The Black Queen (Book 6) Read Free Page B

family.”
    “Near the other Place of Power?” Madot asked.
    Gift had never seen her agitated before. She wasn’t certain of what she was doing either. “I don’t want to leave,” he said gently. “I do want to learn how to use my powers for Healing Magick, not Warrior Magick. I am not a Domestic. I’m a Visionary. The only choice left to me is to become a Shaman.”
    “You have the Black Throne,” Pelô said. “By rights—by Fey law—you should be sitting on it. You and your sister, with your wild magicks, believe you are above Fey law and Fey custom. You believed you could give her your throne. But the Throne chooses whom it will, and for centuries it has chosen your family. Your sister has denied her Feyness all her life—”
    “She is more Fey than I ever was,” Gift said.
    “She was raised by outsiders,” Pelô said. “She does not know our customs. She is fierce, but she is no warrior. We have taken no land in fifteen years.”
    “More than that,” Gift said. “My great-grandfather Rugad took no land for twenty before that. He was waiting to hold Blue Isle.”
    “And now we have Blue Isle. Tradition says we move to Leut and conquer it.”
    Gift’s mouth was dry. He was suddenly thirsty. He and Madot had brought no water or food with them. He wondered if that were customary or an oversight.
    “I have never heard a Shaman argue for war before,” he said.
    “We uphold Fey tradition,” Pelô said.
    “There is much to Fey tradition,” Gift said, “besides war.”
    “We do not believe in indiscriminate fighting,” Pelô said. “But now two Places of Power are known. It is time to follow the prophecy—“
    “Enough,” Madot said.
    “No,” Gift said, turning his head toward Pelô. Gift had always thought of that movement as the royal movement, a command without giving a verbal order. “I’m curious.”
    “And you are an apprentice,” Madot snapped. “You do as I say.”
    “I’m only an apprentice when it suits you,” Gift said. “If I were truly one, I would be below, learning how to control my Vision with the others.”
    “You could control your Vision since you were ten,” Madot said. “You have no need for such tricks. Which is why you can never be an ordinary apprentice.”
    “Then why did you allow me to come here?” he asked.
    “We almost didn’t,” Madot said.
    “Who denies the true Black King of the Fey?” Pelô asked.
    “I am not the Black King.” Gift spit out the words. “I am not and I will not be.”
    Pelô acted as if the words meant nothing to him. He turned to Madot, moving so that Gift was cut out of the conversation. “Do not take the boy any farther.”
    “I will not take him to the heart.”
    “Then why have you brought him?”
    “Come with us and see.”
    “I cannot leave my post.”
    “Then you will find out after the boy does.” She held out a small wizened hand to Gift. “Let’s go.”
    He didn’t take her hand. He stood for a moment, looking at Pelô’s thin back, at the staff which guided his protective powers, and at the shimmer beyond. The entrance to this Place of Power was plain. The Fey had left it unadorned, so that it looked like a common cave to the untrained—or non-magickal—eye.
    “Gift,” she said.
    He looked at her. If he went with her, he was doing something many of the Shaman did not approve of. If he stood up to her, he was acting like a member of the Black family. And if he left Protector’s Village, he gave up all his dreams. He could not be a true apprentice; he knew that now. He had always thought the Shamans’ hesitation reflected their attitude toward him. He hadn’t realized it was also because of his own talents, his wild magick.
    “Gift,” she said, and he recognized the tone. This was the last time she would ask him.
    He put his hand in hers. Pelô grunted and turned away.
    The shimmer was bright. Gift had seen the entrance to the other Place of Power as a living blackness, not as a silvery light.