Deverry - A Time Of War Part 40

'It's a cursed useful thing you can read and write.'

'My mam saw to it that I was taught letters, both in Dwarvish and in the language of men. They did send me to Lin Sen, when I were but a lad, to learn where there be priests and books. I lodged with Envoy Garin, you see, which is why I can speak your tongue a fair bit, or better than my mother, at least, for all that she learned what she knows of it from her own mother, down in the women's quarters.'

During these last few days Rhodry and Angmar both worked hard at pretending that their time together would last an eternity. When they were together during the day, they spoke mostly of the small doings of the island, as if nothing of more import than a caught fish or servant's twisted ankle existed in the world.

Yet at night, they made love with a desperate greed, and despite the hot weather, they slept clasped in each other's arms.

In the end, of course, the last morning came, a hot dry dawn, good travelling weather and a betrayal.

Rhodry woke and slipped out of bed without waking her to sit in the window seat and watch the brightening sky while he cursed his Wyrd. In a few moments, though, she felt him gone and woke, sitting up, yawning and smiling, glancing his way, letting the smile fade when she saw the sun outside. She got up and joined him, sitting down at an angle so they could see each other's faces.

'Think you that the pair of you will find this beast?'

'Enj swears he will, now that he knows where to look, and I'll take his word for it. Your son knows more about such things than your man does.'

'It be lairing north, he did tell me.'

'It does, and so if we succeed, we'll be coming back this way.'

She smiled a little at that, hesitating., speaking again finally in a small voice.

'And after that? I know it be needful for you to leave again, as soon as ever you can.'

'It is, but I don't want to go.'

'Ah. That were what I did wonder.'

They shared a brief smile that made her look as weary as he felt. The wind sighed through the open window with a damp scent of pine.

'It be not too likely that ever you'll return that second time,' she said at length.

'It's not likely that I'll live to return.'

She swung her head round to stare at him, her lips half-parted.

'Forgive me. I should just hold my tongue.'

'Nah, nah, nah, Rori, what think you I be, some la.s.s to live on false hope and dreams? This thing you speak of, the dweomer war, be it as bad as all that?'

'It is, and it's only beginning. Angmar, please, believe me. If I thought there was any sound chance at all that I could return to you and Haen Marn, then I'd promise you I would.'

'It means much, knowing that. I'll remember you saying this thing, when I think of you.'

'Ah ye G.o.ds, don't think of me! I'll beg you: forget me the moment I'm gone. Find yourself another man, and don't trouble your heart over me for one moment more.'

'In this we be alike, Rori. I will not promise a thing I cannot fulfil.'

When he held out his hand, she took it. He clasped her fingers tight in his, and for a long time they sat together, looking out over the lake without speaking, until they heard Enj calling to them from what seemed like an infinity away.

All through their last meal together her calm held, and seeing her strong he could be so as well. Even when he kissed her farewell, they smiled at each other and spoke of little things. But when the boat carrying him pulled away, turning toward the north sh.o.r.e of the lake, he looked back and saw her standing at the very end of the pier, doubled over with grief. He tossed back his head and keened, an animal howl of heartache that echoed round the lake louder than the thrumming of the bra.s.s gong.

At about the time Rhodry and Enj were taking s.h.i.+p to leave Haen Marn, Dallandra looked up through the bars of her cage in the Lands and saw that the tedious afternoon of her capture was still refusing to drag itself toward evening. She realized another thing as well, however, that she was finally beginning to recover her full complement of wits after the morning's ordeal. She sat up cross-legged in the middle of her cage, sipped the water her captors had given her, and watched the camp below. In his cage, flat on the ground, the page was pacing back and forth for the few steps allowed him either way.

Round the fire Lord Vulpme's men had spent the past hour or so drinking, pa.s.sing round big skins of whatever liquor it was that their leader had left them and guzzling the stuff so fast that it darkened their green tunics. By now the ursine fellows were stretched out snoring again, the human and the wolf warriors were singing together, and the vulpine contingent stared into the flames and smiled to themselves. In a little while they'd all be drunk.

Or they would have been if it weren't for the herald, who was cold sober and sitting on the edge of the group, keeping a sharp eye on the guards and the prisoners alike. He sat with his staff across his knees, ready to poke or slap the warriors sober, and he kept up a running commentary of mingled disgust and warning, which they mostly ignored. If she'd been able to speak openly, Dalla suspected that she could have talked the old creature round to her side. He had some shreds of honour and decency, at least, some kernel of feeling for other souls that she could use as a counter to his fear of Lord Vulpine. But if she tried, the warband would doubtless take steps to silence her and the herald both.

When she stretched her sore arms above her head, the cage swung, creaking. The herald was on his feet like a shot, waggling the staff at her.

