Page 148 of The Ragpicker King
Andreyen laid his hand atop the head of his blackthorn staff. “Tahe Asher Benezar,” he said in Ashkar. “Sape zenevet altah wakhahe. Pekanwa kol qemzo zawahena.”
I am Asher Benezar,I was exiled by my father. I think you know my story.
Lin’s head spun. As if she were recalling a Story-Spinner’s tale, images flashed before her—the silver incantation bowl on the shelf in this very room, with its Ashkar inscription:DESIGNATED IS THIS BOWL FOR THE SEALING OF THE HOUSE OF BENJUDAH. She had thought he had simply collected it, as he collected so many pretty things; now she realized otherwise. His obsession with magic—the very subject that had gotten Asher exiled. That he had known there were books in the Shulamat, books he wanted. She had wondered why her grandfather had brought her here after her trial: It was not because he had known she was working with Andreyen, she realized, but because he had known Andreyen was really Asher, and would look out for another exile.
Asher Benezar.She had never seen a hint, never guessed. In herworld, there had been Ashkar andmalbushim,and one could not be the other. And yet...
“Does your father know? That you are the Ragpicker King?” she demanded, turning from Andreyen to Aron. “How didyouknow?”
“Indeed, Aron,” said Andreyen, with a slightly foxlike grin. “Howdidyou?”
Aron spread his hands wide and spoke not to Lin, but to Andreyen. “Asher, I tried to stop it when it happened. I spoke to my father when you were exiled; I beseeched him to intervene. He said he could not, that it was in the Maharam’s power and neither the Law nor mercy would justify interference. But I could not let it lie. I searched for you, for whispers of you on the Gold Roads, and when I heard there was a new Ragpicker King, and I heard of his doings, I recognized your cleverness, the labyrinthine paths of your mind. I knew— You were always resilient, Asher. I knew you would not simply disappear. I knew you would find your way.”
For a long moment, Andreyen said nothing. His clear green eyes were opaque, like milky jade; Lin could not guess what he was thinking.
Then, to her immense surprise, he swung his beloved staff up over his knee and snapped it unceremoniously in half.
Ji-An jumped as if a cannon had gone off. They all stared as Andreyen dropped one half of the cane and lifted the other. It was hollow as a reed. He reached his fingers inside and drew out a long length of parchment vellum, carefully rolled into a hollow circle, like the symbol of themagal.
He handed it to Lin. “Read it,” he said.
She began to unroll the paper, careful with the old vellum, which threatened to crack in her careful fingers. At last she had it open, a narrow banner upon which was written in a careful hand the Great Prayer:Hear, oh Aram, She is One, She will return.
“You gave me that,” Andreyen said to Aron, who was gazing at the paper with a stunned expression. “And I have kept it all theseyears. I never blamed you, Aron; you were a child. And I have never accepted that because I am exiled, I am not Ashkar.” He turned to Lin. “If Aron believes that you are the Goddess, then you are the Goddess. Ifyoubelieve it, then you are the Goddess. I may be a heretic and an exile, but I have always thought that the Goddess is the one who has the courage to stand up and claim the name and all that comes with it.”
“But I am exiled,” Lin said. “What could I even do with such power, if I am not accepted by my people?”
“Then you make them accept you,” said Ji-An. She had her arms crossed over her chest. “You make them see the truth.”
“Come with me,” Aron said, “to the Halls of Hewn Stone. The place of the ordeal. And when you return from the ordeal, you will return with the power of lightning in your hands. They will have no choice but to see, Lin.”
The Halls of Hewn Stone.Lin felt lightheaded. She had never been out of Castellane, and Aron was asking her to come with him to what had once been Aram. The stony desert of Jiqal, far in the northeast of Dannemore.
“The Malgasi have magic,” added Aron. “Only another who wields magic can face them down. But Lin, you must choose soon. TheBlack Rose,the ship that will take us to Jiqal, will sail at dawn. And it will not wait.”
In that moment, Lin heard the voice of the King, burning with the fire of the phoenix inside him.The Malgasi will come. They cannot be held back without great power. You will be that power. You will protect Castellane. You will protect your people. For without the Goddess, all are doomed.
“But I am needed here,” she said. “Kel and Conor, both of them need our help. The conspiracy will close its net around House Aurelian very soon. The Malgasi—”
“Let us worry about Castellane,” said Andreyen, and glanced over at Merren and Ji-An, who nodded. “About Kel, and about thePrince. If Prince Conor must be made to see the truth, we will find a way.”
Lin slowly closed her hands at her sides. She could feel her heart beating in her palms. She did not say that there was no use telling her not to worry about Conor; she had never been able to stop herself thinking of Conor. And she would not forget her last glimpse of him, alone in his rooms with a pile of glass shattered at his feet. She did not say she doubted her own ability to withstand the ordeal, or to return with the power to strike down an army.
She did not say any of those things, because they did not matter. What mattered was not that her chance of success was small, but that it did not seem that Castellane had another chance as good. And it mattered that those in the most danger from the Malgasi were all those she loved—even if they had cast her out. Even if they did not want her.
She had chosen to claim the title of the Goddess, and with it she had claimed a destiny. She did not know if she could see a fire within herself, as Aron could, but she could see it reflected in his eyes, and she could see the road to Jiqal spread out before her like a beacon. At the Tevath, she had made a promise to her people, and she would keep that promise. Even if it took her away from her friends, her family. From Conor. From all that she loved.
She turned to Aron, who was watching her with his desert eyes. “It is up to you,” he said. “As the Goddess chooses, I will do.”
Lin looked to her friends. Ji-An and Merren regarded her steadily, as if to say that whatever she was leaving was safe in their hands. And Andreyen—Asher—sat holding the broken pieces of his staff, the staff he had carried everywhere with him for years because of the prayer it contained: an invocation and a vow, a statement of faith and belief. In the Goddess. In Lin herself.
She turned to Aron.
“I have made my choice,” she said. “I will go with you. I choose the ordeal.”
Hours passed after Conor’s footsteps had receded into silence, and Kel didn’t move. He stayed where he was, his back to the wall, watching the small patch of moonlight travel across the floor before it dimmed and vanished.
He was not angry at Conor, he realized. He couldn’t be. Falconet and the others had lined up the evidence against Kel like Castles pieces, arranged on a board by a master of the game who left his opponent no way out. And Kel knew better than anyone who Conor had to be, and what his responsibilities were. The Malgasi and their allies had made sure it didn’t matter whether Conor believed in Kel’s guilt or not; his hands were tied.
