The Worlds of Katherine Kurtz

Awesome scene.  Very scary, and very powerful.  I wouldn't want to be in Christian's path right now.

Looking forward to what follows next.

Quote from: tmcd on May 03, 2025, 11:54:27 PMI have no useful comment. Just "Well. THAT was DIFFERENT." Good, mind you. The DIFFERENT in your writing is good.

Merci! Thank you very much!

I have no useful comment. Just "Well. THAT was DIFFERENT." Good, mind you. The DIFFERENT in your writing is good.

Quote from: Evie on June 15, 2017, 12:38:45 PMLOL! Perhaps best read with a dish of fava beans and a nice Chianti?

I like fave beans, but Chianti has always seemed too thin and sharp for my tastes. I'm more a malbec or pinot noir type.

This is the fifty-fourth part of an AU construction about a Gwynedd where the duel at Kelson Haldane's coronation went very differently indeed. We are now a bit more than three years into the Gwynedd Wars-- Charissa's new kingdom at Valoret against the Haldanes in the south and the kingdom of Torenth in the east. This episode is set just after "Western Roads". As always, comments and suggestions are very much appreciated.


There's a crowd outside the Shadow Queen's bedroom, filling the antechamber and spilling back out into the corridors. Men from Tolan Guard and Queen's Moors are crowding around the antechamber doors, and there's a fence of halberds going up. There's a constant pulsing of warding cube glow from the corners. The old ducal palace at Tolan-by-Sea is coming alive here after midnight, and Deryni witch-lights are filling the ceiling space.

The Shadow Queen herself is sitting on the edge of her bed, wrapped in a dark robe. Her husband is kneeling on the floor in front of her, and he's leaning in to peer at her face. He reaches up to tilt her head to one side. "No bleeding," Christian says. "Not your eyes, not your nose or ears."

Charissa puts her hand over his fingers, "I'm fine. I'm fine." She looks down at her husband. "Not even a headache."

There are servitors in doctor's gowns trying to get past the guards and the Queen's women, and Charissa jerks her head at the door. "Get that lot out. No doctors, no effing charlatan adepts." 

The Queen touches the white scar across her face. "I can feel it here," she says. "I can always feel it afterwards—  whenever there's Deryni power in the air." She takes a breath. "This isn't my first time. People have been trying to kill me since I was eleven. That's almost twenty years."

"Not like this," Christian says. "They were inside your mind. Tell me what you saw."

Charissa shrugs inside the robe. "I was dreaming. There was a long, long stone corridor and there were mirrors on both sides. It looked southern and maybe Moorish. I was walking past them. I was barefoot and I was wearing a white gown, and I couldn't understand why. I mean, I never sleep with anything on. Took me a minute to think— it was a penitent's gown. In the mirrors...there were people in monk's robes, but all dark, just silhouettes. There was an opening at the end of the corridor. Something big and oval— like an eye."

"It would be." Christian's voice is cold and hard and there's nothing at all in his face.

"There was a mirror there, too, on a wooden stand. There was someone in it, and it was Clarissa. They were using her ghost; they were using her against me."

"They knew your sister's image."

Charissa shakes her head. "But they didn't get her right. My twin— I know what she'd look like now, what she'd be if she'd lived. This...this wasn't right. Clarissa's me, and this girl wasn't. Too ordinary, too soft and pink-and-blonde. And what she was wearing— not fashion, you know? Her dress and her hair, that was all out of date; it was something from back in my mother's day. It wasn't right."

Christian looks back to the doorway. Aurelian is pushing his way through into the room, and al-Fayturi and Brennan de Colforth are with him.

Aurelian looks at him. "Storm's here," he says. "This was the first part of it. Here and at Cardosa and down on the Molling. Everything's coming at once."

Christian closes his eyes and nods. "Storm's here. I know." He turns back to Charissa. "Did your twin say anything? Did anyone say anything?"

The Queen nods. "She said my name, and she said I was there to be judged for what I'd done. She said I'd destroyed so many souls, and that I was being judged. Her voice was wrong, too. Not a Tolan voice, not a Torenthi one, either. She sounded southern."

