The Lord of Radzyn shrugged, an attempt at casualness. “Maybe I’m just getting conservative in my old age. Change isn’t necessarily a bad thing. And he seems to have his reasons.”
“But why couldn’t he have waited?” Tobin burst out. “He’s moving too fast. The tradition of hundreds of years can’t be wiped out in a single night!”
Rohan looked pensive. “You’re both right, of course. But consider Andry’s motives. He needs to do something to indicate how different his rule will be from Andrade’s.”
“She’s been dead forty days,” Sioned murmured. “Why does it seem so much longer?”
Ostvel used one finger to smooth a ripple in the carpet. “You’ve told me she was uneasy about Andry. But Urival is there, and knows him well. Urival will guide him.”
“But not control him,” Sioned replied.
“And did Andrade ever really control you?” Ostvel smiled faintly. “Andry’s not a fool, Sioned, nor is he venal or grasping. He’s a very young man thrust into a position of great power before being prepared for it. I think there are those among us who can understand his feelings and his needs.”
Rohan nodded. “Oh, yes. I understand him very well. I’ve been the architect of a few departures from tradition myself, many of them in my first year as a ruling prince. And this is Andry we’re talking about here—a boy you and I played dragons with, Ostvel. Nephew, son, and brother.” His gaze moved around the circle.
Sioned cleared her throat and looked down at the wine cup. Slowly she filled it from the golden pitcher. Then she reached into a pocket and took out a small cloth pouch.
“Sioned—is that truly needed?” Tobin asked worriedly.
“I don’t like the idea any more than you do. But Urival was quite specific. And it will only be a little bit. Not enough to do me any harm.” Loosening the drawstrings, she took out a pinch of powdery gray-green substance. “Enough to fit inside a thumb ring,” she murmured, quoting Urival. “The Star Scroll advises caution, but this amount is safe enough.”
“According to a half-translated book hundreds of years old!” Maarken shook his head and glanced at his wife. Hollis did not shrink back from the sight of the dranath in Sioned’s fingers, but her eyes were haunted. She had spent the journey from Waes to Stronghold freeing herself of addiction to the drug; even though she no longer craved it, the anguish of withdrawal was still evident in her pale lips and bruised eyelids.
“The conjure I’m working tonight is difficult enough to sustain under ordinary circumstances,” Sioned reminded them. “This one will take all night. Urival says dranath can increase powers. And he sanctioned its use.”
Before anyone could say anything else, she sifted dranath into the wine and swirled the cup to mix it in before drinking off half the contents.
“I remember how it felt,” she murmured into the silence. “Dizziness for a moment, then warmth. . . .” Her cheeks flushed. There was another effect of dranath: sexual desire. Or perhaps, she thought suddenly as she sensed her gifts expand within her, perhaps the power was all-inclusive, and every aspect of body and mind was touched by the drug. She began to sway gently back and forth in response to the humming sensuality compounded of physical and faradhi power. There was a hunger in her, not only for the touch of her husband’s flesh but for the unleashing of her talents. She understood the seduction of the drug. She had always been too afraid of it to analyze its effect, but this time she was going to work with the dranath, not against it—glorious and terrifying and impossible to resist. The demands of her body slowly faded, subsumed into an urge to ride the last sunlight and dare the shadows, to summon a torrent of Air, to call down Fire and in it conjure fateful visions.
Sioned told herself she chose to succumb.
Her disciplined Sunrunner mind brought forth a gout of Fire into the empty brazier. The polished bowl seemed to ignite. And in cool flames half the height of a man there formed clear, detailed pictures.
Andry, too, had just called Fire. He stood in the courtyard of Goddess Keep, hands bare of rings. All the senior Sunrunners in residence stood in a circle around the bonfire he had just lit. Urival came forward and gave him the first ring. An instant later a whirlwind circled the courtyard, plucking at clothes and hair, blowing Andry’s