Oathbreakers' Guild (The Rose Shield Book 2) Read online

  “Catling.” Dalcoran arched an eyebrow. “A touch of fear, and do not cover your eye this time.”

  Brow furrowed, she raked a hand over her stubble of hair and then pinned her fist to her thigh. Varying the intensity proved arduous enough; she couldn’t imagine blending influences at different strengths. Even after his years of training, Kadan seemed to struggle with modulation, a fact that didn’t bode well for her in more ways than one.

  She stifled the urge to cover her unmarked eye and visualize the influence as threads, the way she had learned to shield. She drew the image of fear from her consciousness, an orange spool unwinding in her imagination. The woads on her back and head warmed, and she sent out a tenuous thread, directing it at Kadan’s chest.

  Kadan nodded at Dalcoran, his fingers coiling into loose fists.

  “Increase it,” the doyen instructed.

  Catling drew in a breath and added another thread, thickening it. Kadan’s fists clenched, and he flinched, the discomfort on his face making her cringe.

  “More,” Dalcoran instructed.

  The threads multiplied. Kadan’s eyes closed, his body rigid.

  “Increase it.”

  “Dalcoran-Elan,” Catling pleaded.

  “Increase it.”

  Catling unrolled another thread, sending it forth to join the others. Kadan trembled, his eyes opening in alarm. She drew it back, hoping Dalcoran had seen enough to satisfy him.

  “Now, add a touch of pain.”

  “I can’t do it.” Catling shook her head.

  “You will do it,” Dalcoran insisted. “You will find fear and pain are your friends, Catling. Love and pleasure have their uses, but when you need results, you must do what’s necessary. The effects are impermanent, which is more than I can say for other means of coercion.”

  “Go ahead,” Kadan murmured.

  Reluctance rippled up Catling’s back. She exhaled and concentrated, imagining the yellow spool beside the orange, unrolling a single thread, snaking it forward into Kadan’s… arm. He twitched and nodded at Dalcoran.

  The doyen held out his palm and gestured at the ceiling. Catling added another and Kadan stepped back, pain intensifying and compounding his fear.

  Dalcoran’s wrist flicked, demanding more. Catling glanced at him, his expression showing none of the ire she expected. He taught a lesson, nothing more. She unspooled another thread, changing the trajectory and aiming for Kadan’s knee, drawing a wince.

  “Now, Catling, hold the influence. Do not let it waver.” Dalcoran stepped forward from the wall. “Kadan, you may return the favor.”

  Fear erupted in Catling’s head, and she backed up with a whimper. Her influence snapped and vanished. Blistering pain ripped over her skin like yellow fire. She stumbled into a table behind her and reached for her shield, then held it back, Vianne’s warning more frightening than Kadan’s power. Her hands shook as she covered her face and sank to the floor. Tears welled in her eyes. Dalcoran would make her do it until she got it right. Then he’d make it worse.

  ***

  Catling pecked Minessa on the cheek before slamming a palm to the panel and flying out the dormitory door. She dashed down the hallway, late for her lesson with Vianne. Nessa laughed behind her. “You forgot your cloak!”

  “No time,” Catling called back. Living with Minessa, free of Vianne’s hawk-eyed scrutiny, made the dreary season tolerable. The change in quarters had been Vianne’s surprise, a gift prior to the commencement of training. Despite Nessa’s status as daughter of the High Ward of Kar-Aminia, she was gentle-hearted, there to study the healing arts of a mercy and disregard all else to the best of her ability. She was also of mixed blood, her flaxen hair and slanted eyes setting her apart from the ordinary aspirant.

  Her face scrunched, Catling stepped into a Winterchill rain that grayed into a deluge. Too late to turn back, she scurried to the neighboring dormitory. Kadan stepped out before she could knock, eyeing her dripping hair as he pulled his hood lower over his forehead. He hardly looked happy at Vianne’s command.

  Catling wiped the rain from her forehead. “My regrets for my tardiness.”

  “We should go.” He ambled to the spiraling staircase, ignoring her attempts to march ahead and hurry their pace. She waited for him half way up the climb to the twelfth tier. Water trickled down her neck, and she shivered. Vianne would be furious when they arrived.

