Swords Over Fireshore (4 page)

She should have killed her. The thought was cold, but Eliani knew that any mercy they showed the alben now would only mean another, harder fight ahead. For her soul's sake, she had not wanted to atone for taking the helpless alben's life. As a warrior, she knew it had been a mistake.

Vanorin glanced up at her, question in his eyes. She nodded. She had told him of this encounter. He dropped the gourd fragment and stood, looking up at the wall.

Eliani gestured that they should continue along the path. They were still too close to the gates for her liking. She had crossed the wall farther to the east.

They resumed their silent march, listening all the while for any sound of alarm from the city. Eliani expected none. The wall was solid; the alben would be in hiding. She and her escort would steal into the city like beams of sunlight.

When Vanorin halted once more, she nodded. They were almost due east of the city; this place would do.

Vanorin gestured to Birani, who was small and lithe, to climb the wall. Birani gripped the rough rocks with gloved hands and booted feet, pulling herself up the wall with cautious movements. Slowly she raised her head above the edge. Eliani knew she would see little thus, nor be seen; the wall was wider than an armspan.

Vanorin tensed beside her as Birani hauled herself atop the wall. Eliani swallowed, listening. No sound came from within the city; no cry of alarm or clash of weapons. Birani lay still for a long moment, then shifted to whisper down to Vanorin.

“I see no one. The houses are all shuttered.”

Eliani nodded. “They are empty.”

Vanorin gave her a sharp glance, then turned to Revani. “Wait here. If you hear any sound of trouble, start for Woodrun at once.”

The guardian acknowledged this, and “stepped back against the forest, into the shadow of a darkwood sapling. Vanorin and two others climbed atop the wall. Birani was no longer in sight; she must have descended into the city.

Four guardians awaited Eliani. Two of them climbed beside her as she set her hands to the rock, grateful for Revani's gloves. Her first climb over this wall had cut her bare hands and feet.

“She paused atop the wall. She could see Darkwood Hall, its terraced rooftops rising above the other structures. Ghlanhras was silent, more so than any ælven “settlement should be. No smoke rose from any chimney, no sound of labor rang from any yard or crafthall. If there were ælven “remaining in the city, they were not at liberty.

She lowered herself down the inside of the wall, joining the others in its shadow. When the last two of her escort had followed her, she turned to Vanorin, nodding to the nearest street. “She did not know if it was the street she had taken before, but it did not matter. Ghlanhras was an ælven “city; its straight streets all ran toward the “public circle at its center, crossing the curving avenues, concentric rings that flowed outward from the city's heart.

She could see the public circle ahead, a vast, open ground where markets and festivals were held; empty now. Before they reached it, Vanorin halted and drew the others into the last avenue outside the circle. The houses here looked more recently inhabited—some of the windows were open, and one or two hearthroom doors stood ajar—but there was no sign or sound now of anyone within.

With a gesture, Vanorin sent three of the guardians toward the circle. They were to go to the stables and ready horses for riding, if the horses were to be found. Legend said the animals disliked the alben, and Eliani hoped that the city's invaders had not yet dealt with the horses in Ghlanhras's stables.

She watched the three guardians hasten to the circle and disappear from sight. Holding her breath, she listened for a sound of alarm, but heard none.

She looked at Vanorin and nodded, and the party continued along the avenue toward the rear of Darkwood Hall. She had only glimpsed the garden wall in her hasty escape, but thought it might offer the easiest way onto the roof of the Hall.

As they followed the avenue's curve, a blackness appeared blocking their way. Vanorin turned to look at Eliani and she nodded; this was the wall she remembered. It was smaller than the wall around the city, and made of shaped blocks of stone rather than the rough rocks of the outer wall.

Vanorin slowed their pace and walked near to the houses on their left. Eliani's shoulder blades prickled with a sense of danger. Part of her wished to flee, but she walked on, gritting her teeth.

The avenue ended at the street that ran along the east side of Darkwood Hall. Vanorin paused and looked to the left, then swiftly crossed the open space to the garden wall, followed by the others.

Eliani glanced toward the Hall; there had to be windows, but perhaps the alben had covered them against the daylight. They paused, clustered beneath the wall. No sign of their having been seen reached them. Ghlanhras remained silent.

Vanorin summoned Sunahran with a gesture, and after a whispered consultation, the guardian braced himself against the wall and Vanorin climbed onto his shoulders.

Eliani bit her lip, watching as Vanorin cautiously looked over the wall. After a moment he pulled himself up onto it, and gestured for the others to climb up.

Two more guardians climbed onto the wall with Vanorin's help. As they moved forward toward the roof of the Hall, Eliani climbed onto Sunahran's shoulders, whispering her thanks. She took Vanorin's hand and he hauled her up, setting her on her feet. She smiled, but he was already reaching down to help the next.

Eliani joined the other guardians on the roof and watched the rest of the escort climb up, Sunahran coming last with Vanorin's assistance. Now they must be especially cautious, and move with absolute silence. Any sound would alert the alben below to their presence.

She swallowed a sudden dryness in her throat. They would do this; reaching this point had been half the battle.

