“You haven”t heard of him?”
Maximilian shook his head.
“Well, you”ll need to ask Axis for the details,” Ishbel said, “but he is devoted to me
because many, many months ago, when he was part of the detail accompanying Axis to bring me
to Isaiah, I healed him of a twisted bowel. My skills as the Archpriestess of the Coil did not only
encompass death.”
“I keep finding ever more hidden depths within you, Ishbel.”
She made a noncommittal movement of her shoulders, and they sat in silence for a little
while.
Maximilian”s attention was eventually caught by a movement to the west. There was
something in the sky…
“Icarii,” Ishbel said, who had caught his look and frown of concern. “Can you see? One
of them has such pink feathers!”
Maximilian smiled, relaxing. “Yes. I can see. There must be fifteen or sixteen of them.
Where have they come from, do you think?”
“Perhaps they have heard that they have a new Talon, and that he travels with you.”
Maximilian nodded slowly. “Word must be filtering out into the eastern lands.”
“StarDrifter will be happy to gather his people about him.”
Maximilian nodded again.
Ishbel drew a deep breath. “I came up here because I wanted to apologize for the way I
spoke to you this morning.”
“I deserved it.”
Another small silence.
“Surely we must be done apologizing to each other now,” Ishbel said, and Maximilian
laughed softly.
“If you say so.”
Now the silence was a little more awkward.
“I don”t want to hurt you, Maxel,” Ishbel said. “If Ravenna has shown you a vision where
I—”
“Don”t…” Maximilian said. “Come with me to Elcho Falling. You are a Persimius, and it
is your home as much as mine. Whatever happens, happens.”
He picked up a small fragment of rock where the frost had splintered it from the greater
one, and turned it over and over in his hand. It struck him, once more, just how different were
Ravenna and Ishbel. Ravenna had not once stopped trying to persuade him that Ishbel was a
nightmare just waiting to wake, while, contrariwise, Ishbel had not once, in all the months she”d
had the opportunity, said a single thing against a woman she had every cause to loathe.
Ravenna would hate it that Ishbel had offered to stay behind, and he had refused.
“All Persimians must be true fatalists,” Ishbel said, and Maximilian laughed out loud.
“Grim fatalists,” he agreed, still smiling.
“I wish our baby had lived,” Ishbel said.
Maximilian hesitated, wondering where this would lead. “So do I,” he said.
Ishbel didn”t take it any further, and Maximilian thought that somehow they had, in those
two simple statements, probably encompassed as much—and as well—as if they”d spent hours
beating their breasts about the tragedy.
Ishbel took a deep breath. “Are you looking forward to Elcho Falling?”
“Yes,” Maximilian said. “How long have I been on the road now? Eighteen months?
Longer? You almost as long. I left Escator to find a bride…and here I still am, on the road. So,
yes, I am longing for Elcho Falling—longing for a home. Longing for an end to this journeying.”
“And Elcho Falling is home, not Escator?”
“I think so. Escator seems so far behind me. I don”t think I could go back there and be
happy. I would always be restless. I was always restless there, I think, perhaps knowing that it would not be where I ended my days.”
“You should not talk so about ending your days.”
He shrugged.
Ishbel chewed her lip, looking over the vast encampment. “Do you worry about this
army?”
“Yes. I have no idea what I can do to hold it together. Isaiah could barely do it, and I am
not Isaiah.”
“Perhaps you need to allow it to fracture apart.”
He looked at her, frowning. “What do you mean?”
“Look at us, Maxel. Here we sit, talking comfortably, and when have we ever done that?
Neither of us keeping any secrets…and when before have we had such truth between us? What
did it take, Maxel, for us to reach this moment where we could trust each other and be friends?”
She rose, and Maximilian had to squint into the sun in order to look up at her. He thought
she smiled at him just before she turned to walk down the hill, but was not sure.
He watched her all the way back to her tent, thinking about what she had said.
Perhaps you need to allow it to fracture apart.
What did it take, Maxel, for us to reach this moment where we could trust each other and
be friends?
The frown smoothed from Maximilian”s face, and he smiled, tossing the fragment of rock
high into the air before catching it again.
Suddenly he could see the road ahead to Elcho Falling clear and straight.
“Thank you, Ishbel,” he murmured, then rose and made his own way down the hill.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
The Sky Peaks Pass
Ishbel sat in her tent, the Goblet of the Frogs in her hands. It was late at night. Madarin
had long settled down in his bedding in a small shelter built into the back of the tent, and Ishbel
supposed that she, too, should go to bed. The Lealfast were due to arrive in the morning, and it
would be a day partly of excitement, partly of nerves. No one truly knew how the Isembaardians would react to the arrival of such a supernatural force—or even how the Lealfast themselves
might behave.
She turned the goblet over and over. It felt wonderful in her hands: the glass was smooth
and warm, and even when it did not whisper to her the goblet managed to convey such love and
warmth that Ishbel found it difficult to pack it away.
It was so beautiful. Ishbel thought that her ancestor, Tirzah, must have been extraordinary
to have created something this beautiful.
It was because she loved the man for whom she created me, the goblet said.
“Boaz,” Ishbel murmured, so relaxed by the goblet”s soothing presence that the fact it
spoke to her did not mar her serenity in the slightest.
Love can do many amazing things.
Ishbel smiled, just slightly. “You think that Maximilian and I…”
It is a possibility only.
“I don”t think so,” said Ishbel. “I am the stronger without him.”
Possibly.
“I can”t think that—”
“Talking to yourself, Ishbel?”
Ishbel looked up, startled.
Salome was standing just inside the door of the tent, looking at her quizzically.
“Talking to myself only,” Ishbel said, folding the goblet away in a piece of cloth. She
smiled. “I find it helps, sometimes.”
Salome smiled back, sitting down on a stool and arranging her robe and wings to her
satisfaction.
“The baby?” Ishbel said.
Salome rested a hand on her growing belly. “He is doing well, but I am almost at that
point where I will be happier with him outside of me than inside. StarDrifter will not allow me to
fly. He says I still am too ungainly in the air—” Salome made a moue “—and my flight muscles
not yet strong enough to bear us both. I might harm his precious son should I topple from the
sky.”
“I am sure he is just as worried for you, Salome.”
“Well, perhaps.”
“Maxel and I saw some Icarii flying in today. What do you know of them?”
“Ah! StarDrifter is so pleased! Apparently BroadWing sent word back with several Icarii
when first he realized StarDrifter was heading north with Isaiah”s force. Now Icarii are heading
to join with their Talon.” Salome smiled. “Many are coming, including a goodly number,
BroadWing told me this afternoon, who were once with Axis” vaunted Strike Force. All I can
hope for, my dear, is that StarDrifter”s entire family does not reappear. I simply could not
manage.”
Ishbel laughed.
“Now,” Salome continued, “you must tell me all about you and Maximilian. You told me
yesterday what transpired when you went to declare your love for him, but now it appears that
Ravenna has been left to mope alone with her mother, and Maximilian is all of a sudden casting
hooded looks your way!” Salome smiled in genuine warmth. “And now you tell me that you and
he met earlier? Ha! Do you remember that day when first we became friends, and I said how I
admired you for the fact that you so carelessly manipulated the love of kings and
tyrants—without even being aware of it?”
“Yes.”
“Any other woman would have crumpled with despair at Maximilian”s rejection, Ishbel. I
know of no one who could have managed such a disaster with aplomb and dignity. And now
look at you! You wear your clothes with such…difference. Two days ago that gown would have
hung dispirited on you. Now you wear it as though it were a vestment fit for the most powerful
empress. As though you were the most powerful empress. What is your secret?”