The Sword, The Ring And The Chalice - The Sword Part 24

After a time, however, she realized that this was not the moonlight which glowed in the depths, but rather something else. It rose slowly, slowly to the surface of the water, wavered there, then broke through and lifted into the air. Water and vapor seemed to blend together. The air grew suddenly cold, as though she'd been plunged into winter. She saw an apparition form and take shape, still glowing from within. It was the figure of a man. Her breath caught, then fled her lungs. This was not her father. Disappointment seeped through her. She saw instead a youth, dark-haired and lanky, his full growth not yet achieved. He stood there, his feet in the mist, his legs straight and coltish, his chest strong, his arms longer than his sleeves.

His head was bowed, but then he lifted it and looked right at her. She sat there openmouthed, unable to look away. How pale his eyes were, glowing with the unearthly light that formed him. His cheeks were lean, his nose straight and aristocratic. His brows were thick dark slashes above his eyes. He spoke not, and she could not tell if he saw her. Then he lifted his right arm. A sword formed in his hand, both mist and light, a sword whose blade flashed with carved runes. When he swung it aloft, the runes flowed from the blade and sparkled off the tip like shooting stars.

They rained down on her, winking into the water and glowing there like tiny lights.

Tipping back her head, she laughed silently, marveling at the beauty of light and mist and water.

"I am Faldain," her vision said, his voice sounding only in her head. It was a voice young but deepening, with a resonance that echoed long inside her. "Summon me not again. It is not my time to be found."

"We need you," she dared whisper. "Come and save your people." He swung of mist and light again, this time right at her. The tip pierced her breastbone, and icy fire plunged through her heart. She arched her back with a choked cry.

Then he was gone, the vision fading in a last shower of sparks and starlight. When she recovered her senses, Alexeika found herself huddled on her knees in the bottom of the skiff, doubled over and crying.

She hurt, yet her fingers found no wound where the vision had stabbed her. The mist was gone, and the water lay calm and dark. A cloud had crossed the moon overhead, muting the starlight as well.

With shaking hands, she rubbed the tears from her face. Her teeth were chattering, and she felt so very cold. Whatever she had wanted, it had not been this.

"Alexeika," called a voice softly. It reached across the fjord and brought her from her thoughts. "Child, come back to sh.o.r.e. It is over now." Startled, she looked at the bank. Uzfan, his long robe perilously close to the water, stood right at the edge, beckoning to her. Behind him cl.u.s.tered what looked like half the camp. The people were silent in the moonlight, which came and went fitfully behind its thin veil of cloud. They stared at her with their mouths open.

Fear touched her, along with embarra.s.sment. What had they seen? She gripped the paddle, her fingers tight on the polished wood, and felt a strong temptation to go far away into the darkness, never to return.

"Alexeika," Uzfan called again. His voice was gentle, full of understanding.

"Come to sh.o.r.e, child. You must be cold."

Yes, she felt as chilled as if it were a winter evening. Overhead, a falling star plummeted through the sky, falling out of sight among the treetops of the distant sh.o.r.e. She s.h.i.+vered and began to paddle slowly to Uzfan. Her arms felt leaden and stiff. It seemed to take her forever to return, but finally the skiff b.u.mped into the rocks and eager hands reached down to grip it and tie it fast. Someone took her hands and pulled her to her feet. She stumbled out, feeling as though her mind was not quite connected to her body, and Uzfan gripped her arm firmly.

"Come, child," he said. "Time to rest. Make way for her. Shelena, step aside." The women and old men parted way before her reluctantly. As she walked between them, they reached out and touched her hair and her clothing, murmuring words she did not quite understand.

Up the hill, as she and Uzfan left the others behind and approached her tent, she faltered and stopped.

"What happened?" she asked, still feeling dazed.

"Come. I will build a fire," the old man said kindly.

Beneath his rea.s.suring tone, however, she heard disapproval.

She frowned. "I don't understand. I wanted to see my father." Uzfan shook his head and pushed her toward her tent. She stood next to it, watching while he a.s.sembled twigs and kindling in a circle of stones and struck sparks into the fluff of shredded bark. A small blaze caught, flaring orange in the darkness.

"Child, child," he said in mild rebuke. "Do you remember none of the lessons I taught you? A soul newly departed cannot be seen. Would you call your father forth from the safety he so barely reached?"

"I miss him," she said, her voice small like a child's.

