A Pledge of Fire
“That is a lie.”
I whirled around. Alastair stood beneath the entry arch, his face pale, his fists clenched at his side, eyes fixed on Kaheset. His words parted the air of the cavern like the shaft of a spear, quiet and deadly. Yelling would have been less frightening.
“It’s a vile slander and I will not allow it,” he said.
Kaheset sighed. “You are in the halls of the Vehryshi, Alastair, in the Keep of the Chronicler. It does not rest with you what will and will not be allowed,” he said. “I have kept this secret far too long.”
“Tristan Wydrick was the bastard of a Ranger and a bard from Upper Westhull. He—”
“He was Erran’s kyshakyn son and you know it. You’ve suspected it since you were a child. Your father wouldn’t have fostered Tristan if he was not his own.”
“My father took him in because he was a good man. A good man, Kaheset!”
“It is the best men who make the worst devils.”
“You dare?” Alastair cried. “He was your brother-in-arms! He fought for decades at your side, and this is how you repay him?”
Kaheset inhaled sharply, then turned aside. “Oh, curse me as you will; I care not. Continue believing that your father was honorable, upright, the very picture of integrity, whatever you wish. Only leave me out of it. I am weary of the affairs of humans and I will have no more of this.”
Alastair’s eyes blazed. “Ah-na’shaalk.”
Kaheset spun around. His growl shook the Hall. “You speak to me of shirking my duty? Of cowardice? I kept his secret for years, boy, against the laws of both our kinds and my own conscience. I was the one who disguised his absences, who claimed a contract every time he went to visit Merranda. I lied to the world for the sake of my khela, Alastair, and it cost us everything. Your mother—”
“My mother knew?”
“Isobel was an intelligent woman. Of course she knew. I did all in my power to keep it from her, but the years had worn through her patience and her suspicions would not be allayed. She learned of it after your sister was born. Why else do you think she took that contract in the Fens so soon after the birth?”
“She . . . the Fen-folk needed her protection.”
“Your mother could have taken any contract in the kingdom. She had no duty to the Fen-folk, yet she chose to fight the lamias in that stinking, poisonous swamp. Why do you think she did that? A young warrior, brokenhearted, betrayed by the man she loved but unwilling to shame him publically, she saw no other recourse. She was already weakened from the birth. When that sickness came on her, she embraced it.”
“And my father died avenging her!” Alastair cried. “He swore an oath before Thell at her pyre. A blood oath, Kaheset. Or don’t you remember?”
“You think he made that promise out of love? Don’t be naive, boy. That was guilt, not love.”
“You’re lying.”
“Erran cared for Isobel, yes, and he knew his duty, but he only ever loved one woman. He’d broken all his vows to his wife save one, and that oath was the last balm he could muster for his guilt. I know very well it was a blood oath; nothing else would atone. Think of the years it took him to fulfill it! Your father was the greatest warrior Arle had seen in generations, Alastair. You must know it wasn’t the lamias who defeated him.”
Alastair took a step back, hands half raised as if to fend off the blow he felt coming, that I felt coming, that hung in the still air of the Hall like an invisible hammer.
Kaheset followed him step for step. “Why do you think he swore to Thell and not Mikla?”
“Kaheset, don’t.”
“Your father never intended to leave the Cairn alive.”
The silence pressed on my ears, a living, terrible thing. Alastair turned and walked from the Hall.
Kaheset sighed as he watched him go. “He is so like Erran. Stubborn, and a fool.”
I wanted Akarra’s strength or the Drakaina’s authority or anything besides the weak and pathetic body that was all I had to hold my anger. “Do you have any idea what you’ve done?”
“I have unleashed the wind of truth, Lady Aliza, which only the strong of wing can ride. Better he brave the storm now than live any longer under the pretense of calm.” Perhaps he saw the fury in my expression, for he was quick to add, “But do not despair. The boy may be a fool, but he is a Daired too. He will weather this.”
I stared hard at the great dragon beside me, drinking in the broken pride in his marshlight eyes, and wondering if there was some of his Rider in him as well. “His father was everything to him.”
“Then that was his mistake.”
“It was a mistake to love his father?”
Kaheset scoffed. “You humans with your saints and heroes. Learn the truth as I did, both you and your husband: they will always disappoint you. If Alastair returns to Pendragon a wiser man for my honesty, then I will have done some good. It is all I have left to offer House Daired.”
The chill in his tone set my teeth on edge. I tugged at my trousers in a mock curtsy. “You needn’t worry. We won’t be bothering you again.”
He looked at me then, face to face and eye to eye. His breath was cool and smelled of age and decay. “You think me cruel, do you not?”
“Well, you’re certainly not kind,” I spat.
His golden head drooped. “Believe what you will of me, my lady, but no matter how foolish or stubborn he may be, it was never my wish to cause Alastair pain. It is not his fault his father was faithless.”
“He’ll still carry that burden the rest of his life.” I turned to go. “Goodbye, Kaheset.”
“Lady Aliza, wait.”
“I have nothing more to say to you.”
“You need only listen. I spoke the truth in the Council Hall: I do not know what it is you faced out there in the Old Wilds. All the gods forbid the ghastradi have returned, but if they have, and if Tristan Wydrick has fallen thrall to the brotherhood, he will not stop until he has destroyed House Daired.”
I stopped in spite of myself. “You knew him, didn’t you?”
“All too well. Erran took him as his ward the year Isobel died. I watched him grow to manhood in the Pendragon halls, and I saw how love blinded my khela. Even after his disgrace and demotion, Erran could not bear to send him away. The boy reminded him too much of his mother.”
“Did Wydrick know he was . . . is a Daired?”
“I do not know. Erran never told him, but he was always a clever lad, and no boy with half his wits about him could doubt there was something to his ancestry. Whether he knows for certain now I cannot say, but even if he does not, I fear we have handed this unknown enemy a great and terrible weapon.”
“What do you mean?”
“The boy was raised to be a Rider, Aliza. Erran trained him himself, and in those days Wydrick thirsted for nothing but his approval. He was baptized in the ways of war before most Rangers touch their first weapon, and now you tell me that he’s been given not only the undying strength of a ghast, but also the brotherhood of an ancient evil that even we dragons do not fully understand. What time and hatred have warped that desire for approval into, I do not know, but I fear it. I fear the damage he is capable of inflicting on Alastair and Julienna and their dragons. If given the chance, next time he will not stop with a maiming.”