The sun's heat rose up from the roof tiles, making her uncomfortably warm in her borrowed leathers. When the guardians were all gathered, she gestured toward the highest roof in the complex, the large expanse that covered the audience chamber. She had found a way to see into it as she fled, and glimpsed Luruthin below—bound, at the feet of the alben leader—the last she had seen of him. She wished to see what the chamber held now.

Vanorin and three others went ahead, the rest came behind Eliani. They walked with hunters' stealth, crossing the tiled roofs, keeping wide of the ornately filigreed screens that covered the high windows, lest their shadows fall across them and draw the notice of those inside the Hall.

Eliani wondered about those screens. They were designed to bring light into the central areas of the Hall while minimizing the heat that came in. The alben would not care for the light, however.

She reached the corner where she had previously looked through a screen, and knelt to look again. The small hole she had made in the silken gauze covering was still there, but behind it was a darker, heavier cloth. She could not move this aside to see down into the chamber; the fabric eluded her grasp.

She glanced up at Vanorin, standing over her, and shook her head. Carefully she rose again, looking westward toward the wing where she and Luruthin had been given rooms, and whence she had escaped.

She started toward it, going slowly, trying to remember from which window she had crawled onto the roof. The varying levels of the roofs followed the major passages of the Hall; she found the main corridor easily enough, for it adjoined the audience chamber.

Following it toward the front of the Hall, she remembered the turning into the guest quarters, and so reached the passage where she had fled the alben. She stood above the very spot where Luruthin had been taken, and closed her eyes briefly at the memory.

Spirits, guide me now. Help me find my kin.

Drawing a deep breath, she walked slowly along the roof of the passage. She whistled a few notes, quickly and without rhythm. Bird-like.

Beside her, Vanorin frowned. Holding his gaze, she whistled another phrase, and his brows rose. He understood; he had recognized “The Winter Star.”

She waited, listening, then walked onward. The passage turned and she followed it. She remembered her desperate search for a way outside from that passage; she had found none. It had rooms to either side, and at its very end, a room without windows.

She whistled again, a few notes at a time, pausing between like a bird waiting for its mate to answer. A few steps, another line of the song.

Murmured voices below made her freeze. The others all did likewise, standing motionless in the hot sun. Eliani held her breath, straining to listen to the muffled voice from below.

“Did you hear it? Do you know what sort of bird that is?”

Eliani inhaled sharply, and looked at Vanorin. Luruthin? She mouthed the name silently, questioning, and the captain shrugged.

She whistled a few more notes. More murmuring came from below, then a hesitant whistled answer—the next phrase of the song.

Her stomach clenched. She had found him.

Darkwood Hall

 

L
uruthin leaned against the door of the room where Othanin was being held. The alben guards frowned, but apparently the red cord he wore bought him a measure of tolerance. He spoke urgently to the door.

“Did you hear it? Othanin?”

“Get back from there.”

The alben male put a hand on his sword hilt and took a menacing step toward Luruthin. Though he could not help flinching, he did not move away from the door.

“We are just talking. That has not been forbidden.”

“Do as he says, or you will find your privilege curtailed.”

Luruthin flashed a resentful glance at the guard who had followed him. No doubt the alben meant to earn reward by reporting to his leader everything Luruthin did.

His pulse sped as he thought of her; he forced the memory away. Someone was here—someone from the south—and he had to make Othanin understand.

A creaking of wood sounded nearby. Luruthin reacted, but managed to keep from looking up. A tingle went through him; hope, dread....

The sound came again, from a little way down the hall. Another creak, small and swift, as of a peg being drawn.

“What was that?” One of the guards.

“Othanin, did you hear that bird?”

Luruthin raised his voice as much as he dared, as if to make himself heard through the door. One of the guards buffeted his shoulder, thrusting him back.

“Get away!”

He glanced upward and thought he saw movement; a tiny breeze stirring the gray cloth that had been hung to block light from the overhead windows. He caught his breath, then a horrendous groan of breaking wood began.

The shouts of the alben guards turned to cries of anguish as five of the overhead windows were staved in and sunlight poured into the passage. Luruthin squinted, looking up into the sudden brightness.

Figures appeared in the open windows, light glowing all around them, burning white in their pale hair. Luruthin gasped in spite of himself.

Not alben. Not outside at midday.

Someone grabbed him roughly. He wrenched away, out of the guard's grasp and into the sunlight. Two ælven dropped down to land beside him, one to either side.

One drew a knife and ran down the passage in pursuit of one of the alben. A second alben lay writhing in the sunlight; the other ælven dispatched him with a quick knife-thrust, then turned to Luruthin.

“Othanin—where is he?”

It was Taharan, one of his own clan. Grateful tears sprang to Luruthin's eyes. He pointed toward the door at the end of the corridor.

The last alben—the one that had been following him—stood against the door, cowering in the small shade remaining at the end of the corridor, menacing with his drawn sword. Taharan glanced upward.

“Sword!”

A blade was lowered hilt first into the guardian's waiting hands. He advanced toward the alben.

“Luruthin!”

Eliani's voice! Gasping, he looked up, but the sun was behind her and he could not see her face.

“Eliani! What are you doing here?”