  “Why does Vianne need me?” Kadan glanced at her.

  “She needs someone for me to influence and shield. I can’t do both at the same time.” Catling inspected her feet as she walked, hiding her face from the rain and her frown from him. “Qeyon used to help us.”

  Whatever Kadan thought of that time and the small role he played in the chaos, he said nothing. He rarely spoke to her at all, though he obeyed the doyen, a willing partner in their lessons.

  All her training thus far amounted to a simple, straightforward application of influence, with disappointing attempts at subtlety or blending. She’d learned to direct physical pleasure and pain, love and hate, and with more difficulty, illness and healing. Kadan’s influence consistently whacked her like a sledgehammer, without any refinement at all. How he expected to sway hearts and minds without raising suspicion was a mystery she couldn’t fathom. She certainly didn’t need to see his influence to feel it.

  A servant opened the door to Vianne’s quarters and stared at Catling’s soaked head and jacket. “She’s going to tie herself in knots,” the woman whispered as she ushered them in. “I’ll find you a cloth to dry yourself. There’s greenleaf in the salon.”

  Catling rubbed the rain from her hair though hiding her foolishness was beyond her skill. At least she no longer dripped. Kadan hung his cloak on a peg, and she led him down the hallway.

  ***

  Vianne heard them at the door. Late and later, as usual. She sat in her customary chair, tatting a broad ribbon of snowy lace. Heat vented from the pylons, warming the room, and the luminescent tubes snaking across the ceiling brightened the dull day. The minty scent of greenleaf mingled with her perfume. She looked up when Catling and Kadan entered and frowned at the ragged girl.

  “If you are unable to manage your time, and care for your health, Catling, I shall be happy to supervise. Of course, that would require you to return to your room here.”

  “I promise to take better care.” Catling bowed. “My respects, Vianne-Ava.”

  Kadan followed suit. “My respects, Doyen.”

  Her tatting in her lap, Vianne studied the two of them. Kadan was an enigma, his face without a readable expression, so different from the boy who’d trembled on the Ava-Grea docks five years before.

  Different too from the young man nearly destroyed by his influenced punishment. Fear and pain had bred in him a wariness of the crueler aspects of this skill, a change she hoped would serve them all. His suffering had transformed him into the model aspirant, and no doubt, Dalcoran’s spy.

  “Thank you for your assistance, Kadan. Please have a seat. Catling will serve you tea.” While Kadan took a chair, Catling poured tea for both of them. She handed him a steaming cup and sank into a seat.

  Finished with her lace, Vianne faced the young man, refraining from applying any influence Catling might sense. “Do you know why I requested your presence?”

  “Catling told me she’s unable to shield herself and others at the same time.”

  Vianne spared a glance for Catling. “That alone presents its share of challenges. Yet, it also appears she is unable to influence and shield simultaneously.” She sighed, still irritated with the recent discovery.

  “My shield blocks my own influence,” Catling explained.

  “Perhaps.” Vianne returned her gaze to Kadan. “Yet, I’m the one influencing her, so she’s attempting to block me while influencing me. We require a third person. We need another participant for all of this. Dalcoran suggested you, and to be frank, you are the only aspirant with knowledge of her skills.”

  Kaden dipp
ed his head. “I’m willing to assist in any way I can.”

  The perfect aspirant, indeed. “My preference is to practice without pain, and I suspect neither of you will object.” She smiled as the tightness in their shoulders eased. “We shall begin with something rather simple and work our way into new territory. I shall ply Kadan with pleasure and love. Please direct your gaze at Catling. Catling, you will count silently to five and then block me. Kadan, raise your hand when you experience the block.”

  When Kadan looked at Catling, Vianne dosed him with a swell of love and a touch of pleasure. He shifted and flushed, a smile cracking his staid demeanor. Vianne maintained her poise despite the urge to chuckle. He raised his hand and blew out a breath.

  “Timing, Catling?” Vianne asked.

  “He felt the change immediately.”

  “Excellent.” Vianne smiled. “I apologize, Kadan, for the intimacy. We can switch to discomfort if you prefer.”

  “No, Vianne-Ava, I would rather avoid it when I can.”

