Stormlight - Ed Greenwood [69]
* * * * *
The late afternoon sun brightly lit the battlements of Firefall Keep-a good thing for those brave enough to stand on the heights, given the chill breezes that blew from the mountains.
Those winds whipped the chestnut-hued hair of Lady Shayna Summerstar into an unruly plume. She didn't care. The ruin of her coiffure was not why her face was tight and tense as she stared at the tall woman with the silver hair-hair that serenely held its shape, defying the winds. Shayna admired this Harper. She felt shame and resentment as question after question politely probed at her secret.
"I know that even now, a Summerstar is aiding the foe who slew your brother and your grandmother," Storm was saying, her eyes two dark pools Shayna could not escape. "Is it you?"
Dark master, aid me! With an effort, the young heiress kept her face calm, trying not to show how frantic she truly felt. “I am shocked that such an idea would occur to you or anyone, “ Shayna said with just a touch of ice. “I am, after all, a Summerstar.”
“So is Thalance, the scourge of Firefall Vale,” Storm said with just a hint of grim mirth about her lips. “So is Uncle Erlandar, reportedly thrice the rogue in his day than Thalance will ever be.”
Shayna made no more reply to this than to sardonically raise an eyebrow. Inwardly, though, she screamed, Master, can you hear me? What shall I do?
Because Storm was more than a mortal, and the cry was so impassioned and so close, she heard the mental call. Keeping all trace of that hearing from her face, she said, "You can't hide forever, Shayna House Summerstar needs a leader as bright and clear as Athlan tried to be. Those who consort with beast end up as beasts themselves-or, far more often, end up the food of beasts."
With those softly barbed words, she turned and walked away.
Master? Master!
Shayna watched the woman she admired so much stride along the battlements, dwindling into the distance. Storm disappeared down the stair she'd come from. Still, empty silence was the only reply to Shayna's entreaties.
She drew a ragged breath. Storm knew. She must know…
Too late, her worried fingers found the hilt of the knife sheathed in her bodice, and she drew it out. Bright and sharp it flashed, throwing sunlight defiantly back up into the sky. With this blade, one could slay a Harper. But would it fell a Chosen of Mystra, wise and spell-shrouded from centuries in service to the goddess?
Could she go after Storm Silverhand, the Bard of Shadowdale, and put this gleaming thing in her throat? Did she dare? Did she want to?
Sudden tears broke forth and ran down her cheeks. Shayna shook her head and sobbed against a bling crenelation. No, a thousand times, no. There walked the sort of lady she dreamed of being…
She found herself looking over the battlements. Down, down… it was a sickeningly long way to the treetops below. Shayna Summerstar started to shake. She was alone, and trapped, with death drawing nearer-oh, gods, why had she been such a fool?
But what choice had she had?
Athlan's choice, she told herself. She looked down over the battlements again. Then she shook her head, went to her knees against the old parapet of her home and started to cry in earnest as a soft and magnificent sunset came down over Firefall Vale.
* * * * *
The man who was not Maxer shook his head to banish the ever-crowding memories. He wearily descended a flight of steps into the great vaulted hall at the heart of the Haunted Tower.
Let me take charge, Pheirauze Summerstar said in his mind. I can handle such things.
NO DOUBT, he grunted mentally. He sank down into a high-backed seat that still bore the stains where one Summerstar had killed another on it, a century ago.
He thrust the knowing voice of the dowager lady firmly from his thoughts and hummed to himself, feeling bloated and tired. This subsumption was useful, but burdensome. His mind was awash in the thoughts and passions and scenes of others, crowded until he could scarcely think-unless battle brought him fully to the here and now.
Battle.