Dread Empire - All Darkness Met Part 32

Yet that had little real meaning. The practice of magic, except in the wastes of Jebal al Alf Dhulquarneni, had been abandoned by the children of Hammad al Nakir. He had become the best for lack of compet.i.tion.

Varthlokkur, O s.h.i.+ng, Chin, VisiG.o.dred, Zindahjira, Mist-they could have withered him at a glance. Excepting O s.h.i.+ng, they were ancient in their witchcraft. He would need a century to overtake the least and laziest.

Haroun still suffered from his ride, yet when he chose a place to rest, he sat and sharpened his sword instead of sleeping again.

Sometimes he considered Mocker, and sometimes wandered among his memories. Mostly, he longed for his wife. The peaceful years hadn't been bad.

He hadn't been much of a husband. If he came through this maybe he could make it up to her.

He left before next dawn, slipping away so quietly that only one sentry noticed.

The man bid him a quiet farewell. There were tears in both their eyes.

That was why he had chosen to depart stealthily. Some of his men had been fighting for twenty years. He didn't want to feel their grief, to see the accusation in their eyes.

He knew he was betraying them. Most were here for him. They were his weapons.

And he was yielding them to an unfamiliar hand....

He wept, this dark, grim man. The years had not dessicated that faculty.

He rode toward the rising sun, and, he believed, out of the pages of history, a free man at last, and less happy than ever.

TWENTY-TWO: Eye of the Storm

Protected by the Unborn, Ravelin became bucolic. The common folk accepted that happily.

At the Palace they smelled the electricity of the calm before the tempest, yet couldn't keep an edge on. The quiet became possessive.

Even problems like Altea's refusal to permit Oryon pa.s.sage didn't alter the atmosphere of well-being. Ragnarson quietly arranged transit through Anstokin and Ruderin, and asked caravaneers headed west to follow Oryon. Altea's mercantile houses depended on the eastern trade as much as Ravelin's. The new Altean leaders.h.i.+p quickly became less obdurate.

The swift-flying rumor that Haroun had abandoned his armies to his son disturbed no one either. Ragnarson didn't believe it. He felt it a ploy to lull Al Rhemish.

The Thing did little to find a new King. Their one candidate, Fiana's baby brother, fourteen-year-old Lian Melicar Sardygo, didn't want the job. He and his fatherwere downright rude in their refusal of the committee's invitation to visit Ravelin.

They said they would come only to visit Fiana's tomb.

Ragnarson, often with Ragnar and Gundar, made a daily pilgrimage to the cemetery.

He had the boys pick wild flowers along the lane. Then, till after dark, he would sit by Elana's grave. Too often, he counted headstones. Elana. Inger. Soren. Rolf. And two earlier children who had died soon after birth, before they could be named. He had had them moved here.

Sometimes he took a few flowers to the Royal Mausoleum, to Fiana's plain, gla.s.s- topped casket. Varthlokkur's artifices had restored her beauty. She looked as though she might waken.... The old, secret smile lay on her lips. She looked peaceful and happy.

There were times, too, when he would visit Turran's grave, his face clouded. Once they had been enemies, and had become allies. He had considered the man almost a brother.

Yet strange things happen.

He felt no resentment, except against himself.

The days pa.s.sed into weeks and months. He spent evermore time on his morbid jaunts. Prataxis, Gjerdrum, Haaken, Ahring a.s.sumed more of his duties. Ragnar began to worry. He had idolized his mother, and, though a little frightened by him, loved his father. He knew it was unhealthy to spend so much time mourning.

He went to Haaken. But Haaken had no suggestions. Blackfang remained steadfast in his belief that the family should return to Trolledyngja. The political compulsion for exile no longer obtained. The Pretender had abdicated-by virtue of a dagger between his ribs. The Old House had been restored. Heroes of the resistance were collecting rewards. Lands were being returned.

Bragi never considered returning, neither when the news first came down, nor now.

Someday he would go. He had family obligations there. But not now. There were greater obligations here.

Except that he was getting nothing accomplished.

Then Michael Trebilc.o.c.k returned.

Trebilc.o.c.k finally sought Haaken at the War Office. He had waited hours with Prataxis, and Ragnarson hadn't shown.

Haaken listened. An evil, angry smile invaded his face. It exposed the discolored teeth that had given him his name.

"Boy, this's what we've been waiting for." He strapped on his sword. "Dahl!" he called to his adjutant.

"Sir?"

"It's war. Spread the word. But quietly. You understand? It'll be a call-up."

"Sir? Who?"

"You wouldn't believe me if I told you. Get on it. Come on, man," he told Trebilc.o.c.k. "We'll find him."

Dantice had remained to one side all afternoon. Now he said, "Mike, I'd better see my father.""Suit yourself. He could wait another day, couldn't he? If you want to see the Marshall...."

