any news.”

“There has been a great deal of news not to have had. The delaying tactic worked. The goblin army was defeated.”

“And the people of Drellin’s Ferry?” she asked impatiently, as if the outcome of the war was of little interest to her. “Captain Serranis?”

“Safe in Brindol. Dryden’s orders were received. The worg outriders attacked the refugees, and Captain Serranis was seriously injured fighting them off, but the Dispatch arrived in time. And in the larger geopolitical landscape, because of your efforts and their sacrifice, along with the toil of others, Iuz’s mighty war machine lies in ruins.”

“But it’s existed for decades,” she said, startled. “How could it be dismantled in a few short months?”

“You should know the answer to that,” he reproved. “By a man not too timid to take huge risks, nor too kind-hearted to discomfit whoever is required in the execution of those risks.” Brin frowned, but before she could say anything Geoffrey continued, “Tenser’s map – and Clement’s own intelligence – suggested the presence of a series of tunnels emanating outward from the Great Rift, pointing toward both Furyondy and Dunthrane. Iuz knew that Dunthrane’s forces were stretched thin dealing with the North Kingdom – a disaster the Scarlet Brotherhood conveniently created by assassinating Grenell – and that Furyondy’s were scattered overland dealing, they thought, with Iuz. But he had pulled the bulk of his army back to those tunnels, intending to swarm out in both Dunthrane and Furyondy – laying waste to the countryside while their military attention was occupied elsewhere.” He smiled thinly. “It’s much simpler to bury an army than to fight it, if it is foolish enough to give you the opportunity.”

“The paladins on griffons,” Brin said. “Clement committed all of you to a winner-take-all, suicide mission.”

“Only suicide if we failed,” the paladin pointed out. “And thanks to Hadrack’s unerring skill in finding those tunnels, we didn’t. And had the opportunity to destroy Iuz’s temple while we were at it. He’ll be a long while recovering from that.”

She seemed to take no particular pleasure in the news and her eyes were cold as she said, “He should have left him alone. There are no other trackers in the service of Dunthrane?”

“Hadrack has extraordinary talent. As for deep wilderness lore married to such political instincts as his years of directing the Dispatch gave him – no, there very well might not be another such ranger available within Dunthrane’s borders.”

“The king should have thought of that before he disgraced him and cast him out.”

“Borch agreed with you,” Geoffrey said mildly. “He argued vehemently against recalling Hadrack.” At Brin’s triumphant look he added, “Something about once bitten, twice shy. Clement thought Hadrack deserved better than that. He didn’t take him at swordpoint, you know – it was his choice.”

“He’s still a Heironian,” she said. “He’ll always do his duty.”

Geoffrey considered her gravely. “Will you?”

Her coldness fractured into something less certain. “I don’t know. I don’t know what it is. I don’t know what I believe in. I barely know what I am anymore.” She stared down at her hands. “The Alpha gift of repose is gone. Appropriate, somehow, all things considered. But I can’t help but feel…just when I thought there was no more of him to lose…” She traced an outline around the fingers of her mechanical hand. “And it’s been replaced with – of all things – the gift of healing. I’ve been trying to figure out from where, and what it means. Rao, perhaps?” she muttered half to herself.

“Does it matter?”

“I don’t know. I’d like to understand – ” She thought she’d heard some odd note in his voice and cut off mid-sentence to stare at him intently. She felt as if she saw him – really saw him – for the first time. “Damn you.”

His roguish smile was more sad than usual. “It’s both a blessing and a curse that you chose to be a priestess,” he said. “Easier to make amends, but more likely to be discovered as one matures in one’s divinity. Your friend the Canoness, for example, recognized me at once.”

Brin clenched her fists and her jaw. “You’ve been – lurking – all these years?”

“‘Lurking’ is an unpleasant word,” he remonstrated. “In the best tradition of your own goddess, I sought repayment of a debt incurred. We had the need to use you as we did in Blasingdell. But we didn’t have the right. Fharlanghn felt otherwise about it – if you turned your back on him, all obligations were canceled, but I thought,” he shrugged, “why, after that moment of terrible awareness we forced on you, would you do anything else?. So yes, I’ve waited, for an opportunity to return some small measure of what we took from you.”

“Was there ever a Sir Geoffrey?” She heard a sharp intake of breath from the attendant by the door. He was supposed to be silent but she supposed if he understood, even tangentially, the implications of this conversation she could forgive him a moment’s indiscretion.

“Yes,” he sighed, “there was. He died in Blasingdell, at the hands of the servants of Nerull. He couldn’t face what they’d made him in undeath, the atrocities he committed against those he’d sworn to protect; the fact that he was strong enough to fight his depravity even some of the time wasn’t good enough for him. When Haissha tried to raise him, he refused to return to his mortal life. This splinter of my Self took his place without her knowing – for her sake, for yours, for Keraptis, for all the people whose lives he would have touched if he had lived.” He looked thoughtful. “And for his, I suppose – he was a faithful servant. He is a penitent on Celestia now, a point of light whose past is mercifully lost to him.” He met the Jasian’s gaze, and there was no mistaking the otherworldliness of the being behind his eyes. “But I remember.”

