The Master of Heathcrest Hall (74 page)

“But will you be staying here?” she had asked him as he met with her in a candlelit parlor. A portrait of his father on the wall gazed down at them with what Rafferdy thought was a wistful expression.

“No, I cannot,” he said. “There are things that I must do. And if you hear the voices of men speaking in the night, do not have a fear, Mother. They will be acquaintances of mine.”

She gave him a small, fond smile. “Having lived with your father, I have gotten quite used to nocturnal comings and goings. Be assured, you will not disturb me. Do whatever you must.”

He kissed her cheek, then left her in the parlor with the portrait, and he had not seen her since.

It was several hours into the long umbral when the others began to arrive. Canderhow was first, which somewhat surprised Rafferdy, for he had not thought the plumpest among them would be the swiftest. Trefnell was next, then four of the others. But two of the Fellowship never came, nor would they; for a message from Wolsted appeared in their black books, stating he and Coulten had been unable to get through the gates in time.

It is all my fault
, Wolsted wrote.
My gout has made me unbearably slow, and Coulten foolishly thought to come to my aid, and so was trapped with me in the city. Do not fear for us, though. We shall keep hidden, and keep watch. And we will send you what reports we can
.

This had caused Rafferdy a pang. He had entertained some thought that Coulten would be game to come with him to join the revolution. Yet perhaps it would prove useful to have some members of their order still in the city—provided they could remain hidden from Valhaine’s witch-hunters and magician-seekers.

Those seven members of the Fellowship of the Silver Circle who had reached Asterlane met in the library as the night wore on, drinking brandy and formulating plans—though these were vague at best. They had prevented Assembly from passing laws to abolish
the Wyrdwood, but there was nothing more they could do upon that matter now.

“Nor do I think we need to,” Canderhow said. “While the magicians of the Golden Door may wish to burn down the Old Trees, Valhaine is far too distracted with the matter of Morden to act against the Wyrdwood now.”

He spoke, as usual, with a barrister’s logic. All the same, Rafferdy was not convinced.

“That may be so,” Rafferdy had replied, “but I cannot think they did not expect this. The High Order of the Golden Door must have some other scheme in mind to address matters. Gambrel is their real magus. He’s been the one directing Davarry all this while. And from what I have learned, Gambrel is a clever and persistent man.”

Trefnell’s eyebrows had bristled in a fierce glower. “I suppose you are right. Destroying the Wyrdwood was an aim of theirs, yes, but not the final aim. There is one thing only which they seek.”

And none of them needed to speak it, for the way the darkness seemed to press in hungrily through the windows was enough. At a recent meeting of the order, Rafferdy had described his and Lady Quent’s supposition that the Ashen were preparing for the Grand Conjunction. As it happened, Trefnell’s research had been leading him toward the same conclusion. Cerephus would be at its closest proximity when the conjunction occurred, and arcane energies would be at their maximum potential. The Ashen had not yet been able to enter into the world in force, so clearly they were waiting for some event that would give them this opportunity. What else could it be other than this?

The idea filled Rafferdy with great dread when he considered it. If the Ashen indeed entered the world, how could they be fought? Yet it was not the Ashen that were currently waging war against Altania; it was Valhaine’s army. And that was something he
could
fight.

Weary from their flight to Asterlane, the other magicians retired, but Rafferdy remained awake. There was one more thing he had to do. He spent several hours going through his father’s things.
Then, just as a crimson glow kindled in the eastern sky outside the windows, Rafferdy found what he was looking for. By means of a spell, he discovered and unlocked a hidden drawer in a table in his father’s study.

Inside was a small box, fashioned of a single piece of onyx.

After that, Rafferdy slept for a few scant hours. Then he rose and, after some quick words with Trefnell, departed Asterlane. The swaybacked nag he had bought from the farmer had been given to the stable master, with instructions that it was to be cared for most kindly. In its place, Rafferdy rode a powerful gray gelding. And while his ultimate destination lay to the west, there was one last thing he had to accomplish before going there. So it was he turned toward the sun, and rode into the morning.