  “As you wish.” Vianne pivoted to Catling. “Now, I shall influence you. You will influence Kadan, and then block me.” At the girl’s nod, Vianne injected her with affection. By the expression on Kadan’s face, Catling pumped his heart with an extra dose of sweetness. “Now block me, but continue to influence Kadan.”

  Catling’s eyebrows pinched, and Kadan raised a hand, the effect of her influence lost.

  “It can’t be done, Vianne.” Catling’s shoulders dropped. “It’s as if I’m attempting to be wet and dry at the same time.”

  “A variation,” Vianne said. “Shield yourself. We shall both influence you with caring feelings and physical ease. On my signal, you will shift your shield to block only me and apply your influence on Kadan.”

  “It’s impossible.”

  “You will attempt it until I’m satisfied,” Vianne scolded her, willing to stretch this tryst out as long as she pleased. “Begin.”

  Vianne applied a whisper of love over both of them, scarcely enough to notice in light of the previous intensity. Kadan wore a wide-eyed smile, pushing the sensations against Catling’s barrier as if it were a matter of might alone. The effort made no difference with Catling shielded from both of them.

  “Now, slowly lower your shield until you sense the influence,” Vianne instructed. Catling’s eyes popped open, and she blushed at Kadan. “Endure it, please,” Vianne instructed, “or we shall shift to pain. Now shield me alone.”

  Vianne assumed the next step would fail, but success wasn’t the point. “Now influence Kadan, but maintain your shield over me.”

  Her hands gripping the arms of her chair, Catling narrowed her eyes and focused. Her shield failed as her influence succeeded. Kadan lurched back in his seat, mouth agape. “Ah, Oh!”

  “You may both tone down your intensity.” Vianne huffed, the heat in the room more than she intended. “Modest affection will do.” They both relaxed, blinking at each other like owls. “Now, let’s attempt this again.”

  Chapter Three

  Lelaine stared out the window at the churning delta waters. The wind keened through Elan-Sia’s tiers, and charcoal clouds smudged the bold faces of the moons. Two days past, Brightest Night heaved up high tides while the snowmelts from the south shed a torrent of icy water. The morning had dawned with a dreariness matching her mood.

  Behind her, councilors and influencers wrangled with her father, the king increasingly childlike and as ornery as a rusty hinge. They’d been discussing the Cull Tarr presence beyond the surf, the delta’s shifting shoals, and a need for further dredging. It all faltered when her father began issuing orders for public executions, none of which she held any inclination to authorize. Councilors Oaron and Edark were first on the gibbet and therefore frantic to soothe the monarch’s tantrum.

  She’d retreated to the view. The talk of the sea and ships and sails juddered against her father’s petulance and the councilors’ postulating with regard to Cull Tarr motives. The cajoling prattle and manipulation ground her teeth and grated on her nerves. No doubt, the royal influencers were earning their keep.

  The urge to flee the room and climb aboard her little boat percolated in her chest, her wariness of the choppy weather weighing less in her thoughts. An hour or two alone would refresh her and infuse her with the stamina to endure a lengthy afternoon of more spectacular monotony.

  “Perhaps, Your Excellence would appreciate a bite to eat, something sweet,” Oaron suggested as if speaking to a young son.

  “Have a cake brought in,” her father demanded. “No sense in spilling the vermin’s blood with a growling stomach.”

  “A nap, Your Majesty,” Edark remarked, less willing to placate. “A draught of godswell to help you sleep.”

  “Where’s my ambassador?” the king shouted. “Where’s Varon Kest? What are those bastard Cull Tarr doing in my sea?”

  “The sea belongs to no one and all, Your Excellence,” Oaron explained for the hundredth time. Lelaine rolled her eyes at the sea. Oaron possessed the patience of the dead. Why he tried to apply reason would forever baffle her. His voice droned on in a long history lesson sure to have her father nodding off.

  “It’s beautiful, heiress, isn’t it?” a voice whispered behind her.

  Lelaine glanced over her shoulder. Gisalle-Bes smiled. A petite influencer with shiny brown locks and wide-set eyes, she exhibited a tendency to stand close enough to share one’s shoes.

  “Even on stormy days.” Lelaine’s gaze returned to the window, and the influencer joined her. The luminescent sea shimmered as a stream of sunlight spilled from a gash in the clouds. Waves roared over the harbor’s breakwater, the spume a rainbow of hues despite the gloom.