Uzfan climbed to his feet with a grunt and turned to grip her arms. "Come and sit by the fire. It will warm you."

She sank to the ground, rubbing her chest where she still ached. Uzfan tended the fire, feeding sticks to it as the flames grew hungry and stronger. He kept staring at her with a frown, his eyes s.h.i.+fting away each time she glanced up. His disapproval seemed stronger than ever.

She frowned. "I did something wrong?"

"Do you think so?" he asked too quickly.

She sighed. She didn't want a lesson. "I don't know. It seemed-I don't know. I've never cast a real vision before. Not like that." She rubbed her chest again. "I didn't know it would hurt."

"Who did you conjure forth?" he asked sternly.

She did not answer. She was suddenly afraid to.

"Child, what you did was very wrong. Think of the danger you have placed yourself in. The camp now knows what you can do."

She shook her head. "I can't. I don't know how it happened. I've tried before, and it never worked.

You remember."

"I remember an impatient girl refusing to follow instructions. Did I not warn you never to part the veils of seeing on your own?" "No."

He snorted. "Then remember it now. Dangerous, child! Dangerous. You must never invoke forces you do not understand or cannot control." He shuddered. "We are too close to the battlefield. Nonkind roam our land, and the darkness is always close. You must never again take such a risk."

"It wasn't malevolent," she said, trying to defend herself now. She felt ashamed, and therefore defiant. "I found no evil-" "Ah, but evil may find you," he retorted, glaring at her. She glared back and wanted suddenly to shock him. "It was Faldain," she said.

"He told me so."

Uzfan's mouth fell open. He stared at her, his expression altering into one of shock. The stick he held halfway in the fire burst into flames, and still he sat there motionless.

At last, however, he was forced to throw the stick into the fire. Shaking his scorched fingers, he blew on them and stared at her again. "Faldain?" he whispered. "Are you certain?"

"He said that was his name."

"Impossible."

"Why?"

"Because it is. No one knows if the boy even lives, or where he might be."

"He lives," she said with a.s.surance.

Uzfan clasped his hands together. "Great mercy of Thod," he muttered. "How could you find him, an untrained natural-I-I am amazed." "He said for me not to summon him again. He said it was not yet time for him to be found." Frustration filled her, and she pounded her fist on her knee. "When will he come? If I am to keep people in support of him, he must come soon." Uzfan reached out and closed his hand over her fist. "Stop this at once. You are not in command of these events."

"Don't you think I can lead-"

"That is not what I'm talking about. Listen to me, child." Uzfan's old eyes, very grave and serious, held hers. "When you want a thing to happen, when you have devoted your life to making it happen, it can be very hard to let events take their course. But you do not control what is to be. You must never again try to force destiny."

"I only wanted to see him," she began, but Uzfan scowled. "No," he said sternly. "You asked me to give the people a vision of Faldain, and when I refused you set out to defy my wisdom. Is this not the way of it?" She could not meet his gaze now. Squirming a little, she glared at the fire.

"Alexeika?"

"Yes! I suppose so. I wanted hope for myself. Is that wrong?"

He stared at her. "It is wrong." Angry, she flashed her eyes at him, then looked away again. "If he comes one day or if he never comes, it is not for you to decide. You cannot set his path. It is forbidden for you to try. Is that clear?"

"I don't have those kinds of powers-"

"You might! Great Thod, girl, look what you accomplished tonight. Your power unchained and unchanneled, careening everywhere. You are a natural. Your mother's blood gave you what ability you have, but it's erratic, unusable." "That can't be true," she said in surprise. "Why did you try to train me before if my gifts weren't-" 'To keep you from doing harm to yourself or to others," he said angrily.

"Oh."

"Yes," he snapped. "I felt at the time that it would be unkind to tell you more. You seemed uninterested in learning, and so I let it pa.s.s. I see now I was wrong."

"So even if I tried again to do what I did tonight, it might not happen." "You might set fire to yourself, or nothing might happen at all. Your gift is small and uncontrollable. If you did not bring Nonkind to us, I will be very grateful."

She bit her lip, understanding now why he was so angry. Contrite, she said, "I ask your pardon. I was not trying to do harm. If we must leave camp tonight, then I will-" "No, no, do not alarm everyone," he said grouchily. "There's been enough trouble for one day. Promise me, child, that you will never do something like this again."

