Page 79 of Valdemar

It was rather nice to be able to wake up in his old bed, saunter into the bathing room where a boiler of hot water was already waiting, and get a morning bath without having to heat the water himself. A small thing, but pleasant, especially when his muscles ached a little from all that unaccustomed walking. Yes, he did indeed walk a lot, and train, but he’d been walking for many more marks than he was used to down there in Haven, and on hard, paved streets, not turf.

Perhaps because he had gone to bed as soon as he could, and long before his brothers came up from the Great Hall, he was awake even before his parents were. So he had his leisurely bath in peace, and took his time dressing. Jon was up next, flew through his bath and threw on his clothing, and after an interval of crooning over his cats, was ready to dart out the door when Restil intercepted him.

“What’s the hurry?” he asked.

“I want to catch Starbird and get her Herald story,” Jon explained. “She always eats in the first serving, but since Father wants her to eat with us, I can catch her before she starts, get what I need, and be done before we all need to be at the head table.”

That gave Restil pause. Something about this plan bothered him, though he couldn’t put his finger on why. So instead, he said, “I’ll come with you. Darshay will tell Ardatha and Father will know where we are.”

Jon gave him a sly look that said, You just want more time with Starbird, and Restil wasn’t about to deny that—but he also wasn’t going to allow his youngest brother to twig him over it, either. So he raised an eyebrow, which Jon interpreted correctly as Don’t. Just don’t.

Who needs Mindspeech when you have Sibling Speak?

So they clattered their way down the stairs to the Great Hall and intercepted Starbird as she followed the rest of the Heralds into the hall.

She cocked her head at Jon’s exuberant greeting, but gave Restil a warm look that gratified him no end before turning her attention back to Jon. “I am happy to see you, Jon, but what is so urgent that you have risen this early just to speak with me?”

“Well, you know the King made me the chronicler of everything to do with the Heralds, right?” Jon said, motioning with his head that they should step aside and not block the door. She followed him a little way down the hall, with Restil following her.

“Of course, we all know that.” She gave him a slightly doubtful look.

“I’ve got everyone’s story but yours—” he began—and that was when she raised a hand to stop whatever else he was going to say.

“And you will please leave me and Radiant out of your chronicles,” she said, firmly, and steadily.

Jon was clearly taken aback. “But—but—”

“No ‘buts.’ We must not be in your chronicle. Radiant agrees.”

:I do, too.:

“So does Darshay,” Restil relayed. “I don’t know why, but she does.”

“But why?” Jon demanded. “What reason could you possibly have? You being Chosen is . . . almost as big and important a thing as the Companions themselves! It means the Hawkbrothers are really our allies—”

“And that is precisely why we must not be in your chronicles,” Starbird said patiently, brushing a strand of her black hair across her forehead and back into place. “If the Tayledras are known far and wide as allies, we lose much of our effectiveness as your allies. Instead of being a factor of uncertainty, we become something your people will think they can depend on. Instead of being something they do not want to cross, we become something taken for granted. Secrecy is part of our armory. We will not give it up under any circumstances.” As Jon’s face registered his disappointment, she looked as if she was inclined to pat him on the head, but instead, just softened her expression to one of sympathy. “I understand that this is very important to you, but this is not something I am prepared to compromise on.”

“But what about—”

“You may make up a new Herald, Chosen by Radiant. You may give her whatever background you wish. You may ascribe what we do to Radiant and her Chosen, the Herald you made up. You just may not make that Herald me, or say she is a Hawkbrother.” She paused. “And Radiant says that Ardatha says that the King agrees. As your father, he understands your disappointment. But as your King, he orders you to abide by my wishes.”

Jon heaved an enormous sigh. “But what about history?”

“What we know as history changes over time, little brother,” Restil said with the authority of being the eldest. “It depends on who is telling it, why they are telling it. People will edit out, add, or change a lot of things in twenty years, let alone a hundred. And no one actually needs to know that one of the first Heralds was a Tayledras. I mean, in fact, once we are in the uniform, we are all just Heralds and none of us is any more special than any other. That’s why we have a uniform.” He thought about it a little more. “In fact, the only stories that need to be told are those of Heralds who came out of poverty or modest circumstances, because that will mean people will know that this is not confined to the wealthy or highborn. Other than that—it’s nice to know, but in twenty, fifty, or a hundred years, it won’t matter.”

“Especially not if, in twenty or fifty or a hundred years, what my people want is to be the frightening, spooky people that no one knows much about, who live in the Pelagirs where no one else will.” Starbird gave him an earnest look. “Much of our work revolves around keeping the unwary out. Because the Pelagirs are dangerous, even to the wary, much less the unwary. In the future, we will inevitably move apart from you, and perhaps another clan will be nearer than us, a clan that has no interest in you. That is our culture. That is part of our Goddess-appointed task. And in that future, we don’t want people reading your chronicles of the first days of the Heralds, then wandering around in those dangerous lands, looking for us. I do not want to become an exotic icon—and we don’t want romantic young idiots interfering with the job we must do because they’re hoping to find someone like me. We want to be the people they are actually afraid of encountering. Do you understand now?”

“I do,” Jon sighed. “I don’t like it, and it seems wrong to keep such a momentous thing out of the chronicles, but since Father agrees with you . . . I guess I’ll just make someone up, like you suggested, if you do something I need to write about.”

“Thank you,” she said, then added, with mock seriousness, “because I would really hate to have to kill you to prevent you. Your cats would never forgive me.”

“The King wants you to have breakfast with us,” Restil said, relieved that what could have been a “situation” had been dealt with so easily. “He has some things he wants to discuss with you.”

She looked curious, but didn’t ask any questions, merely nodded her assent. The three of them made their way up to the high table just as the rest of the family got there.

There was no talk of the trip at breakfast, which he found odd, but at least the King relayed through their Companions that he wanted them to follow him when they finished. That seemed even odder, and Restil began to worry immediately. And when Kordas took them not to the royal suite, nor to his own privy chamber where he had private conversations, but to the corresponding chamber that the Lord Martial used for the utmost secret talks, Restil’s concern shot straight up.

It was not soothed at all when he found that Sai and Jonaton were there, along with the Lord Martial.