  “You must love taking your little boat for a sail,” Gisalle said. “Such a shame that the weather’s so foul.”

  Her boat called, the wind and surf within her expertise, surely. She’d sailed all her life. “I could manage it,” Lelaine assured her.

  “You mustn’t risk it, however.” The woman sighed, touching Lelaine’s ringlets. “Your duties demand your caution. All of Ellegeance must take precedence to your desires.”

  Lelaine drew her hair from the influencer’s fingers, the woman maddening with reminders she didn’t require. Confidence swelled in her veins, the urge to sail, to garner a moment of freedom, blending with irritation at being told she shouldn’t… and couldn’t.

  “Your father has agreed to Oaron’s suggestion that we reconvene this afternoon,” Gisalle said. “If your schedule permits, High Wardess Sianna-Bes and one of her sons seek an audience to discuss a bonding.”

  A rapid succession of boorish comments paraded through Lelaine’s head, including that she had made herself categorically clear regarding Sianna’s pushy middle-aged sons, both of them. “I’m going sailing,” she said, her mind made up, “and Founders forbid any suitors attempt to accompany me because I’ll drown them.” She turned on her heel, heading for the door.

  Gisalle followed in her shadow. “You mustn’t, Heiress. It’s far too dangerous.”

  “I’m quite capable, Influencer.” Lelaine strode down the hallway to the pylon’s lift and slapped the panel. She spun on the woman who trampled on her toes. “And I order you not to influence me.”

  “Of course not,” Gisalle replied, her eyes wide. “I only advise you. The High Wardess will eventually beg your attention, and with the weather so beyond your abilities, this is the ideal time for an audience.”

  Lelaine stared at the woman in disbelief. The lift’s door glided open, and she stepped inside, the influencer impossible to lose. “I don’t trust your guild,” Lelaine said, her irritation flaring with her resolve. “My skiff is the only place where I’m assured any emotional privacy. I won’t be influenced into a bond, and I won’t be badgered about my duty. Thirdly, I won’t be told what I am and am not capable of.”

  The woman sighed. “Well then, I might as well assist you. The guards will attempt to stop you without a little prodding i
n the other direction.”

  “The first helpful thing you’ve suggested.”

  The influencer trailed her down to the docks, waving the score of guards aside who attempted to follow. On the pier, the wind keened. Sheets of spray blew sideways, soaking Lelaine’s jacket and hair. Despite a bone-rattling shiver, excitement plied her senses. The sea roiled, majestic and untamed, appealing to her desire for a challenge and the freedom to test her power.

  “Are you sure of this?” Gisalle shouted over the roar, her dripping hair flying across her eyes.

  “Without question.” Lelaine stepped from the dock to her skiff and laughed. The boat strained on its lines, the convergence of river and tide torrential as if sucking the entire world to sea. Lelaine unwound the last line from the cleat. “I’ll haul the sail when I’m free of the docks,” she yelled and let go.

  The skiff bolted from the pier. Lelaine hauled the mainsheet, the boat nearly tipping as the wind grabbed hold. She yelped and glanced back at the influencer standing at the pier’s end. The woman waved and turned back to the city.

  Lelaine hung her knee over the tiller, holding it steady as she hauled on the sail, twisting the sheet around her arm. The boat strained, flying across the water, scarcely in her control. Her confidence evaporated, replaced with unrestrained fear. What was she thinking? What had she done? What had the influencer done to her?

  A wave blasted over the boat’s side. The breakwater reared from the sea, pouring with luminescence before the mountainous surf pounded it again. The gap between the jetties churned, river and sea crashing in a cauldron of froth and spray.

  “Filthy, filching influencer!” She spewed every foul-mouthed curse she could conjure up in an effort to quell her fear.

  The split gaped, yet on her current course, she’d batter into the rocks head on. She inched the tiller, turning broadside as far as she dared. At the last moment, she pushed hard, keeping the sail close-hauled for speed.” The skiff’s rudder hit rock. The boat bucked and spun, whipping the mast and dragging her from her seat by the line around her arm. She pitched over the side, pulling the boom with her.