To be awakened by Matt Sören knocking at her door. The Dwarf devoted the morning to her, an attentive guide through the vastness of the palace. Roughly garbed, with an axe swinging at his side, he was a harshly anomalous figure in the hallways and chambers of the castle. He showed her rooms with paintings on the walls, and inlaid patterns on the floor. Everywhere there were tapestries. She was beginning to see that they had a deeper significance here. They climbed to the highest tower, where the guards greeted Matt with unexpected deference, and, looking out, she saw the High Kingdom baking in the rigor of its summer. Then he led her back to the Great Hall, empty now, where she could gaze undisturbed at the windows of Delevan.
As they circled the room, she told him about her meeting with Jaelle two days ago. The Dwarf blinked when she explained how she was made guest-friend, and again when she described Jaelle’s questions about Loren. But once more he reassured her.
“She is all malice, Jaelle, all bright, bitter malice. But she is not evil, only ambitious.”
“She hates Ysanne. She hates Diarmuid.”
“Ysanne, she would hate. Diarmuid . . . arouses strong feelings in most people.” The Dwarf’s mouth twisted in his difficult smile. “She seeks to know every secret there is. Jaelle may suspect we had a fifth person, but even if she were certain, she would never tell Gorlaes—who is someone to be wary of.”
“We’ve hardly seen him.”
“He is with Ailell, almost all the time. Which is why he is to be feared. It was a dark day for Brennin,” Matt Sören said, “when the elder Prince was sent away.”
“The King turned to Gorlaes?” Jennifer guessed.
The Dwarf’s glance at her was keen. “You are clever,” he said. “That is exactly what happened.”
“What about Diarmuid?”
“What about Diarmuid?” Matt repeated, in a tone so unexpectedly exasperated, she laughed aloud. After a moment, the Dwarf chuckled, too, low in his chest.
Jennifer smiled. There was a solid strength to Matt Sören, a feeling of deeply rooted common sense. Jennifer Lowell had come into adulthood trusting few people entirely, especially men, but, she realized in that moment, the Dwarf was now one of them. In a curious way, it made her feel better about herself.
“Matt,” she said, as a thought struck her, “Loren left without you. Did you stay here for us?”
“Just to keep an eye on things.” With a gesture at the patch over his right eye, he turned it into a kind of joke.
She smiled, but then looked at him a long moment, her green eyes sober. “How did you get that?”
“The last war with Cathal,” he said simply. “Thirty years ago.”
“You’ve been here that long?”
“Longer, Loren has been a mage for over forty years now.”
“So?” She didn’t get the connection. He told her. There was an easiness to the mood they shared that morning, and Jennifer’s beauty had been known to make taciturn men talkative before.
She listened, taking in, as Paul had three nights before, the story of Amairgen’s discovery of the skylore, and the secret forging that would bind mage and source for life in a union more complete than any in all the worlds.
When Matt finished, Jennifer rose and walked a few steps. Trying to absorb the impact of what she had been told. This was more than marriage, this went to the very essence of being. The mage, from what Matt had just said, was nothing without his source, only a repository of knowledge, utterly powerless. And the source . . .
“You’ve surrendered all of your independence!” she said, turning back to the Dwarf, hurling it almost as a challenge.
“Not all,” he said mildly. “You give some up any time you share your life with someone. The bonding just goes deeper, and there are compensations.”
“You were a king, though. You gave up—”
“That was before,” Matt interrupted. “Before I met Loren. I . . . prefer not to talk about it.”
She was abashed. “I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I was prying.”
The Dwarf grimaced, but by now she knew it for his smile. “Not really,” he said. “And no matter. It is a very old wound.”