Нора Робертс - The Becoming

“But Uwin is an indulgent father, and Shana a clever daughter. I used the mirror to speak with my mother, and she’ll ask him. He won’t lie. She’d know if he did, but he won’t. If he told her, he did so because he believed I’d pledge with her, and that she would sit at the council table one day.”

He turned away a moment to look out the window, the fields flowing toward the hills, the hills rolling toward the mountains, the mountains reaching for the sky.

“I don’t excuse him for it, though I understand it. And by law if he hadn’t resigned, he would be removed from the council. And I must send him and Shana’s mother from the Capital, where they’ve both served and honorably, for all their lives.”

“This is not for you to carry.”

He turned back at Marg’s cool tone.

“Who else then?”

“He chose, and wrongly. I am a mother who loved her child more than my life. Yet I never spoke of council business with my son, a clever boy indeed, until he himself was taoiseach. You love your brother, your sister, and this one here who is another brother to you. Yet you have never spoken of these things, never broken your oath to indulge them.”

“She ruined them,” Breen said quietly. “They let her.”

“There you have it.” Morena tapped a fist on Breen’s shoulder. “That’s exactly so.”

“A word?”

Keegan nodded at Sedric.

“I know the portals, as this is my gift. And yet never have I spoken of where they are with Marg, nor she with me. Love, the healthy sort, holds respect as well, and doesn’t ask another to break a trust. In my time, I’ve seen you, and those before you”—he laid a hand over Marg’s—“lift and carry the burdens of taoiseach, and so I know the staff is heavier than the sword.”

Keegan sat. “Would you take his place on the council?”

Sedric smiled. “Not even for you, lad. There’s too much cat in me for politics and protocols. But if you intend to use those maps here with those you trust, I’ll show you any portal not on them.”

“There are more?”

“I have no way of knowing. I know only what I know.”

“Wait,” Harken said when Keegan started to rise again. “You did take an oath, and can only break it to save Talamh, and the worlds beyond it. Must break it for that, but you can’t do that on a feeling or a guess, Keegan. You have to be sure Shana’s father told her, and even if he did, can you be sure she’d betray her own world? Her people, her family. To do that takes a vicious heart, an empty soul.”

“I’m going upstairs now to ask our mother if Uwin gave Shana the knowledge. If he did, as he denied her nothing, the rest follows.”

“But does it now?” Harken argued as Keegan strode out. “I know what she’s done, and I know if she’s ever found again, she must be banished for it. But to help Odran destroy her own people—”

“Men!” Morena tossed up her hands as she shoved back from the table, then used one of them to cuff Harken on the back of the head as she started to pace. “Men, men, men can be the most simple of creatures. And I count you and Keegan as two of the most sensible of the breed. But what does he do but get himself tangled up with a selfish, conniving bitch of an elf, and all for a bit of grinding together in the dark.”

“Well now, it was a bit more than that. Not much,” Mahon added, “but a bit. She could be charming, and—”

“Another blind spot.” Morena aimed a finger at Mahon, and followed it with her derision. “Charm, beauty—the clever mind, sparkling eyes, and quick tongue? Well, they can go either way, can’t they? But beauty forever makes a man think with his cock instead of his brain.”

“That’s not what I’m thinking with at the moment,” Harken shot back. “And she wasn’t the sort who brings that out in me.”

“But you see beauty and charm and it’s hard for such as you to see past that and see what it hides. Men! What do you do about them?” she demanded of Marg.

“Patience helps.”

“Oh, but I’m tired of patience.” She jabbed a finger at Breen.

“I don’t know enough about men to know.”

“Oh, you’ll learn, trust me on it. Aisling, what do you say?”

“I’ve said nothing to now, as I have two children napping upstairs here, and a third resting inside me. And every choice I make must have that in mind. I can say what Keegan decides is for him. And I will say I never liked her or trusted her. And while I can’t say Mahon thought about the trust, he never liked her. And I’ll say to you, Harken, if the question asked me was would she do this terrible thing, my answer would be, well, of course she would.”

Morena walked behind Harken again, and this time kissed the top of his head. “I love the quality of you that pulls away from thinking the worst of anyone, even as it frustrates me.”

“It’s not because she’s a beautiful woman.”

“Maybe just a bit.”

“You’re loyal.” Breen spoke up because it seemed so perfectly clear. “So it’s hard to accept such terrible disloyalty in another, and one your brother had an affection for.”

“Affection.” Morena snorted.

“Beauty and charm played into that, I suppose, but it was there. You’re kind, Harken, and that’s as much a part of you as the color of your eyes. She’s cruel. I don’t know if even she knew how much cruelty she had in her, but it’s free now.

“Keegan’s right,” she added. “If she has the knowledge, she’ll use it to destroy. It’s what she has left.”

“And she has it right enough,” Keegan said as he came back in. “My mother is calling the rest of the council, and will tell them what I need to do. I won’t wait for them to debate and argue and drag it all out to do what I need to do.”

“You’re taoiseach,” Marg told him. “Your duty’s clear.”

“Aye, it’s clear. I ask you now to be council in the valley, to hold that trust sacred, to swear it. To swear to speak truth to me as you know it, to stand for the law. To stand for Talamh. You’ve already sworn,” he said to Marg, “but I ask you to swear again.”

“And so I do.”

As he went around the table, Breen felt the doubts want to rise up. But he met her eyes, waited.

“I swear it.”

“In the Capital the council has representatives from every tribe.” On a hiss, Keegan dragged a hand through his hair. “I can’t take time for that at this moment, but will deal with it.”

Out of long-ingrained habit, Breen raised a hand. For a moment, Keegan just stared at her.

“This isn’t a bloody classroom. Speak if you’ve something to say.”

“I’m going to say you have the blood of all tribes in you. You, Harken, Aisling. So, it could be said you represent all.”

Now he frowned, even as Harken gave her a nod of approval.

“I can work with that,” Keegan decided. “Politics is bollocks half the time, and that I can work with. But for now we start with the maps of Talamh, and its portals. Then the maps of other worlds, the outside, and theirs.”

He took a map from the server, unrolled it on the table.

Breen’s first thought was that it was a beautiful piece of art, surely hand drawn and lettered with the dragon banner flying over it. Beautifully detailed as well, as she recognized places she’d been.

The Capital, of course, with its castle and bridges, the sea, the forest, the village, to the Far West and the wild cliffs and stone dance.

Then Keegan laid his hands on the parchment, and it glowed under his palms.

When he lifted them, she saw that markings had appeared. Small circles in dragon’s-heart red that shined with light.

“Here are the portals of Talamh, each named for the world or place it leads to and from. There are twelve. There are more worlds than this, of course, and some of these worlds have portals that lead to other worlds as well. A traveler may pass through two, even three to reach the one desired—and approved.”