The uror.
He’d been convinced it would never come. The first year after his sixteen birthday, he’d woken every morning expecting it to be the day the sign would appear. He’d been told since birth that it would come, that he and his brother would have to prove their worth to follow in their father’s footsteps.
But day after day came and went with no sign of it. And as one year became two, he would go to sleep each night with the weight of his unworthiness pressing on his chest. By the time the third year came, he began to accept in his heart that it was never going to happen. That acceptance was half the reason he left Rime. There seemed no point in staying. Not with all his failures.
I failed as a son.
When the panic started that day in the marketplace, the wilder burning everything in reach, Corwin’s mother had ordered him to climb the rail outside the seamstress shop, but he’d argued with her. He wanted to help, not flee. She’d insisted, and he’d finally obeyed, climbing all the way to the roof. But when he turned to help her up after him, it was too late. All he could do was perch there on the edge and watch while the frenzied crowd crushed her beneath their feet.
I failed as a brother.
“Why did you let her die?” Edwin said that night. “Corwin, why didn’t you save her?” They were questions he couldn’t bring himself to answer. He didn’t need to. All of Norgard bore witness to his shame. He heard them whispering about it when they laid the queen’s body on the pyre and anointed her skin with holy fire.
I failed as a friend.
“Dal!” he had screamed, searching for him among the blackened, smoking debris. “Dal!” When he finally found him there’d been so much blood, so much damage. “I’m sorry, Dal. I didn’t mean for this to happen. I didn’t know.”
I failed . . . Kate.
“Please let him go, Corwin,” she had said, falling to her knees before him. Shudders wracked her body, her voice hoarse from screaming. “Mercy, please. Send us into exile. If you ever loved me, please do this. Don’t let him die today. Don’t let him die.”
With sheer force of will, Corwin stopped the flood of memories. He couldn’t handle them right now.
While the soldiers loaded the dead daydrake onto a cart to send to the League Academy for dissection and study, Corwin led his companions into the central wing. He needed to get them settled into their new quarters. Or old ones, he reminded himself, taking a quick glance at Kate. A stoic expression sat across her features and her spine formed a rigid line, but he could see the fragility beneath that hard exterior.
Doubt rose up in him. When he’d sent word to the castle of their impending arrival two days ago, he’d made an impromptu decision to request the old Brighton quarters be prepared for Signe and Kate. The three-bedroom suite had been unoccupied since Hale’s arrest and execution, no other courtier willing to reside in the home of a traitor. Although the Brighton family had owned a house in Norgard’s Glentrove district north of the castle, Hale and his wife and daughter had resided primarily in the castle. Hale’s duties as master of horse required him to spend so much time in the royal stables, and the quarters had been Kate’s home. But now Corwin wasn’t sure that his decision had been wise. Suppose it was too painful for her?
Damn, he inwardly cursed. He’d failed again. Why didn’t I ask her? It was too late to take it back it now, though. The castle housekeeper, Mrs. Paden, approached them the moment they stepped through the door.
Bowing stiffly to Corwin, she said, “I have both the Brighton quarters and the bachelor suite adjacent ready for your guests, your highness. I will escort them there myself, if you wish.”
Corwin heard Kate’s sharp intake of breath from behind him and winced. “Yes, that would be fine. Thank you, Mrs. Paden.”
The woman made an abrupt turn and motioned for them to follow.
Corwin spoke a quick good-bye to Signe and Bonner, promising to check in on them later. Then, he touched Kate’s arm and said in a low voice, “If you don’t wish to stay here, I can make other arrangements.”
She stared back at him for several seconds while a tempest of emotions churned in her eyes. Finally she offered him a timid smile. “I’ll be fine.”
He nodded and dropped his hand from her arm. He wished he could go with her, to help combat the demons she would face returning to her childhood home three years after her father’s death.
But Corwin had his own demons to battle.
For the next three days, Corwin did nothing but provide accounts of his travels and prepare for the uror ritual that would officially mark the beginning of the trials. He spoke openly about what he had learned of Ralph Marcel in Andreas—much to Edwin’s annoyance at his disobedience—and his speculations that the Rising was behind the daydrakes, but whenever the subject of the uror came up, he found himself tongue-tied.
In the two-hour session covering the history of the uror that he had with Master Weston, his old tutor, Corwin failed to ask so much as a single question. The realization that there was an uror sign in the city, some animal bearing the black and white marking of the gods, had left him paralyzed. There must be some mistake. He hadn’t even asked what kind of animal it was—and so far no one had volunteered the detail, as if speaking about it were taboo.
Fortunately, he had a few pressing matters to distract him. He spent several hours discussing the presence of Prince Eryx Fane of Seva with Minister Knox. The old master of arms was an expert strategist, able to anticipate enemy moves with uncanny skill, but after a long debate, they both decided the prince’s visit was little threat. Knox couldn’t see any advantage Seva might press in Andreas. Lord Nevan might envy House Tormane’s rule, but his city was strong only in physical defense, not offering the Godking anything he would need to conquer Rime where he’d failed before. To do that, he would need magist magic and nothing less. No army could survive here long without the magists to protect them from the drakes.
There was also the follow-up business with Ralph Marcel. Before leaving Andreas, Master Raith had inquired after the wilder with the gold robes, but they said that no such person had ever been claimed by the Inquisition. Although Master Raith didn’t state it outright, Corwin had gotten the impression that Raith wasn’t surprised they would deny it. Losing a captured wilder would reflect poorly on them and might even give other wilders ideas. But Corwin wasn’t ready to give up so easily. Too many people had seen Marcel taken. Although he doubted it would lead anywhere, he spent an entire afternoon drafting a letter to the head of the gold order house in Andreas, asking for them to send the official record of all the people taken by the Inquisition in their city in the last year by order of the high prince. He delivered the signed and sealed missive to the Relay house in Norgard himself.
On the night of the ritual, Corwin stood in his quarters with his back rigid, waiting impatiently for a servant to finish buttoning the black tunic down his front. Fine silk piping of sky blue trimmed the front of the tunic and the edges as well as his black breeches. In the quarters adjacent to his, Edwin was donning the same somber outfit. The two of them would enter the Temple of Noralah side by side, mirror images of one another in solemn solidarity of the quest they were embarking on together.
And against each other.
“You look nervous,” Dal said from where he sat lounging in a nearby armchair. He held a glass of wine in one hand, his third by Corwin’s count.
Corwin rolled his eyes. “Sure you’re talking about me? They say wine is courage in liquid form.”