Maze of Moonlight (37 page)

“I'd recommend that you all evacuate,” he told them. “I'm sorry to have to put it so bluntly . . .” Would his grandfather have apologized for bluntness? Never! But Christopher went on without hesitating. “. . . but I think you've lost from the beginning.”

But an older woman near the front of the room shook her head and stood up. This was Charity, Abel's mother, the weaver and midwife to whom Vanessa had apprenticed herself. She was respected and loved in the village, and though Christopher suspected that her religious beliefs were no more orthodox than Natil's, even Dom Gregorie, the priest, seemed on friendly terms with her.

She was over a decade past her half century, but her face was essentially unlined, and her voice was as clear as a girl's when she spoke. “If we leave,” she said, “I think that they will not be satisfied. If we go to Alm, they will come to Alm. If we go all the way to Saint Blaise, then they will eventually come all the way to Saint Blaise. Once, long ago, I told Mirya . . .” And she looked around as though to ask whether any in the room remembered another threat now fifty years past. “. . . that we faced a battle that had to unite all of us. I will say it again. But this time we embrace the grandson of our former enemy.” She smiled at Christopher: it was a warm smile, and along with forgiveness, he caught a trace of light in her lake blue eyes that reminded him of Vanessa . . . and of Natil and Terrill and Mirya. “And I for one bid him welcome to Saint Brigid, and hope he will not think us too stubborn because of our determination.”

Charity sat down. A fighter. They were all fighters. Vanessa's father, Christopher recalled, had come from Saint Brigid. “You're all sure of this?”

He saw the men and women of the council exchange glances as the shadows from the hearth fire flickered across the walls. Glances, nods, murmurs. Yes, they were sure.

“You're all mad, you know.”

Abel scratched his bald head. “And would you leave Aurverelle to the brigands, m'lord baron?”

Christopher was indignant. “Of course not.”

Abel smiled, his mouth a dark line in a face patched with the scars of old burns. “Well, then . . .”

The monkey seemed to agree, for it bounded in through the open window, clambered to Christopher's head, and stared at him, upside-down, from inches away. Charity clapped her hands appreciatively, and Vanessa, present because Christopher was present, laughed.

But Christopher turned to Vanessa. “What about you?”

Vanessa shook her head. “These people tak me in. They've been good t' me. I wan leave them.”

It was suicide. “Vanessa . . .”

“Nay, m'lord. I've found my home a' long last, an' I wan leave it willingly.” She stood up, held out her hands to the monkey, and with a yip it leaped into her arms. She stroked it for a moment, then lifted her brown eyes once more. “I mean it.”

A fighter. She had fought Etienne, fought herself. She had struggled against the fate mapped out for her by her parents, and she had, it seemed, triumphed; for as she stood before Christopher and pledged her loyalty to what had once been a village of strangers, she seemed to have nothing at all in common with the helpless, frightened child who had opened her eyes in a bedroom in Aurverelle. Vanessa was a woman now, a human woman, and a strong one; and Christopher, despite his fears for her safety, knew that he would not have loved her otherwise.

But her refusal meant that her continuing survival would be based not upon Christopher, but upon the alliance. Looking at her now, looking at the faces—old and young, worried and determined—that were turned toward him in this little house in a little village, Christopher was shaken. Into the hands of such as Ruprecht and Yvonnet he was commending these?

He calculated. Another few days remained before the alliance forces would begin to gather at Shrinerock. And he knew—he had no illusions or false humility about it—that, without his presence, the gathering would eventually fragment. He would, therefore, have to leave Saint Brigid. He would have to leave Vanessa. And he would have to leave soon.

“All right,” he said. “You hold out. I'll try to make sure that the free companies never make it this far.”

Abel stuck out an almost black hand. “We trust you, Baron Aurverelle.” He grinned. It was an unlikely thing for a man of Saint Brigid to say.

Christopher took his hand. “Could anyone have imagined this happening fifty years ago?”

Abel laughed. “Times change. Some things fade, others come to take their place. But I'll tell you, m'lord: the baron of Aurverelle will always have friends here in Saint Brigid.”