Some hours later, just as a purple twilight crept over the land, Rafferdy reached Farland Park. He rode up to the front of the grand house which stood at the end of a poplar-lined road, and was off his horse before the beast had fully come to a stop. Not stopping himself, he tossed the reins to a groomsman, dashed up the steps, and into the house.

This abrupt and noisy entrance alarmed the residents, and by the time Rafferdy entered the front hall he found Mr. Baydon fumbling with the flintlock on his pistol.

“Great Gods, Rafferdy, I nearly shot you!” Mr. Baydon sputtered, lowering the gun.

Rafferdy could not help a smile, noticing that Mr. Baydon had failed to properly cock the pistol. “I don’t think there was any danger of that,” he said, taking the gun and setting it on a table where it might cause no harm.

“But what are you doing here?”

“Something has happened in the city,” Lady Marsdel said, slowly rising from her chair. “Morden’s men are marching toward Invarel, I presume.”

As always, little escaped Lady Marsdel’s comprehension. Rafferdy bowed toward her. “You are correct, your ladyship. Lord Valhaine has shut the Old City. I only barely escaped its bounds before he did so.”

Mrs. Baydon rushed forward and embraced him. “It’s all so dreadful, I can hardly imagine it. But I’m grateful you were able to get out of the city. Have you come to stay with us, then?”

Rafferdy said nothing as he stepped away from Mrs. Baydon. From across the room, Lady Marsdel gave him a piercing look.

“No, Mrs. Baydon,” her ladyship said. “I believe Lord Rafferdy will soon be riding westward. In which case, I can only wonder why he’s come.”

Rafferdy’s hand went to his coat pocket, touching the hard, square object within. “I need to see Lord Baydon at once,” he said.

The others exchanged somber looks, and Rafferdy grew alarmed that he was already too late. But that was not the case, for Mr. Baydon said, “I can take you to my father. However, while you may see him, he won’t be able to see you. He is … well, you shall see.”

Minutes later, Mr. Baydon opened the door of a bedchamber. The room was bright and cheerful, for a maid was lighting candles all around against the night. She departed as Rafferdy entered.

“I’m sorry, Rafferdy, but I cannot—” Mr. Baydon’s voice halted as the words caught in his throat. “I will leave you with him,” he said when he regained the capacity for speech, then departed.

As Rafferdy approached the bed, he understood Mr. Baydon’s reluctance to enter. All that was visible of Lord Baydon was his head, for the rest of him was covered in blankets. Though for the way the covers laid almost flat on the bed, it seemed there was hardly anything at all beneath them. That part of him which was exposed bore little resemblance to the Lord Baydon Rafferdy knew. The gray mustache was familiar, but the rest was all yellowed, shriveled flesh stretched over sharp bones.

Rafferdy felt a pang in his chest, then forced himself to draw closer. Lord Baydon’s eyes were shut, but his faint, rattling breaths were audible.

“It’s too much, sir,” Rafferdy said, his own voice becoming choked now. “They asked too much of you.”

Except Earl Rylend and Lord Rafferdy hadn’t known what Lord
Marsdel intended to ask of Lord Baydon—or so Rafferdy’s father had written in the letter that had been locked in the drawer with the onyx box. Lord Rafferdy had explained:

Rafferdy could imagine what Lord Marsdel had said when he approached Lord Baydon. No doubt he had said this act would make Lord Baydon a member of their little band, the Lords of Am-Anaru. And so Lord Baydon had readily opened the box, wanting to feel like an adventurer himself.

“It is enough,” Rafferdy said, bending over the prone figure on the bed. “You have done more than your share. More than you ever should have.”