She frowned, feeling sorry, but not yet ready to promise anything. "But he does exist," she said. "He is not a myth. He does live. Somewhere." "If that is true, then you have endangered him as well. Visions are meant to summon the dead, not those living. You could injure him." Her eyes widened with alarm. "I didn't mean to. Can you find out where he is?"

"No."

"Then how-"

"Alexeika, I have warned you most strongly. Must I make a spell to take your gift away from you?"

She leaned back, astonished that he would threaten her. "You mean this?"

His gaze never wavered. "I do."

"Did the others see him? Do they know? Do they understand now?" "They know you have powers, and that can someday endanger you," he said with exasperation.

"No one here would expose me, no more than they would betray you," she said, shrugging off his concern.

"Are you sure of that?" he asked.

"Of course," she said lightly, but the worry in his face gave her pause. She frowned. "Do you think-" "I do not need to counsel you on who to trust," he said. "This has been most unwise, most unwise indeed.

Now, do I have your promise that you will not do such a thing again?"

"Yes," she said in a small voice of surrender. He grunted and got stiffly to his feet. "Then I shall leave you for the night. You cannot lead people with tricks, Alexeika. That is King Muncel's way, and you know how false he is. Beware your own will. It should never be stronger than your prudence."

She bowed her head under his rebuke. He walked away, grumbling in his beard as he went.

For a while she sat by the fire, until at last the coldness inside her melted away. When she noticed that someone was staring at her from a nearby tent, she threw dirt on the fire, smothering it, and went inside her own. It was easy to distract herself for a few minutes, packing her possessions and those of her father's that she wanted to keep. It would be a hard job in the morning, getting camp to break.

But when her packing was finished, she had nothing else to do except extinguish the small oil lamp and lie on her cot in the darkness.

Faldain's face swam back into her thoughts. He had not looked like she expected. She wondered when he would come and why Uzfan seemed to think he might never do so. Didn't this young king know who he was and what his responsibilities were? Didn't he care? Surely he'd heard about Nether's misfortunes. Was he trying to raise an army, and if so, from where? Would he enter Nether with an invading force? Would he sell Nether to another realm in exchange for fighting men, the way his uncle had done?

She frowned, fretting in the night, and in time grew angry with the boy she'd seen. If he didn't come, then he was either a fool or a weakling. If he didn't care about his own land and people, then he deserved no throne. In the meantime, she had to find a way to persuade the rebels to carry through the planned attack on Trebek. It was a small but important river town, controlling barge trade between the Nold border and Grov. She had to continue her father's plans. Somehow, even if everyone else turned coward and surrendered, she had to continue.

Deep in the night, Dain lunged upright from sleep with a gasp. He felt as though he were drowning in a deep, icy-cold lake. He could not breathe. Water filled his lungs and nostrils, holding him down. In his hand he gripped a sword that flashed with fire. A sorcerelle held him enchanted, drawing him forth from the water only to plunge him back in.

Shuddering, Dain rubbed his sweating face with both hands and pulled up his knees to rest his forehead on them. He realized now it had been only a dream. He was safe within the foster sleeping chamber in Thirst Hold, and he'd better take care to make no noise that might disturb the others.

After a time his pounding heart slowed and he began to breathe more normally. It was hot and airless in the chamber. His cot was closest to the window, but the Mandrian custom was to keep windows firmly shuttered at night. If he opened it now to fill his lungs with fresh air, the others might wake up. Dain had no desire to take a beating from Mierre. As silently as shadow, he slipped from the room, pa.s.sing Thum's cot, where his friend snored, pa.s.sing Kaltienne's cot, and finally pa.s.sing Mierre's. The largest boy was a light sleeper, but Dain made no sound. He had learned early on how to smear goose grease on the hinges of the door so that it could be opened without a sound. Safely in the corridor, he let out his breath in relief and, barefooted, went padding off outside. He crossed the walkway over to the battlements and leaned his bare shoulder against the cool stone crenellation, gazing outward across the patchwork of light and darkest shadows that marked the fields, meadows, and eventually forest belonging to this Thirst.

It would be morning soon. He sniffed the breeze, aware of an imperceptible lightening of the sky. Downat the corner of the wall, the sentry yawned and resumed his slow walk. The man had not yet noticed Dain, but once he did there would be no challenge. The sentries were used to Dain's nocturnal ramblings.

Sometimes he slept on the walkways, or tried to. Usually a sentry roused him and sent him back inside.