The time of the Elves was over. It was up to human beings now. Sickness, and death, and what dull embers of loyalty and friendship could be fanned into flame. Memories that knew no more than a few decades, hearts that were anything but steadfast, hands that knew murder as well as comfort: these were all they had. The legacy of elven blood and elven heritage was sleeping—perhaps it would sleep its way into death—and those who bore it called themselves but men and women, saw nothing but what was before their eyes, and worked to carve their lives out of unseen patterns and shadowy mazes of moonlight.

He said good-bye to Vanessa the next morning, and as he held hands with her just inside the village gate, and as the hot wind from the east blew dust and straw about their feet and the sun threw light against he tower of the church, he recalled another parting. “I . . . could ask you to stay,” he said.

She understood. “I ha' no place in Aurverelle, m'lord.”

He put his finger to her lips. “Christopher.”

He dropped his hand, and she smiled. “Christopher.”

“You see, Vanessa,” he said. “You say my name like one born to the gentry. I couldn't ask for more.”

She blushed. “You're making fun o' me.”

“No, not at all. How could I make fun of someone I love?”

She looked ready to cry. “Oh, dear Lady, Christopher . . .”

He took her by the shoulders. Symbol she had once been, symbol and guiding light—but now she was a woman, and a determined, courageous one at that. A fitting mate for a delAurvre, regardless of her parentage. “Don't you feel it? Don't you feel anything for me?”

She made a face through misting eyes, forced a laugh. “It's like out of an old tale.”

“Things like elven blood and magic are out of an old tale, too,” he said. “And—who knows?—someday, you and I will be a part of an old tale ourselves, and our names will live on in chimney corners and children's bedrooms long after our . . .” He grimaced at his wayward tongue. “. . . peach trees are all planted.”

She blushed again, dropped her eyes, then, impulsively, threw herself against him and held him. “I do love you, Christopher,” she whispered. “You helped me. You ta me in whan e'eryone else turned me out. An' you were e'erything to me that e'eryone else wan't. But . . . but I . . .”

He shushed her. “No. No decisions now. You've told me enough. That's all I need for now.” And he held up her hand: his signet glittered on her finger. “You bear my token. And I . . .” He drew the moon and star pendant from his tunic. “I bear yours. Whatever happens, we're together.”

Vanessa touched the pendant. “Tha's an elvish symbol,” she said. “It's the moon and star o' the Lady. I know tha' now.” She colored, dropped her eyes. “I know about my grandda, too, and about my da. They—”

“I know,” said Christopher. Elvish meddling. But Roger had meddled, and now Christopher was meddling. There were all sorts of meddling, he supposed, some more comely than others. “I don't care, Vanessa. You're human. That's all that matters. That's the Vanessa I love.”

He kissed her, and then she stepped away as he sprang into his saddle. Her hands were clasped, her face earnest. A wife watching her husband go off to war? He wondered. He hoped.

Hope. The Elves had given him that, too. Should he curse them for that? Should he hate them?

“G'bye, Christopher,” said Vanessa.

He thrust the thoughts of immortals from him, smiled down at her. Hope. The Elves had none, men and women—blind though they were—had all. “The French have a better word,” he said. “And since, my beloved lady, they're supposed to know all about such things as love and chivalry, maybe I'll take a lesson from them.” He wrinkled his nose. “For once.” He bent, caught her hand, pressed it to his lips. “Adieu.”

For four hours, the men of the Fellowship of Acquisition had pounded at the lithified gates of the castle with an improvised battering ram, and the granite had finally cracked, shivered, and crumbled, but just enough to allow one rider to squeeze through at a time. Berard had given orders for the aperture to be enlarged for the wagons and guns, but he and a dozen of his men who possessed the fastest horses had threaded their way out and prepared to set off along the south road.

“What about the baron of Furze and his people?” his new lieutenant had asked.

“Burn them.”

“What?”

“Fire the forest. It's tinder dry. And I want the men ready to ride by afternoon. And when they are, Jaques, bring them after us. Bring everything: cannon, supply wagons, everything.”

His mind had burned with thoughts of Christopher delAurvre, and now, two days along the south road, it was still burning. All had been going along as planned, and then the baron of Aurverelle had appeared, skipping lightly through the intricacies of his plots like a monkey scampering among the roofs and towers of Shrinerock. Somehow, Christopher had sealed up the castle. Somehow, he had known about that crossbow bolt. And Berard feared that somehow, if he were not killed quickly, he would bring the Fellowship's glorious and profitable future to dust.

