Kaithbaurg wasn't a black fortress, and the prince of Hansa was a man with a history, friends, and scruples. He was still, of course, an enemy, but an enemy Neil would gladly call a friend if the times changed, and one he could kill or die by the hand of with a warrior's dignity.

Brinna he was having trouble even thinking about. She was still very much the woman he had met on the Lier Sea whose voice and expression had haunted him since he'd first opened his eyes to her. But there was something cold in her center he'd only sensed then, the thing that allowed her to poison someone and speak of it as if she had put a cat out the door.

But if she was cold, why did she seem like white fire from the corner of his eye? Why could he still feel the heat on his hands from touching her, even through the steady drizzle of rain?

He glanced at her and found her studying him, or thought he did. It was too dark to see her eyes beneath the eaves of the hat her brother had given her to keep the rain off.

They rode through the day as the rain grew steadily colder and more miserable. Mists lay heavy in the trees, dying dragons dragging themselves off to watery graveyards. Berimund's men lit torches that hissed and sputtered and trailed noxious, oily fumes but still burned, until at last they reached a stone face concealed by a sort of wickerwork grown over with vines, which Berimund shifted to reveal a stout wooden door. He stood looking at it for several long moments.

"What's wrong?" Neil asked.

"It ought to be locked," he said. "It isn't even closed."

Neil was off his horse before the thought to dismount was even conscious. He drew his stolen weapon and stalked toward the door.

"You'll follow us, Sir Neil," Berimund insisted. "We know this place, and you do not."

Two of his scouts went ahead, and then they all dismounted, tying the horses near the entrance. Stairs carved in living rock took them down.

Not much later they debouched into a large chamber carved in antique style but furnished much like Berimund's hall in Kaithbaurg.

The floor was littered with the dead. He heard a sudden, sharp sob from Berimund, who flung himself at the corpses, lifting their heads, kissing them, moving from one to the next in the vain hope that one still breathed.

Then Alis pushed past him and flew across the floor, the muddy hem of her dress dragging a snail's trail behind her.

Neil saw then, too, and ran after her, knowing his heart would fail.

Muriele did not look like she was sleeping. Her lips were almost black, and even in torchlight he could make out the bluish tinge of her skin. Alis had the queen's head cradled in her arms. Her eyes were open, her features twisted into a look of utter and desolate despair such as he had never seen.

Something lay on the floor beside her. In a daze he reached for it and found that it was a half-withered rose.

He rose up, choking back tears but letting the rage rise up, each breath filling him with red light. He stepped toward Berimund, who still knelt with his own, and stepped again, nearly treading on a dead man staring up at him with the same forsaken expression as Muriele.

Berimund hadn't done this. Berimund hadn't known about it. But Berimund was the only enemy before him, and by the saints, the floor was going to be red.

"No," Brinna said. "Stop there, Neil."

It arrested him. He hadn't seen her enter the chamber or follow him to Muriele's body. Her tear-jeweled eyes caught him like iron bands.

"Why would you cry for my queen?" he snapped.

"I'm not," she said. "I'm crying for you."

His hand trembled on the sword. "Why didn't you see this?" he asked. "You said Robert was coming…"

"I didn't see this part," she said. "I was occupied with other things."

"Like your own escape? You knew Berimund would be at the gate."

"There was nothing eldritch about that," she said. "I heard he was in the city. I sent a message telling him of my plans. Besides you, Berimund is the only one I trust."

"Was it Robert?"

"I can see your queen," she said, her voice suddenly dreamier. "I see a man, hear a music…" She trailed off, her breath quickening, her eyes rolling back.

"Make her stop," Alis said. "Sir Neil, make her stop."

Brinna was trembling now as if an invisible giant had taken her in his hand and was shaking her.

He gripped her by the shoulders.

"Brinna," he said. "Wake up. Stop seeing."

She didn't appear to hear him, so he shook her harder.

"Brinna!"

"What are you doing to my sister?" Berimund's raging voice shouted from across the room.

"Brinna!"

Blood began running from her nose.

"Swanmay," Neil cried in desperation. "Swanmay, return!"

She went rigid and suddenly sighed, collapsing against him, her heart beating weakly.

He felt the tip of a sword prick his neck.

"Put her down," the prince commanded.

Neil cut his eye toward the prince but kept Brinna bundled against him, feeling her heart strengthen.

"Do as I say!" Berimund exploded, pushing hard enough that Neil felt blood start on his neck.

"No." Brinna's hand came up and rested on the blade. "He saved me, Baur." She gently pushed down on the weapon and then reached for her brother. He tugged her away from Neil and wrapped her in both arms.

Neil just stood there, his knees feeling weak.

Alis took his elbow and got under his arm to support him.

"Robert did this," she said. "I'm certain of it."

Neil walked back to Muriele and sank slowly to his knees, understanding finally reaching his grieving brain.

She's gone. He couldn't protect her anymore. There was nothing else he could do.

Except find Robert and cut him into so many pieces that it wouldn't matter if he was alive or not.

PART IV

When walks again the Born Queen, the bones of men will clatter within them; the wombs of their women will fill with venom; every rider of the night will take her lash with hideous joy. And when at last the bones shake off their flesh, and the wombs consume their bearers, and the lash murders; when finally it is only her single voice screaming in the night-when she lacks any man or beast or ghostly thing to harrow and she must at last turn on herself-then all will be still.

But ten times a hundred years will first pass.

– TRANSLATED FROM THE TAFLES TACEIS OR BOOK OF MURMURS

CHAPTER ONE

LEOFF CLOSED his eyes and let the form build in the ensemble of his mind. The first bass line began, a male voice, rising and falling: the roots in the soil, the long slow dreams of trees. Then, after a few measures, a second line entered as deep in pitch but in uneasy harmony with the first: leaves rotting into soil, bones decaying into dust, and in the lowest registers the meandering of rivers and weathering of mountains.

Now the middle voice came in: Birth and growth, joy and tragedy, suffering and learning met with forgetting, the loss of senses, discorportation, disintegration…

It wasn't until Joven, the gardener, started shouting that Leoff understood that someone had been pounding on the outside door, probably for some time. His first reaction was impatience, but then he recalled that Joven rarely got excited and never to the point of shouting.

He sighed and set down the quill. He was at a standstill anyway. He had the form; the instruments were his problem.

When he answered the door, Joven proved to be more than excited; he seemed to be on the verge of panic.

"What is it, fralet?" Leoff asked. "Come in, have some wine."