He took the onyx box from his coat pocket. It was hard in his hand and strangely cold. He placed the box on the covers, just below Lord Baydon’s chin, and opened the lid. He spoke the runes of magick that were inscribed on the box’s side. Then he watched,
both horrified and entranced, as several tendrils passed from Lord Baydon’s thin lips like an exhalation of black smoke and coiled into the box.

I
T HAD BEEN CLOSE to a month since that day, and during that time it seemed to Rafferdy he had spent more than half of his life in the saddle. With an exhalation of great discomfort, he dismounted the big gray gelding, stumbling a bit as his boots struck the ground.

“I’ll take your horse, sir,” said a soldier in a brown coat.

He was so young in appearance that he made Rafferdy, at twenty-seven, feel positively decrepit. But then, given all his present aches and pains, he
was
rather decrepit at the moment.

“Thank you, Private,” Rafferdy said.

He detached his small pack of things from behind the saddle, then watched as the young soldier led the gelding away. Small clouds of ash, the color of dried blood in the moonlight, were stirred up by its hooves. A chill went through Rafferdy. He wondered if that was how the Ashen had been named—if that was what Altania and all the world would be reduced to when the Grand Conjunction came and the door to Cerephus was broken open.

A barren plain of ashes.

He shivered again; the long umbral had grown cold, that was all. He went to the stone-walled farmhouse. The men had cleared out one end of the main room—the other being filled with debris fallen from the roof. They had lit a fire on the hearth and arranged a wooden bench near it. Rafferdy spread the blanket that served for his bed on the bench, then sat down. He might rather have lain down, but he could not rest yet, for Beckwith would be coming back to him soon with a report on the state of the encampment.

Rafferdy let out a grim laugh at this thought. He had never in his life wanted any sort of power or responsibility. Indeed, he had
fled from it at every turn. Now here he was—a military captain in command of forty other lives, able to order them to march no matter how hungry or exhausted they were, or to throw themselves into a battle no matter how overwhelming the odds. It was utterly absurd.

Yet somehow, that was how things had transpired. After taking his leave of Lady Marsdel and Mr. and Mrs. Baydon—hardly an hour after his arrival at Farland Park—he had ridden west, giving Invarel a wide berth as he made for the front lines of the war.

That had been a harrowing experience. He had ridden through a countryside plagued by Valhaine’s forces. More than once he had pulled hard on the reins, plunging his horse through the hedges narrowly in time to avoid being spotted by a patrol of blue-coated soldiers. At last he had come to the valley of the River Telfayn. It seemed far too bucolic a landscape for something so awful as war, but as he neared the region around Baringsbridge he saw evidence of recent fighting.

He waited for night, then under cover of darkness made a mad gallop to the river. There was some skirmish going on to the north, for he could see the flashes and hear the rumbling of cannon fire. It was his hope that the attention of the royal army would be turned in that direction, and in general that was the case. All the same, the flanks of the army had not been forgotten entirely, and as Rafferdy was traversing a marshy field he saw lights bobbing toward him. They were lanterns, carried by an entire company of redcrests.

There had been nowhere for Rafferdy to flee. Hastily, he had leaped down from his horse and fashioned a circle in the damp ground with his boot heel. He arranged some sticks into the shape of several runes, then hastily spoke words of magick, calling down a circle of darkness.

All went pitch-black. The stars and moon were hidden from him. There had been no time to call a circle of silence as well, but the company of enemy soldiers made a great noise themselves as they marched by. Rafferdy could feel the ground tremble, and he
had been in dread that they would march right into him and thus discover him.

But they did not. At last the sound of marching feet receded into the distance. Rafferdy dispelled the circle, then mounted his gelding and rode hard for the river.

He knew he had at last made it past the front lines when he encountered a band of grim-faced young men in brown coats. Hurriedly, he called out the words Garritt’s compatriots had taught him in a ragged voice. Had he been any slower about it, he would have had several rifle bullets in his chest before he finished. As it was, though the rifles were lowered, he was regarded with great suspicion, and was led none too gently to a tent to meet with the colonel in charge of the regiment.