“Does Clement of Dunthrane know who you are?”

“If he does, he’s never spoken of it to me.”

She looked puzzled. “You serve him. Why?”

“I believe him a righteous man. I believe in his cause. I also believe that, in his dedication and purity of purpose, he sometimes requires reminders of his humanity.” He looked almost amused. “I have taken that role upon myself.” He gave her that piercing, more than human glance she couldn’t believe she’d overlooked for so long. “Wrestling with similar issues as you do, perhaps that is why you find him a difficult liege.”

She looked away. “Did Corwin return from the North Kingdom safely?”

“Safe, and successful.”

“He was very mysterious about why he was going, although I assumed it had something to do with the missing heir apparent to Grenell’s throne.”

“Cyrinia Cath,” he filled in.

“Closeted with her mysterious new advisors, presumably the Scarlet Brotherhood.”

“Closeted with her mysterious new visions, as it happened,” he corrected her.

“Visions? Of what?”

“Tiamat.” He nodded at Brin’s widened eyes. “Agents of the Scarlet Brotherhood were trying to convince Cyrinia Cath that she was a part-dragon descendant of Tiamat herself, and that it was time to reclaim her heritage and aid the dragon queen in forging a grand new destiny for Oerth. To that end, she was to gather the goblin tribes and send them on a merry march of destruction through Nyrond while preparations were made to open a portal capable of summoning Tiamat herself.”

“I thought a significant portion of the North Kingdom’s army consisted of the demi-humans,” she said.

“Yes, and wouldn’t it be convenient for the Scarlet Brotherhood if they were committed elsewhere? But Cyrinia is not a stupid woman, nor an incautious one, and proved less malleable than they’d hoped.”

“So they conjured apparent visitations from Tiamat herself? How did they achieve sufficient verisimilitude? That would take an enormously powerful mage.”

“Or a psion. You should know. You’ve encountered her phantasms before.”

“T’lar,” she murmured. “Are you certain?”

“Positive. That was Corwin’s mission – to find out who was influencing her, and how, and in what direction. ‘Tiamat’ was promising Cyrinia a Great Kingdom reborn under her control, asking in return only a reasonable commitment of forces as a show of good faith.” Brin snorted in disgust. “But with some help from your Inquisitor, Corwin convinced her of their mendaciousness and malign intent.”

“But she did commit forces in Nyrond, and now you say they’ve been destroyed. Hasn’t the Scarlet Brotherhood achieved its aims?”

“Cyrinia is acutely aware that, far from ruling over a united Great Kingdom, she will lose control of the Northern without external aid.”

Brin’s face was an unreadable mask. “Dunthrane is sending troops.”

“It was turn to us, or to Ahlissa, or let the Scarlet Brotherhood overrun her country. I don’t think she sees us as the greater good,” he said wryly, “but we are the lesser evil.”

“If I may ask, who will be in command?”

“Because Corwin was the first to win Cyrinia Cath’s trust, I believe he and your friends are being asked to decide.”

“And the candidates?” she pressed.

“Sir Borch and,” he replied, continuing only after a pause, “myself.”

She laughed for the first time since he’d arrived. “Interesting choices.” Then she sobered again. “But I don’t understand why Iuz, the Scarlet Brotherhood and T’lar’s psions would suddenly become so cozy.”

“Don’t you? Clement continues to win allies. He has reunited the old Bone March. I’d be surprised if some spy, somewhere, hasn’t gotten wind of Ardel’s – and therefore Nyrond’s – sympathetic regard. Because of your ongoing influence in Veluna the Raoists – gently, as ever with the Raoists – have been pressuring Furyondy to relent in their foolish and prideful aloofness. Returning the body of Thrommel to them could only accelerate the process. The Scarlet Brotherhood grandfathers, T’lar, and even Iuz are wise enough to see that none of them could withstand the heart of the Great Kingdom united and against them, so they banded together to strike at it first, while it was still fractured.”

“And accomplished nothing but pulling it together more swiftly,” she mused. “Prideful and aloof as they are, I find it hard to believe that Furyondy can ignore Clement’s risking his entire kingdom to deal Iuz a deadly blow right on their sleeping border.”

“I would venture to say that’s correct.”

She tried to recall the paladin’s history lesson; it seemed a long time ago now. “If he gains Furyondy, he gains the Duchy of Urnst; the County comes with Nyrond. And you told me that Countess Katarina of the Shield Lands was unreceptive to Clement primarily because she was occupied with Iuz’s predations.”