He and his men camped that night to the south of the threatening shadows of Malvern, and he noted with approval that the stars to the northeast were hazy with rising smoke. Jaques had done as he was told. Now, if the rest of the expanded Fellowship proved to be as dependable, he might speedily be rid of Christopher, and Adria would fall into his hand like a piece of ripe fruit.

On the third day, the smoke was rising fiercely, the drought-scorched trees and litter igniting quickly and, driven by an east wind, carrying the flames further into the forest. Berard gave a moment's thought to the possibility that all of Malvern might eventually be consumed, but then he shrugged philosophically: if Paul delMari and his people died, that was enough. Forests always grew back.

The horses clattered along the sunbaked surface of the road. Berard could not be absolutely certain that Christopher and his companion were still ahead—they might well have turned off into the pastures and the fields—but he had expert trackers among his party, and nothing that they had seen indicated anything but that they had stayed on the road.

And then, early in the morning, as the road swung in to skirt closely the ranks of trees, they saw Christopher trotting towards them on a gray horse. Unarmored, unaccompanied, his thoughts apparently turned within, he looked very much the foppish noble out for a morning's recreation. He had a sword at his side, true, but what was one sword against a dozen?

Christopher looked up, saw them, stared. Berard rose in his stirrups. “Get him!”

The horses leaped forward. By the time Christopher had realized the threat and wheeled, the gap between him and his enemies had closed by half.

Christopher fled, the road smoking behind him. Berard spurred his horse bloody. To the right was the forest, the trees thickset and impenetrable, to the left was open grassland: the baron was trapped between too much cover and none at all. It was only a matter of time.

Christopher increased his speed. Berard shouted encouragement to his men. “Ten thousand pieces of gold! Red sealed! I want his head!”

In response, Christopher turned his head and stuck out his tongue at his pursuers.

Berard dug the goads on his heels deeper into his horse. “Scum, little cock-a-whoop?” he muttered. “We'll see. I'll cut your throat and have you stuffed and mounted like the miserable monkey you are.”

Movement suddenly. To the right.

Berard tore his eyes from Christopher just in time to see two riders—women, both of them—charging out of the trees. Clad in green and gray, riding without saddle or bridle, they wove effortlessly through the scattered trunks at the edge of Malvern and bore directly down on Berard.

Berard stared. They had to be crazy. They were
attacking
.

But, regardless of their mental state, they were closing quickly, and one of them had a sword; and so Berard pointed at them with a shout. Immediately, three of his men swerved to intercept them. Women they might be, but Berard was not taking any chances, and Christopher was still loose.

Christopher, as though heartened by the women's appearance, had abruptly turned about to drive straight at Berard, sword in hand. Berard stared, aghast. “My God . . . he
is
mad.”

Mad or not, Christopher's first stroke caught Berard's parry soundly, and the captain was almost unhorsed. “I told you to get your scum out of Adria,” cried the baron. “It's been two days now. You're a dead man, Berard.”

“The hell I am.” Berard shoved Christopher back and waved his men forward. Surrounding and disarming a single man by sheer force of numbers was not a particularly chivalrous act, but Berard had given up on chivalry years before.

But as he wheeled to give himself room, he was shocked to see that the three men who had set off to intercept the women were now lying on the ground. And the woman with the sword, carrying herself with frightening grace, was again bearing down on him. Her red-gold hair floated free, and her face was both eerily lovely and terrifyingly determined.

Christopher's sword feinted, doubled back, swept in. Berard barely blocked in time, but he was nonetheless confident: the rest of his men were now encircling Christopher, spreading out to surround him, drawing weapons. Ten to one. Only a matter of time.

Before they could complete their envelopment, though, the second woman, dark-haired and bearing no weapon save a harp, cut in among them and . . .

She must have done something. Berard had no idea what it was, but abruptly, all the horses save those ridden by Christopher and his allies were rearing, beating the air with frantic forelegs, whinnying shrilly. Berard managed to save himself from being dumped into the road, but a number of his men wound up in the dust.