No one understood how hard it was for him to sleep inside a building of stone. Although he had lived at Thirst now for three-quarters of a year, he still wondered sometimes what men feared so much that they should build such a fortress of timber and stone to hide within. He found it overwhelming at times to be among so many people, with so many men-minds flicking past his own. He had learned to shut them out as much as possible, but at night it was harder. Sometimes he dreamed their dreams, and that was difficult, if not repulsive.

Tonight's dream, however, had been different. Frowning, Dain rubbed his chest. He still felt unsettled by it, and he hadn't understood it at all. It was almost as though he hadn't dreamed it, but had instead been yanked by magical means into another world and time. If so, why? Who was that maiden on the lake with eyes like starlight, and what had she wanted him to do? His fingers reached up to curl around his pendant of bard crystal, which wasn't there.

Dain's frown deepened. Angrily he lowered his hand. He kept forgetting he no longer wore it.

Thanks to Gavril and Mierre, who had tormented and teased him on his first day of training. During the break, Mierre and the prince closed in on Dain, and Mierre attacked first. While he and Dain were fighting, the leather cord had snapped, and the pendant went flying into the dirt. Gavril picked it up, exclaiming, "This is king's gla.s.s! Where did you get it?" Pinned at that moment by Mierre, who was sitting on him and twisting his arm painfully behind him, Dain spat out a mouthful of dirt. "That's mine."

"Oh, you stole it, no doubt."

"Didn't."

"I say you did. No one wears king's gla.s.s unless they are royalty." Mierre twisted Dain's arm harder.

He grunted, gritting his teeth to keep from crying out, and flailed uselessly with his other hand.

"Mine," he insisted.

"You cannot claim stolen property."

Dain gathered all his strength and managed to break free of Mierre. Sending the larger boy toppling, Dain scrambled up, landed a dirty kick that made Mierre double up and howl, and launched himself at Gavril.

"It's mine!" he shouted, tackling the prince and knocking him down. Biting and scratching and gouging, the only way he knew how to fight, Dain swarmed Gavril furiously, determined to get his property back.

It was all he had of his lost heritage, the only possession his unknown parents had given him. Jorb had warned him and Thia never to lose their pendants, never to show them, never to give them into anyone's keeping. And now, his worst enemy-this arrogant, pompous prince who had already thrown a royal fit at the idea of even being in the same hold with him, much less in training together-clutched his pendant and no doubt intended to keep it for himself. "Give it back!" Dain shouted. He struck Gavril in the mouth, and pain shot through his knuckles as they split on the prince's teeth. Blood spurted, and Gavril howled.

"Give it back!" Dain shouted. Lunging for Gavril's clenched fist, Dain rolled over and over with the prince.

Then they were surrounded by men, who pulled them bodily apart. Bleeding and streaked with dirt, hisfine doublet torn, Gavril pointed at Dain with a shaking finger and gasped, too furious to speak. Dain glared and lunged for him, only to be held back by the men. "Now, now, what is all this?" demanded the master-at-arms, Sir Polquin. "This is not the way knights, n.o.bles, and gentlemen conduct themselves on a field of honor."

"He's none of those," Gavril said, his face beet-red with fury. "The dirty little-" "Now, now, your highness," Sir Polquin broke in. "Dain does not yet know our customs. Let us not lose our temper."

Gavril turned his blue-eyed rage on the master-at-arms. "I shall lose my temper if I desire! He'll die for this! The ruffian attacked me without provocation." "Liar!" Dain shouted back, struggling against the hands that held him fast. "He is a thief. That pendant is mine. He took it from me."

Sir Polquin's weather-roughened face turned slightly pale. He frowned and scratched his sun-bleached hair, but his green eyes held little mercy when he looked at Dain. "You must never strike his highness or call him a thief or a liar."

"He is!" Dain insisted.

Sir Masen cuffed Dain on his ear. Pain flared through his head, distracting him momentarily. "Don't talk back to the master-at-arms, boy." Sir Polquin beckoned to Mierre, who had dusted off his doublet and now came forward. "And what say you about this? Were you fighting Dain as well?" "I was showing him how to wrestle, sir," Mierre lied smoothly. "If we must have him with us, we don't want him shaming us by not knowing how to grapple." The men chuckled, and seemed to accept this lie. Mierre smiled, and his gaze flickered to Dain for one brief, malevolent moment.

Seething, hating them all, Dain set his jaw and glared at everyone. "The pendant is mine," he said.

"Prince or not, he cannot take it from me."