“And if Cyrinia Cath is not an ally, she is at the least not an enemy. And after we’ve dealt with her honorably, helped her purge the malign forces at work in her country and then withdrawn, who can say what will come? But I must say,” he remarked casually, “that your tactical instincts, let alone interests, don’t seem to have deserted you.”

Brin looked at him, but said nothing.

“We’re not out of the woods. A replacement for Tenser’s – mis-temporized rather than misplaced, I suppose – sapphire hasn’t been found, but the summoning gate has not yet been destroyed. The Scarlet Brotherhood has managed to get their hands on the phylacteries of the two liches on Oerth with armies at their disposal: unwilling attack dogs they may be, but also highly motivated ones until we get those phylacteries back. And there are, as always, the psions. We’re certain that T’lar has provided the Scarlet Brotherhood with one or more of those arcane dampening devices. Tenser has analyzed the phenomenon and is convinced it can be countered with metamagic – but one of our most powerful metamagical assets has been incommunicado for the past two months.” His gaze was level and dispassionate, but unrelenting. “What will you do?”

“I…I don’t know.” She looked around the dimly lit room. “Here, there is no turmoil, and I can turn events over in my mind like chess moves. Out there…I didn’t care about the war. I didn’t care about correct strategy. I cared about Captain Serranis and Delora Zhaun. I care about Canonness Y’Deh, Rufus and Burne, Vayel’s catfolk,” she laughed sadly, “even Tenser, now that his shell of invulnerability has cracked. I’ve lost the dispassionate view. I think we both know why.” She waved a hand at the door and beyond. “Being out there, watching people suffer, started tearing me apart. I couldn’t stand it anymore. I left.”

“And are you happier here?”

“I’m not happy anywhere.” She glanced at the attendant by the door, mandatory now that she had taken up official duties within the temple walls. He was an observer only, and would report the conversation to no one, but she still wished he weren’t there. “I’m a servant of Wee Jas. We’re supposed to have the long view, the cosmic perspective, the impartial soul.” She leaned forward, eyes bright with anger and with tears. “I’ve spent two months searching that soul and have to admit that everything I do now, I do for one man. Everything I feel, I feel because he taught me how. And if there was a point to this – education – he left before I learned what it was. Left me with nothing but the pain of empathy.” The figure by the door stirred and then was still again.

“Perhaps there was no lesson plan,” Geoffrey said. “Perhaps he only wanted to be your friend, to see you happy, as you would see him. Perhaps he is, as he has always insisted, just a simple man, with all the same sorrows and joys, virtues and vices, confusions and uncertainties as the rest of us.” Brin gave him a hard stare, and he laughed. “Well, most of us.” He rose and moved toward the door.

“That’s all?” Brin said.

“Yes. I heard what I needed to hear. I’ll be in Greyhawk through tomorrow. I need you, or the surplice, back by then.” Nodding curtly to the black-robed figure by the door, he departed.

She sat with her hands flattened on the cold, dark wood of the table before her, staring unblinking until her sharply circumscribed world defocused around her. Looking up she saw the Jasian attendant, standing silent and still, dark eyes glittering in the shadows of his hood. She bowed her head and closed her eyes, wishing he’d have the sense to go away without her needing to engage in the effort of speech. “I’m alone, as you can see,” she said. “You can go.”

“I’d rather stay.”

She knew that voice, and her gaze snapped to him just as he drew back the hood. The greying hair, the weathered face, the sad, kind eyes. She knew the voice, knew the man, and all she could think to say was, “I shouldn’t be alone with outsiders.”

Hadrack held out his hands. “These have known your touch of death. Perhaps,” he half-smiled, “that makes me some sort of honorary Jasian.” The smile faded. “I have permission to be here.”

“Permission to spy on me?” she snapped, hiding her embarrassment at her earlier candor behind acrimony. “Now that you’re back in Dunthrane’s service, you’re to get the wayward Jasian back in line?”

He refused, as always, to rise to the bait. “This has nothing to do with Dunthrane. I think you know that.” His expression grew troubled. “He said I would always come for you, and whatever else I think of – that malevolent being, he spoke the truth there. When I heard you’d left – ”

“My duties?” she interrupted.

“Your friends,” he said mildly, “and come here alone, and not emerged, I was worried about you. So I came, to see if you were embracing the darkness of the temple – or hiding in it again. For the one, I would have left without you ever knowing I was here, grateful that you’d found peace, if not the peace I would have chosen for you. For the other…”

She glared at him, but her anger lacked conviction. “What do you want?”

“To talk. If you have anything to say. I know I do.” He drew nearer. “Come walk with me, outside.” She let him bring her to her feet. “Yesterday’s rain washed the dust from the memorial garden. It’s quite beautiful today.”

“Sir Geoffrey – ” she hesitated over the name, “hates that garden. What it stands for.”

“I know.” He smiled again. “But the violets are blooming, and they don’t care why.”