"Of course she did. It's the details— they didn't know how to do the details."

"There was light behind her— pale violet. Lilac, maybe. That kind of colour. I mean— red, white, green, blue. Even gold. I've seen all the Deryni colours, all the colours you see when you call up power. This was different."

Charissa looks past him at Colforth and al-Fayturi. Their faces are white and ashamed. She points at them. "No. No. Keep your mouths shut, both of you. I don't want to hear it. No apologies, nothing stupid like saying you're resigning. Neither of you is ever going anywhere. You're staying here, you're commanding my guards, and you're effing going to find out where this attack came from and how they got inside the palace wards. Anything else, I don't want to hear it."

Aurelian leans down to the Queen. "Kyri's on her way. She's fine, too. There was a third attempt as well. The Duchess of Marley's quarters. They're a shambles now. The duchess is fine, and she's being escorted here. My people are with her."

Charissa nods. She reaches out and squeezes Aurelian's hand. "Thorne's in Valoret. Get messages down there. Inform Bishop Brechlin. Extra wards for Thorne, extra wards wherever you think they'll do some good at Valoret."

"Already done," Aurelian says. "We're sealing off the palace here now. I have my people replacing the wards here and putting in new pattern wards."

Christian puts a hand on her thigh. "The violet light— did it change?"

"Just that colour. When whoever that was in the mirror said that I was being judged, the light got stronger and stronger. That was wrong, and I knew it. I mean, I knew it was a dream, and I knew it was wrong. I called up my shields in the dream, and I went face down on the floor. The light kept getting brighter and I could hear all the mirrors exploding and spraying out. I felt like I was falling through the floor...and then I was awake in my bed. And there was this."

She flicks one side of the robe open for a moment. There are scratches and thin cuts rimmed with dried blood from the top of her bare left thigh up past one bare, sharp hipbone to her lower ribcage. "These are glass cuts."

Christian brushes his fingers along the edge of the coverlet across the floor. He holds up something black and shiny. "Mirror glass," he says. "It's melted. It's even real. Whatever they did, they missed. When I find them, I won't miss."

Charissa gestures at the door. Five of les chiennes are there, and she snaps her fingers.  "You lot— get out and go get me kahwa. I'm going to be up. So are a lot of us."

There's a shift in the crowd around the door. Kyri de Roiste is there, half-dressed and half out of breath. One side of her face is sunburnt red.  She bows her head. "Shadow-- Your Grace."

The Queen reaches out and pulls Kyri over. "Flame," she says. "You're alright?"

Kyri nods. "I am. This is...I don't know what happened tonight."

"They were in my dreams," Charissa says. "They were using my twin's ghost. What were they doing in your dreams, Flame?"

Kyri shakes her head. "Not dreams," she says. "It wasn't a dream. I was awake when it happened." She's holding the Queen's gaze.

"What were you doing up, then?"

Very quietly, Kyri says, "I wasn't alone."

Charissa half-grins. "Of course you weren't." She brings up Kyri's hand to kiss. "Tell me what happened."

Kyri is looking at Christian and the glass shard he's holding. "I was by the window and then I wasn't." She's trying very hard not to look back at Charissa's women by the door. "I was in my rooms, and then I was in the Council meeting room. Only it wasn't. It was empty, and the big Council table was there, but it wasn't right. The hangings on the walls, the big lamps— they weren't right. They weren't what was there the last time I was at a meeting. They were just...ordinary hangings and lamps. Not the right ones. The chairs, the chairs around the table— there's one for each of us and one empty chair for Saint Camber, but two chairs were turned upside down and put on the table. I knew...I knew they were my chair and Thorne's." 

Christian looks from the Queen to Aurelian and back. "The details," he says. "They didn't get the details right again.

