The Towers of the Sunset - L. E. Modesitt [142]
“Mine have been yours, and you’ve certainly been kind enough to use them against me when it suits your purpose.”
. . . damn you! Can’t keep anything . . . how could he have stood it for so long?
“Damn you . . .” The words are more sob than curse. Her hand touches the blade hilt. “You come after me . . . now . . .”
. . . and . . . kill us both. . .
Creslin stands helplessly as she backs away, her hand still on the blade, before she disappears into her room.
There on the terrace, caught between the sun and the surf, between the past he did not create and the future he cannot foresee, he waits and watches until a flame-haired woman in blue marches north and westward, back to the keep, back to another outpost of Westwind.
XCII
WITHIN THE WHITE mist of the mirror on the table rears a forest of masts upon the dark green swells of the Eastern Ocean.
The High Wizard nods. “Soon . . .”
“Soon what?” Hartor watches the images in the glass.
“Soon we will cloak their fleet from both eyes and magic.”
“Jenred, do you really think that Creslin could not penetrate the cloak?”
The thin wizard smiles, only with his mouth. His reddish-brown eyes glitter. “Of course he could . . . if he bothered to look. But he’s not in the habit, and those who would look for him do not have the ability.”
“What about the Westwind detachment? Why did you let it land?”
“If we had attacked it, he would have been alerted.”
“I don’t know. I don’t like the idea of a Westwind detachment on Recluce. And how would he have known?”
“From Klerris. His Black bitch was on the coaster.”
Hartor asks, “Won’t the Westwind group make a difference if . . . when the Hamorians storm Land’s End?”
“So? We can’t lose. Either the Marshall loses troops or the Hamorians do. Creslin is destroyed, or the Hamorians discover that they have another enemy among the western continents.”
“Fine. What if Creslin wins? What about Montgren?”
Jenred snorts. “What about it? Neither Creslin nor that bitch Megaera will ever claim it, and Sarronnyn can’t. The Duke has no heirs. We’ve seen to that. It will be ours, without even a battle. Korweil can’t live that much longer.”
“I wish I were as certain as you.”
Jenred shifts his eyes to the mirror, and to the ships that fill the glass. More than enough to take Land’s End. More than enough.
XCIII
“ARE YOU SURE you don’t want to try to break your blood-link to her?”
The two men look out over the dark gray cliffs onto the low, sweeping swells of the black-green northern sea. Only an occasional wash of white breaks across the crests of the slow-moving waves. Despite the high clouds, no rain has fallen, and the powdery red dust has drifted from the road onto the black stones of the terrace and over the uncut stones stacked beside the terrace where Creslin still works in the early mornings.
Now the guards are beginning the mortar work on the second guest house, using the stones he has cut, and Klerris has brought up enough timbers for the guest-house roof.
“What good would that do? Lydya said that the linkage would develop anyway.” Creslin leans down and picks up the short-handled stone sledge. Even though the essentials of the Black Holding proper are finished, the windows need glass and the kitchen is only a shell. In the interim, Creslin still putters with the stones for the walkways for the second and third guest houses. Someone will use them, he hopes.
“It might buy you some time.”
“Has that done us any good?” He cannot just stand and wait. Despite Megaera’s insistence on patience, the more he senses of her feelings, the clearer it is that patience is only an excuse for her not to face her feelings about him, and his feelings for her.
He lusts after her. He cannot lie about that, either to her or to himself. He also loves her, independent of lust, because of the other things that she is: determined, intelligent, incisive, and when she is not threatened, kind and considerate.
“I still doubt the wisdom of the whole double linkage,” Klerris adds.
“There wasn’t a choice.”
Klerris frowns.
“Lydya