'Now don't you go trying anything,' he snapped. 'You just stay where you are.'

'I might as well. Now that I've disarmed your lord's trap, my lord Evandar will doubtless come rescue me soon enough.'

The herald moaned and trembled his wattles so violently that she realized her random arrow had struck a target.

'The army's gone off now, isn't it? Where were they hiding? Somewhere nearby, I imagine, lying in ambuscade among the trees.'

The herald merely stared at her with rheumy eyes. Those of the warband still awake had fallen silent to listen. The page as well stood clutching the bars of his cage and looking up at her with hopeful eyes.

'Evandar will come marching in here with his entire host, I should imagine.' Dallandra went on.

'Hundreds and hundreds of them, armed and mailed, swords gleaming, and spears, too, all sharp and ready to cut you all into mince-meat. Oh, the lad and I will laugh to see it, your blood soaking into the ground, your heads all smashed in and bleeding, your guts hanging out, and all of you screaming for mercy and writhing on the ground.'

With sleepy grunts the ursine fellows sat up, scratching themselves and looking round baffled.

'You're going to die.' Dallandra called to them. 'My lord's on his way, and he's going to kill you all.'

They leapt to their feet, grabbing for weapons.

'Hold your tongue!' the herald screeched. 'Don't listen to her! Our lord would never let such a thing happen.'

'Hah! He's not here to protect you.' Dalla said. 'He's gone off and left you as sacrifices to his brother's wrath. It might go easier for him that way. Maybe by the time Evandar's done torturing you, he'll have a bit of mercy for your lord, Old Dog Nose himself.'

They stared, as ensorcelled by her tale as small children by a bard, when he condescends to amuse them for an hour. Dallandra was honestly shocked that her crude and clumsy ruse was working; then she remembered that they had no mind in any real sense of that word, no reason, no logic, no introspection, no ability to a.n.a.lyse a situation or talc. She did her best to leer.

'I'm going to help him torture you, Let's see. I shall heat a bronze knife in that fire and then lay the blade upon your flesh. It'll stink when the metal sears you and scorches all your fur away.'

The wolf warrior screeched.

'Hold your tongue!' This time the herald's voice wavered badly. 'You lie, elvcn b.i.t.c.h.'

'Don't. You're doomed, too, old man. We'll let the page there amuse himself with you.'

The boy laughed and clapped his hands, hut whether he was acting a part or honestly antic.i.p.ating the job she couldn't tell. The herald moaned and began chewing on the end of the staff.

'Oh, Dog Nose is gone to play,' Dallandra sang. 'Over the hills and far away, and Rvandar shall ride where he pleases.'

The wolf warrior turned to the old man and s.n.a.t.c.hed his staff out of his hands.

'Go fetch him,' he growled. 'Go fetch our lord. You know which way he rode. Go get him hack here.'

With a snarl the pair of fox warriors grabbed the herald, one at each arm, and shook him. 'llie entire warband gathered round, snarling, snapping, cursing and shouting.

'Get him, get him, fetch him back!'

'Very well!' the herald wailed. 'I will, I will. Give me my staff. Give it to me, you ugly maggots!'

When he grabbed, the human-looking fellow grabbed back, hit the wolf warrior by mistake, and got bitten for his clumsiness. Screaming and swinging they scuffled, b.u.t.ting at each with heads and shoulders, flailing round with fists and paws. The herald wiggled free and rolled clear, clutching his staff, his face bleeding from long scratches.

'Hurry!' the wolf warrior swung his way. 'Be gone!'

Shrieking and weeping the herald rushed into the forest, travelling in the exact same direction that the earlier messenger had arrived from, Dallandra realized. She could just sec him rush between a pair of strangely identical oak trees and marked them in her mind. Down below the fighting stopped in a wail of curses, a thunder of recriminations. One of the bear warriors picked up a skin of liquor.

'Let us wash this ill feeling away,' he announced. 'It behooves us to behave like the brothers we are.'

Dallandra watched the skin making its round and tried to calculate how far away the herald and his fragment of rational mind might be. She was painfully aware that every beat of her heart meant time pa.s.sing, an hour perhaps for Jill, or even a day. Besides, what if the old man found Lord Vulpine fast and brought him back? Clutching the bars of his cage, the page stared up at her as if she were a G.o.ddess. If only she could get him out of there and away from harm without them seeing, just as Lord Vulpine had winkled the pair of them out from under Evandar's nose!

'Dolt!'

She'd spoken aloud, but fortunately the guards were too busy drinking and bickering to notice. She'd been thinking of the size of her physical-seeming body as immutable, just as it would have been back on the earthly plane, but here in the Lands no such restriction held She raised one finger, got the page's attention, pointed to herself, then to him, repeated the motion several times since she didn't dare whisper, 'do as I do'. He watched with narrowed eyes, as if he tried to understand.