She tightens her hand around Charissa's. "The light was wrong, too. It was all lilac-coloured, and it hurt my eyes. There were shadows on the floor and I knew there was something hanging there from the ceiling. Not a lamp. My chair, the chair on the table, it had a carving on it. It said Traitor to your kind. I knew what had to be hanging there but I wasn't about to look up. The light got brighter and brighter and...somebody...touched me. In the real world, I mean. Someone touched me back in my rooms. I was startled and I stepped back from the light. Then I had my shields up and I was back here." She brings her other hand up to her face.  "And I had this. Like I'd been out in the sun. It stings, but I'm fine."

Charissa darts a look at the door and lets herself smile. There's an easy story to read there in the doorway. The sixth of her ladies is there now, and the girl is trying very hard to avoid the Queen's eye. The girl's face is sunburnt red on one side and her hair is bedroom-messy. The Queen turns back to Kyri. "We both know what was hanging there, who it was supposed to be. I'm glad you didn't look." She kisses Kyri's hand again. "Thorne's being warned. He'll be alright. They won't have known he's in Valoret."

"This isn't Rhydon, is it? Rhydon's already sent his bravos for Thorne and me."

"No." That's Christian, from down on the floor. "Rhydon's in Tarkhan, or at least he was a few days ago. It's not him, and it's not Stefan effing Coram, either. It's the hand-and-eye people. The Hand of Camber people."

There's anger in Kyri's face. "Traitor to my kind, they said. Who is it that told them they could judge me as a Deryni? These people, I'd never heard of them until I came to Tolan-by-Sea. Who said they could judge me?"

Christian shrugs. "Who told Stefan Coram he should be running the Council and telling all the Deryni in the Eleven Kingdoms what they should think? These hand-and-eye people, they're the same as Coram. There's just more of them, with more money. They're some kind of ex-Anvillers. Like Coram, all arrogance and pride."

Charissa pulls Kyri down next to her. "Stay here. Marley's woman— they came for her, too. I want you here for that. I want you to tell her what they tried to do to you tonight. I want her to know who all our enemies are."

One of Aurelian's Slayers comes past the guards. He leans in to Aurelian. "My lord, it's Her Grace of Marley. She brought her son, and she's shielding both of them. The guards have orders— no one gets in with weapons or shielded."

Aurelian waves to the door. "Send her through".

Richenda of Marley is there with young Brendan Coris. There's a pale flicker half visible around them both. They both have cloaks with Marley insignia wrapped round them.  The duchess makes a quick bow to the Queen. "Your Grace sent for us." She's angry and scared and determined all at once.

Charissa tilts her head. "Tell me what happened, Lady Marley. Was it in your dreams or in your rooms?"

"Brendan was sleeping, Your Grace. I don't sleep well anymore, and I was awake. I felt something outside. There was light under the doors. It was the colour of lilacs. Then I heard...someone out there, where Brendan's rooms are."

Charissa looks down at Christian and back to Richenda. "Lilac, Lady Marley. Is that a southern colour for Deryni?"

Richenda is standing immobile, but the muscles in her jaw are clenching and unclenching. She's holding Brendan against her skirts. "It's a colour I've seen," she says. "I saw it once when I was being taught to be Deryni. My tutors, my tutors were...southern. I don't remember what the colour was for. I was very young." Each word is like a tooth being pulled.

Charissa's voice is very soft. Kyri's hand is still in her own. "Is it an Anviller colour? Maybe for ex-Anvillers?"

Marley's duchess is still behind her shields, and tears are running down her face. "I can only say maybe, Your Grace. When I was a girl, some of my tutors were— or had been —Knights of the Anvil."

Charissa nods. "Thank you for that. It's good to know that you understand— the FitzEwans are my allies now. No more secrets. None. Now— you heard someone. Did you see them?"

Richenda spreads her hands. "I tried to call for my ladies, but no one was there. I was going to run to Brendan's room, and I opened the door and there was just that violet light and shadows moving. There was something horrible in the hallway— not like a Portal, like a black thing, a black opening in the air and there were men in cloaks and hoods trying to get past Brendan's door. I could hear the palace wards coming on. I couldn't see anything— and I screamed at Brendan to hide. The shadows turned round and started to come down toward me, and then...there was more light and then no one and when I could see again, nothing was there. Two of my ladies were dead in the hallway, and three of our guards were dead at the turning. The hallway...all the stone was scorched. One hanging was almost on fire. Everything in the corridor was broken."

