The Storm Witch (41 page)

Not the lower levels, no.

“The Upper City.” Had Xerwin had time to assign patrols there as he’d intended? She thought she’d whispered, but she found all other voices stopped, and the commander turning to look at her.

“You are right,” she said. “This is a distraction, but the attack will be made from above, in the Upper City.”

“Nonsense.” In the excitement, the commander seemed to have forgotten who he was speaking to. “The Nomads have never attacked from overland before. They cannot maneuver on land.”

Dhulyn knew very well that just because something had never been done before, did not mean it was impossible. But she also knew when she would be listened to, and when she would be wasting her breath. The commander had already turned away from her. This was clearly an example of the latter.

“Commander.” She waited until she had his attention. “You will not mind if I inspect the Upper City.”

“Of course not, Paledyn.” Relief at being rid of her was evident on his face, and had served to remind the man of his manners.

Catching Remm Shalyn’s eye, Dhulyn trotted down the passage that would take them to the Upper City. The Nomads had never attacked overland before. Nothing more likely, she thought, seeing what a siege engine they had in the Crayx and their water jets. But an overland sortie—was that something she or Parno had ever discussed with the Nomads? Because it would be typical Mercenary planning, exactly what she would have done herself, if she had known what tactics the Mortaxa expected, and that the Crayx had this ability. She stopped dead in her tracks.

“Dhulyn Wolfshead? Are you ill?”

All those evenings of talk, of singing, of telling tales, was it possible that an overland attack could have been discussed? Or that the Nomads could have worked it out from some tale one of them had told?

It must be. Because there wasn’t any other explanation. There couldn’t be. Could there?

She took off running.

*Appears was only the one patrol*

*Typical amateurs* *Any Mercenary Brother would have known to have at least two patrols*

*Lionsmane*

Parno automatically looked in the direction Conford wanted him to look. There were another pair of lights. A second patrol.

As if his thoughts had just conjured them out of the air. What kind of trick was this?

*Do the landsters have any other Mages* he asked. *Anyone other than the Storm Witch*

*Not that we know* Everyone agreed on that. *There are Marked* pointed out a single individual Parno couldn’t identify.

*But the Marked can’t conjure lights out of air* Parno said.
Or read my thoughts.

*Lionsmane* Tension and query were equally obvious in the flavor of the thought. Parno made a quick decision.

*Won’t cross our path if keep to their present heading* he said. *Let them go* *Conford, proceed to the public entrance*

*Agreement*

Parno waited until Conford’s group had melted away into the darkness—almost silently—before leading the twins and Trudi Primoh after him, swinging around westward to approach the wall of the palace precinct obliquely.

Briefly, Parno wondered whether they should have stalked the second patrol, taking one of them prisoner to ask where the Storm Witch could be found. But that was too risky. Better to get inside the palace and frighten it out of a servant or slave.

 

Once away from the Grand Square, Dhulyn let Remm lead her through the palace corridors to the staircase that would take them up into the royal precinct in the Upper City. Once outside, they could head for the nearest wall. As they neared the stairs, Dhulyn had Remm douse his torch, and handed him the crossbow.

“It will be considerably darker in the Upper City than it was even at the cliff face,” she said. “There, the sea itself helped to reflect what little light there is. Carrying lights will make us a target, and dull our own night vision.” She’d prefer in any case to trust her own
Shora
-aided eyesight.

The top of the staircase opened onto a square landing with an arched doorway to one side. This doorway, in turn, opened into the portico that sheltered the entrance proper, a small roofed pavilion made entirely of green marble. Dhulyn had noticed on her visit with Xerwin that it was perhaps three paces wide by five paces long, and raised three steps above the ground outside. When they reached the outer doorway, Dhulyn could just make out the long, tree-lined avenue that fronted the pavilion. The lighter blotches, evenly spaced, she knew to be the stone or marble benches which were laid out beneath the trees. Remm was about to step out into the avenue, already pointing to the direction of the nearest wall, when Dhulyn stopped him, taking him by the arm. There. Off to the right. A movement, like a shadow changing shape. A scuff, like the edge of a boot against stone. The sound of someone coming over the wall.

Dhulyn pulled Remm closer to her, using the nightwatch whisper. “Call for the patrol,” she said. “They won’t come for a female voice.”

“Armsmen!” he obligingly roared out in a voice that startled even Dhulyn; it seemed impossible that so big a sound should come out of so small and compact a man. “To the palace wall! To the Tarxin!”

There was no immediate response, but Dhulyn thought she heard a soft sound over to the right. The patrol would not bother to be so quiet, were they being outflanked? Well, she knew better than to be drawn away from her defensible position. She took a quick look to the right, and the left. Not as much room as she’d like. She drew Remm with her back to the inner doorway. “Stay here,” she said. “Kill anyone who gets past me.” She refrained from saying she expected no one to pass her.

 

*Sounded like just one man* *Stay out here, engage the patrol if they come, and secure my exit* *Be as quick as I can* Parno ran down the stone path, wishing his boots were not quite so loud. If he’d had more time, he could have gone completely silently, but with the alarm already given, someone had to get inside quickly, and that someone was him. This avenue of trees, with its stone benches, led toward an enclosed pavilion, the only completely enclosed structure he could see, and unless he was badly mistaken, the direction from which the voice came. This was likely the entrance to the palace below. He smiled to himself when he saw a darker, vertical patch that meant a doorway.