"Marshall, smarshall. What's he to me? My Dad's probably half-crazy worrying."

"Okay."

After they parted with Aral, Haaken observed, "I like that boy. He's got perspective." He didn't elaborate, nor did he speak again till they reached the cemetery.

Blackfang was no conversationalist.

Trebilc.o.c.k replied, "The trip changed him."

They found Bragi, Ragnar, and Gundar at Elana's grave, with the usual flowers and tears. Haaken approached quietly, but the boys heard him. Ragnar met his gaze and shrugged.

Haaken sat beside his foster brother. He said nothing till Bragi noticed him.

"What's up, Haaken?" Ragnarson tossed a pebble at an old Obelisk. "More bureaucratic pettifoggery?"

"No. It's important this time."

"They've got it made, you know."

"Huh? Who?"

"These people. Nothing but peace under the ground."

"I wonder."

"Do you? d.a.m.nit, when I say...."

"Father!"

"What's your problem, boy?"

"You're acting like an a.s.s." He wouldn't have dared had Haaken not been there.

Haaken always took his part. He thought.

Ragnarson started to rise. Haaken seized his arm, pulled him back.

Bragi was big. Six-five, and two hundred twenty-five pounds of muscle. His years at the Palace hadn't devoured his vitality.

Haaken was bigger. And stronger. And more stubborn. "The boy's right. Sit down and listen."

Trebilc.o.c.k seated himself facing them. He wrinkled his nose. He was fastidious.

He picked dirt and gra.s.s, real and imagined, off his breeches the whole time he told his tale.

Ragnarson wasn't interested, despite Michael's rending the veils of mysteries that had plagued him for months.

"Why didn't you bring them out?" Haaken asked. Michael hadn't told it all earlier.

"They separated her from Ethrian. She wanted to stay. And they had a man there, who wore black, and a golden mask.... He would've found us in minutes if he'd known we were there. Probably before we could get out of town."Ragnarson looked thoughtful when Michael mentioned the man in the mask, then lapsed into indifference again.

"I never saw a city that big.... It made h.e.l.lin Daimiel look like a farm town.

Oh. I almost forgot. She said to bring you this. Well, Varthlokkur, but he isn't around. It might not wait till he finds me." He handed Ragnarson an ebony casket.

Bragi accepted with a slight frown. "Elana's thing." He turned it over and over before trying to open it. .

The lid popped up....

The ruby within was alive, was afire. It painted their faces in devil shades.

"Please close it."

They jumped. Swords whined out. They looked upward.

"Close it!"

Ragnarson kicked the lid shut.

Varthlokkur descended from the sky, his vast cloak flapping about him. Above him floated the Unborn.

Trebilc.o.c.k, Ragnarson thought, at least had the decency to be surprised.

Hopefully, someday, he would be afraid too.

"Where the h.e.l.l did you come from?" Haaken demanded.

"Afar. Radeachar came for me when he saw the pale man and his companion coming through the Gap. You were hard to locate. What're you doing here?"

Haaken made a gesture which included Ragnarson, Elana's grave, and the Royal Mausoleum.

Meantime, Bragi lost interest again. He sat down, reopened the casket.

"d.a.m.nit, I said close it!" Varthlokkur growled.

Ragnarson quietly drew his sword.

High, high above, a tiny rider on a winged steed spied another red flash. He circled lower, pa.s.sing over unseen because he was invisible from below. He recognized three of the men. "d.a.m.n!" he spat. He soared, and raced northward. He didn't notice the great bird which circled higher still.

Varthlokkur shuddered and glanced around, feeling something. But there was nothing to see.

The Unborn darted this way and that. It had felt the presence too. After a moment it settled into position above Varthlokkur's head.

The others felt it too. Bragi lowered his blade, looked around, realized what he was doing. Attacking Varthlokkur? With simple steel?

It was getting dark. Ragnar lighted the torches he always brought because his father so often dallied till after nightfall.

The flames repulsed the encroachment of night....

Something s.h.i.+fted, made a small mewling sound beyond the light.Weapons appeared again. A soft, hissing voice said, "Enough. I come in friends.h.i.+p."

Ragnarson shuddered. He knew that voice. "Zindahjira."

That sorce'rer's life-path had crossed his before. The first time had been once too often. Zindahjira wasn't even human-or so Bragi suspected. When this wizard went abroad by daylight, he wrapped himself in a blackness which reversed the function of a torch.

Varthlokkur was the more powerful, the more dread magician, but, at least, came in human form.

Must be what we sensed, Ragnarson thought.

Something else moved at the edge of the firelight. Bragi had the satisfaction of seeing Michael Trebilc.o.c.k startled.

Two more things appeared. One went by the name The Thing With Many Eyes, the other, Gromacki, The Egg Of G.o.d. Each was as inhuman as Zindahjira, though not of his species.

They were sorcerers of renown and had gathered from the far reaches of the west.