"Lady Marley." That's Aurelian. "Did you think they were there to kill you and Brendan?"

Richenda shakes her head. "No. Maybe. I don't know. Maybe they were there to take Brendan or take me or take us both. I put my shields up as soon as I came out from my room and saw the light, but they didn't attack me."

"The Hand of Camber people. They were Anvillers once. We'll tell you all about them." Christian gets to his feet. He looks from Aurelian to Charissa. "They wanted Charissa  dead because she's the Festillic Queen. They wanted Kyri dead because she used to be on the Council and now she's with the Queen. Aurelian and I— well, I'm nothing to them, and Aurelian they don't know much about. Just the Shadow Queen's hangers-on; that's what they'll be thinking. Once again, they didn't get the details right. But Lady Marley— your husband is the Queen's captain-general. They wanted you and young Brendan to bargain with. If they had you, or one of you, they could try to pry Bran loose from the Queen. I won't say you're lucky to be alive, but you're lucky, you and your son both, not to be locked up somewhere far away from here right now."

Aurelian says very quietly, "Lady Marley, whatever you think of us, it's the Hand of Camber people who came for you and your son. You're a bargaining counter to them. They know the Deryni arts, but so far— so far —they're bad or unlucky at their plans. They'll get better. And they'll come back for you and Brendan."

Christian sits down on the edge of the bed and takes the Queen's left hand. "I'm going to find these people, Lady Marley. You may want the Haldanes back ruling all Gwynedd, but I don't care about that. These people came for Charissa tonight, and they'll be back. They'll come back for you, too. They will. I'm going to find them. I'm a sometime sell-sword captain of light horse, and sometimes I've been a scholar, and these days I'm a courtier. But I'm going to find these people and I'm going to kill all of them. I'm going to erase their memory. These people, it'll be like they never existed at all. This is mine to do."

He looks over at Charissa and Kyri de Roiste. "Whatever and whoever we're fighting, these people, they're mine to kill. This is just like a storm, Lady Marley. Wind and rain and lightning and then it's over and gone and like it never happened at all. This is my part of the Gwynedd wars, my very personal part of the Gwynedd wars. I want you to know— I like Brendan very much, and I'll protect him against these people. You're his mother, so I'll protect you, too. But what I'm going to do for the Queen is erase these Hand of Camber people, these ex-Anvillers. I'll kill them, and I'll burn all their books. No one will remember them.  Whatever you think about the Anvillers, the Hand of Camber people are all going to disappear forever. If your old tutors were Anvillers, or knew the Anvillers, then you tell them what I'm going to do. I'm going to do this for the Queen. It's about the Gwynedd wars, but it's about a lot more than that. This is what I'm doing for love. This is mine to do, and I will do it. When the storm's over, no one will ever remember these people again."

Quote from: Evie on May 03, 2025, 08:24:08 PMhttps://www.learnreligions.com/full-moon-water-scrying-divination-2561752#:~:text=As%20you%20pour%20the%20water,it%20will%20make%20sense%20eventually.

Divined using the amazing powers of Google Fu. 

It never occurred to me that this could be a real-world thing; I just figured it was likely another bit of magic unique to KK's world.

thanks.

https://www.learnreligions.com/full-moon-water-scrying-divination-2561752#:~:text=As%20you%20pour%20the%20water,it%20will%20make%20sense%20eventually.

Divined using the amazing powers of Google Fu. 

Quote from: Bynw on May 03, 2025, 08:13:09 PM

• The Royal Blue Protocol: (the Fifth Protocol, "The Scroll of Daring")
  
  • "On Staring Patterns''
  • "Moon-Scrying"
  • "Blocking of Power in Those of Magical Inheritance"

Anyone know what "Moon-scrying" is?

Thank you Bynw.  I was looking for those Esoteric texts.  But I could not think where they were listed. You found them!  Perfect.