 

There, a man was approaching on the shadowed side of the avenue. Dhulyn considered her strategy again, and backed up. With only one opponent, better if she let him into the relatively confined space of the entryway. There, the darkness would be to her advantage, and she would be able to prevent him from escaping. She took a deep breath. A modified version of the Hunter’s
Shora
would help her senses stay alert. She smiled her wolf’s smile. She and Parno had once needed to practice
Shora
while blindfolded. This would be child’s play compared to that.

 

There was someone in the pavilion. Parno wasn’t sure how he knew it; there had been neither sound to be heard nor movement to be seen, but someone was definitely in the structure. He slowed, drawing his left-hand sword, but continued to advance, both blades at the ready. Better to deal with this person now, quickly, while there was only one of him. The darkness would be helpful.

Her senses enhanced by the
Shora,
the first thing Dhulyn noticed as her opponent passed the doorway into the darkness of the marble-cool entry was that his heartbeat was exactly in sync with her own. A shiver passed up her spine. And there was an odor, an odd, almost spicy scent that she had smelled somewhere before.

 

His opponent was nothing more than a darker shadow among all the others. But he knew that shadow, Parno thought, as the skin crawled on his back. Knew that shape, that angle of shoulder. That scent, subtly changed and yet familiar. His breath caught as a light seem to blaze in his mind. “No,” he told it, not daring to hope. This must be Mage’s work, meant to distract and detain him. There must be a Mage among the Mortaxa after all. He took a firmer grip on his swords and stepped forward.

 

At that single spoken syllable, Dhulyn froze. Shape, smell, and now sound. It was impossible. It could not be. It was a trick. Could she be having a Vision unaware?

“Are you a ghost?” The nightwatch voice seemed impossibly loud in this confined space.

“Come and try me, Mage’s phantom.”

The voice. Dhulyn began to tremble.

“I am no phantom.” Dhulyn’s heart pounded, hard and fast, as she lowered her sword. “I am Dhulyn Wolfshead, called the Scholar, and Schooled by Dorian of the River, the Black Traveler. I have fought at Sadron, and Arcosa, where I met my Partner, Parno Lionsmane. Together we fought at Bhexyllia, for the Great King in the West, and later at Limona, against the Tegriani.”

“Tell me something no one else could know.”

Dhulyn thought, ideas chasing each other hotly through her mind. There seemed so many things, and yet . . .

“I bear a Mark,” she said at last. “I am a Seer. Others know it, but no one this side of the Long Ocean.”

Suddenly she was crushed in two strong arms, arms she knew well, and she found that she could not breathe, not because of the pressure of those arms, but because her heart was too full, her throat too thick. She was crying. She could not remember ever crying like that before.

“Dhulyn. Dhulyn, my heart. It can’t be. You’re alive.”

“Enemy behind,” she croaked out.

Parno released her and whirled, swords raised. “Where?”

“Well, there could have been,” she said, taking what felt like the first deep breath she’d had in weeks.

 

“But how—the Crayx could not find you anywhere.”

“But they clearly found you.” Dhulyn’s raw silk voice sounded rougher, as if she were trying not to cry. She kept touching him, his face, his hands, running her callused fingers along the edges of his beard and lips as if to assure herself that it was really him. “Do we have time for this? I take it those are your people out there.”

“Come to kill the Storm Witch.” Parno blinked. He hadn’t noticed before how much he’d fallen into the Nomads’ form of speech.

“My thinking precisely, but there are complications.”

Parno took hold of her wrists. “Don’t care. I—I’m not even sure I care whether the Witch lives or dies, not now.”

Dhulyn butted him in the shoulder with her head, just like a cat. “I think the matter can be resolved to our satisfaction, but we need time. Can you call off the attack?”

Her words warmed him. It was gratifying that she assumed he was in charge. Though in a way, he supposed he was.

*Fall back* he said to the Nomads. *Fall back, everyone* *My Partner lives* *Dhulyn Wolfshead lives* *She can take me to the Storm Witch with safety for all*

#Rejoicing# came the deeper notes of the Crayx

*Are you certain*

*Certain* *Fall back now, before there is further loss of life on either side*

*Confusion* *Disagreement*

#Parno Lionsmane, our people need further assurance you are well and secure#

And not insane,
he thought. *Look in my thoughts* he told the Crayx. *Can you tell that I am not under any magic, that I have found my Partner, alive and well*

#We see this, and will show the others# #We will fall back, as you suggest, and await your instructions# #We remind everyone, this has all along been Lionsmane’s plan# #We are at his orders#

*Reluctance* *Concern* *Agreement*

#We will stay linked, Lionsmane# #Call upon us as needed#

“You were talking to them, weren’t you?”

He swept her up in his arms and swung her around as if they were dancing. “I tell you, it’s the greatest way to coordinate a two-pronged attack that’s ever been heard of.” When he put her down, Dhulyn’s smile had faded, and her left eyebrow was raised. Parno grinned all the harder. What an Outlander she was, after all, to be embarrassed by his show of emotion.