Carefully she built up the linnet-image in her mind, then concentrated on size. Immediately she felt her body melting, melding, changing. She clung to the image, made it smaller and smaller in her mind, felt her body shrinking as Lord Vulpine had made it shrink, was aware suddenly of the amethyst figurine as a weight pulling on her neck. She broke the image fast, flapped her wings, and took a few experimental hops forward. The cage towered round her, huge and looming. The little s.p.a.ces between the wooden bars gaped - doorways. With a c.o.c.k of her head she looked down and saw a tiny sparrow in the pageboy's cage.

The guards were still talking among themselves, bellowing curses on the herald, shrieking every time a twig snapped in the distant forest. Dallandra hopped to the edge of the cage, chirped to the page, and flew, swooping out over the camp, chirping again as the sparrow flapped up free to join her.

Side by side they darted toward the forest, but just as they reached the trees, Dallandra heard the wolf warrior howl. Shrieking, leaping up, their guards raced after, throwing spears, throwing rocks, cursing and screaming in rage. As the missiles tumbled by it seemed to Dallandra that they flew through falling mountains. Ahead she could see the pair of oaks and, between them, an unnatural veil of mist hanging like caught moss. With a chirp to the sparrow, she darted straight into it and through.

They were flying across a gra.s.sy plain, where tiny streams wound their way between hummocks of yellow flowers. Here and there at deep pools hazels and rowan grew in tangled clumps. Ahead on the horizon she could see a distant roil of smoke, such as marked the battle plain where Evandar and his brother often met. From behind them she heard howls, the baying of a wolf, the sharp yip yip of foxes.

When she risked a glance back, she saw the pack running after them, on all fours and in animal form, the wolf racing ahead, the bears lumbering after, the human-like thing labouring along in the rear. She felt an exhalation of fear from the sparrow and knew that he'd seen them, too.

With every stroke she flew, the amethyst figurine slapped against her breast. She could feel it pulling her down, slowing her down, aching her already sore body or surrogate of one. Although she considered growing in mid-air, all her dweomer knowledge warned against any such foolhardy working, no matter where she might be in the vast scheme of interlocking worlds. She forced herself to think only of flying and live each moment as a single wing-stroke. Although no natural wolf or fox could have outrun a bird's flight, behind the two birds the pack was gaining. With a shriek the sparrow pulled ahead in a frantic flapping of stubby wings.

Seeing him, Dallandra recovered herself. She'd been thinking like a hunted bird, but with the pageboy free,, she could use her dweomer. She deliberately slowed, letting him escape ahead, then wheeled round, letting herself drop low to draw the pack after her and heading for one of the hazel thickets. In bird form she darted among the snarl of shoots and trunks, found a spot of clear ground, and landed, hopping among the twisted roots. She could hear the pack howling and grunting round and smell the bears as they began tearing at the thicket with clawed paws, pulling the withes out, rending the branches.

A moment's thought, and she stood in elven form.

The pack yapped and snarled, falling back a few feet. To them she must have suddenly appeared from nowhere, standing among the knotted shafts and foliage. Dallandra threw up one hand and summoned etheric fire. Blue flames blazed round and shot from her fingers and struck the bears full in the face.

Screaming they raised up on their haunches, seemed to s.h.i.+mmer, and reformed into mostly human creatures, stark naked, batting at their snouts and eyes with human hands, clawing at sparks and yelping as the flames bit deep into their illusions of flesh. When the wolf warrior leapt for her, she flung a cloak of fire and caught him in mid-transformation. Fur scorched but so did skin; a human head screamed on a wolf's body. With both hands she threw blue flames like darts, scattering them across the pack, until the foxes and the wolf-creatures turned and fled, howling across the plains. The ursine warriors fought toward her through one last shower of flame, then broke and lumbered after their fellows, dragging the humanish thing with them.

Panting for breath Dallandra pushed free of the thicket and watched them run toward the wisp of dweomer mist, hanging in the far distance. Their tiny figures plunged through; it blew away. She stood alone on the gra.s.sy plain, wondering where Evandar might be. Perhaps the page had flown to find him, but mostly likely the boy had bolted for the only home he knew, the astral river and the gold pavilion beside it. Once again she took on bird form, but full size, this time, so that she could safely carry her ensorcelled flesh.

In long wing strokes she flew, gliding on the air currents now and again to save her strength, toward the horizon where the yellowish brown smoke fumed up and swirled Underneath her flight the gra.s.sy plain gave way to rock and a rise of barren hill. With one last swoop she found herself wheeling over the battle plain, where two armies faced one another, the glittering silver swords of the Bright Court, the black enamelled mail and spears of the Dark. In the little s.p.a.ce between them Lord Vulpine sat on his black stallion, his sword raised high as he taunted his brother.

'I have her, your precious woman!' he was yelling. 'Harm me, and she dies!'

His helmet tucked under one arm, his sword still in its sheath, Evandar sat dead still, like a statue bound to a saddle.

'Heal my lands!' Lord Vulpine bellowed. 'And maybe I'll give your elven b.i.t.c.h back to you. You'll never find her now, not where I've kennelled her.'

Still his brother said not a word, merely stared, while behind him the Bright Court raged and swore, waving swords and crying vengeance. At last Evandar moved, but it was only to turn in the saddle and shout them into silence.

'Think well upon this demand!' Lord Vulpine snarled. 'When the sun rises on the morrow, I'll return to this place to hear your answer.'

With a smack of his sword he made his horse rear, then swung round and led his host away, all of them howling with laughter, screeching insults, gloating and revelling in their temporary victory. In his flaunt Lord Vulpine never noticed a plain grey linnet circling the field and waiting till at last his army rode out of sight, and the dust settled on the dead brown plain.

Unmoving again Evandar watched them go, while his Court urged their horses up round him, calling out, begging him to lead them after into battle. With a little cry Dallandra swooped down. The Court burst out cheering, laughing and waving in their turn, as she circled Evandar's horse once, landed before him, and transformed herself into elven shape. He stared at her for a long moment, saying nothing. All at once she realized that he wept.

'My love,' he whispered. 'Are you truly free?'

'I am. Did you think they could hold me?'

He tossed back his head in a howl of berserk laughter that reminded her of Rhodry Maelwaedd, then kicked one foot free of his stirrup and reached down his hand. When she mounted behind him, he twisted round in the saddle and gave her one quick kiss.

'Vengeance first!' He turned again, holding out his hand, grasping from the air his silver horn. 'After them!'

The Court answered his cascade of silver notes with a warcry. Yelling, waving swords, they galloped across the battle plain, where far ahead, warned by the clamour, the Dark Court swung to meet them.

Evandar raised the silver horn and blew the command to hold their ground and form ranks. In a milling mob his warriors pulled their horses to a halt, howling their disappointment, while in front of them .e army of the Dark Court did the same.

'Brother!' Evandar called out. 'What do'you think of this, little brother? I have my woman back, don't I now?'

Loid Vulpine screamed and turned to flee, but too late. Evandar flung up one hand and made a circling motion widders.h.i.+ns in the air. The ground beneath the Dark Court shuddered and began to split open, with a crack like breaking sticks but so loud it seemed an entire forest snapped. Round in a circle the widening fissure raced, ringing Lord Vulpine and all his men, penning them inside a vast ditch. Dust plumed, rocks and clods flew and fell, the Dark Court shrieked and begged for mercy as the very earth under them pitched and buckled. Horses fell, kicking and neighing; the warriors plunged to the ground and clung to dirt with fingers and claws while the Bright Court laughed and hooted.

Evandar lowered his hand and let it rest on the saddle peak. As the clouds of dust blew away, Dallandra could see the Dark Court, huddled and clutching one another atop an island of solid ground, barely large enough to hold them all. Round this island stretched not a sea, but nothing at all - empty s.p.a.ce, a blackness, a depth of naught, falling, reaching, stretching down to a view of distant stars like flecks of ice in a black sky, but stars such as Dallandra had never seen before, because they shone steadily without the slightest twinkling or glint. Evandar urged the horse up to their side of the abyss. After one long exhalation of fear, the Bright Court fell dead-silent behind them.

Dallandra had to admit to herself that she felt none too brave, either. She clung tightly to her lover's waist and refused to look down at the distant stars.

'Now.' Evandar said mildly. 'Let us talk, brother, shall we?'

With a shriek and clatter the Dark Court sprang up and flew. A Inuge flock of ravens wheeled once, sweeping round its pinnacle of I and. For a moment black feathers beat against some invisible wall. As the birds fell back, trapped, taking their usual half-human, half-animal forms, Dallandra realized that there were far fewer of them. Only those with some real consciousness would survive such an ordeal, she supposed.

'Brother! I called you forward, did I not?'

Weeping and trembling, stripped of his fine armour and weapons, Lord Vulpine stepped to the edge of his side of the abyss.

'I will have retribution for this.' Evandar called out. Tor the pain you've caused my woman and for the mocking of me.'

'All my lands are yours, and my va.s.sals as well.'

'The lands were mine anyway, and I don't want your stinking pack of monsters. Tell me your name.'

Lord Vulpine howled in agony.

'Not that, never that.'

Evandar snapped his fingers. A chunk of the Dark Court's island prison broke free and tumbled into the abyss, vanis.h.i.+ng as it did so in a scatter of brown dirt that in turn dissolved into naught.