The Sword of the South - eARC (27 page)

“The slope’s steep as the price of grain in Vonderland, but the footing’s firm!” Bahzell said loudly. “It’s after being faced with stone, but grown with grass. Just take it slow and steady! Glamhandro will tell you when he’s ready to swim, and the gray will be after following him!”

Kenhodan nodded and watched Wencit and Bahzell slip over the edge. The courser showed no hesitation as he stepped almost gaily over the side and picked his mincing way down the slope more gracefully than the sliding, slipping hradani and wizard, but the pack horse was unhappy. He planted his feet and refused to budge until the courser turned his head with an admonishing whinny, as if chiding a fainthearted companion. The pack horse’s ears shifted. Then he tossed his head in unmistakable assent and followed.

The courser trumpeted approval and sprang into the water, the pack horse following with a rush. Bahzell released his grip on the courser’s saddle horn and launched out with a powerful breaststroke, and the courser and pack horse followed in his wake. Kenhodan watched anxiously for a moment, then sighed with relief as all of them rode the rippled flood easily.

Than it was his turn. He hesitated a moment, feeling absurdly like the pack horse. He was willing, but he couldn’t avoid a qualm. Then Glamhandro nosed him so impatiently he almost stumbled, and Kenhodan looked back in astonishment and burst into laughter as the stallion snorted and tossed his head impatiently. Urged on by his horse! Thank Tomanāk Bahzell was too busy swimming to have witnessed Glamhandro’s prodding.

“All right, then! Let’s go!” he said, and stepped off the road.

The footing was better than he’d feared. Over the years, a thick skin of sod had covered the ancient stonework, and the thick roots offered purchase in the slippery mud if he took it slowly. The gray pack horse was hesitant—it refused to budge until Glamhandro nipped it sharply—but it kept its feet as both horses finally eased into the river behind him.

The water was bitterly cold, and Kenhodan’s teeth chattered the moment his toes touched it. Snowborn! He shuddered. The river deserved its name! He struck out, side stroking along the stream side of the horses, pacing them to prevent them from straying out into the current.

Glamhandro needed no encouragement. His neck cut the water like a ship’s prow, and the pack horse kept up with him, though it clearly had less liking for the challenge than he. The gelding rolled its eyes and swam with a painful, lunging motion, but the stallion’s eyes were bright as he fought the river. Personally, even though he had to admit Bahzell had been right about the current, Kenhodan could hardly fault the pack horse for its unhappiness.

By the time they reached the oak, only Glamhandro and the courser seemed in the least cheerful. Kenhodan himself was much the worse for wear, shivering uncontrollably, but Glamhandro appeared to have thrived on the trip. He and the courser touched noses cheerfully, apparently amused by everyone else’s misery, but even Bahzell was less ebullient than usual, breathing hard as he leaned against the courser’s side.

“Next time let’s face the assassins,” Kenhodan panted. “At least we’ll die dry!”

He wiped his face and coughed. Half the Snowborn seemed to have found its way down his throat, but Bahzell found the breath for a fair imitation of his normal laugh as he wrung river water from his warrior’s braid.

“At least we’ve thrown them off,” Kenhodan went on, looking back over the flood with a sort of miserable complacency.

“Not if they know we came this way.”

Kenhodan turned at the sound of Wencit’s voice, only to find the wizard once more booted. As Kenhodan looked at him, the wizard settled back into his poncho, as well, and began making sharp prodding gestures.

“Come, come! Let’s not stand around admiring our own cleverness! They can’t be many hours behind.”

“So? How’ll they follow us past
that?
” Kenhodan waved at the river.

“The same way we did,” Wencit said. “Or dry shod, if they want to leave the high road two miles back.”

“
What?!
” Kenhodan straightened in outrage. “You mean we could’ve avoided swimming that—that—!”

Words failed him.

“Aye.” Bahzell had already squirmed back into his hauberk and buckled his breastplate. Now he nodded as he pulled his boots on. “That we could have, but the trail’s after twisting like a broken-backed snake betwixt here and there. It’s nigh on three times farther, and we’d’ve moved slower, too. We’re after leaving them further behind by this, and it’s possible they may miss us entirely, though I’d not bet on it.”

“Well you might’ve told me!” Kenhodan retorted.

“No, lad, this time I couldn’t be doing that,” Bahzell disagreed solemnly as he watched Kenhodan stamp into his own boots and buckle his sword belt.

“And why not?” the red-haired man demanded.

“Because you’re after being too smart and stubborn.” Bahzell grinned. “You’d never have agreed to swim if you’d known as how you had a choice!”

He and Wencit were still roaring with laughter as they squelched off down the sodden trail.

* * *

Chernion reached the Bridge of Eloham at midday and drew up to regard the flood sourly. The water’s fruitless assault on the bridge seemed to mirror the assassins’ efforts to catch their prey, mocking them.

“Let’s move on,” their leader sighed finally, shifting in the saddle. The strain of so many mounted hours was beginning to tell even on Chernion.

They clattered onto the bridge, the horses wincing at the vibration in the stone. Storm wrack and flotsam left by the Snowborn’s wrath covered the road in places, proving the torrent was less than it had been. The pavement was clouded with drifts of fine sand and pools of water, and the misting rain was so fine it scarcely dimpled the puddles.

Chernion neared the center of the bridge and suddenly stopped. One hand rose sharply in command, and the others halted instantly. Some seemed puzzled, but all had worked with Chernion before and waited patiently for the reason to unfold.

“What is it?” Rosper finally asked softly.

“We’ve lost them,” Chernion replied calmly.

“Lost them? How? We found their last rest stop not a quarter-mile back! How can we lose them in the middle of a Sharnā-damned
bridge?
”

“Because they never crossed it, Rosper.”

“How do you know?”

“Look for yourself, Brother. This entire span’s covered with sand. Where are their hoof marks?”

“Wh—” Rosper leaned from the saddle and looked carefully. Smooth sand smiled blandly back at him. “Could rain have washed them away?”

“It’s not heavy enough,” Chernion replied.

“Agreed.” Rosper nodded curtly. “But where have they gone, then? There’s no other road for them, Chernion.”

“No?” Chernion eyed him thoughtfully. “I’ve said from the start that the Bloody Hand has some plan, and it seems I was correct. Consider: we’ve become so certain they’re on the road before us that we almost failed to notice they’d left it. No, Rosper. There
is
another way.”

“Very well, I agree. But where is it?”

“Let’s see.”

Chernion wheeled and rode back along the bridge, and dark-cloaked assassins crowded aside and then fell in behind. Chernion rejected the north side of the road—leaving in that direction would only have mired their targets in the mud of the White Water and pinned them between the two rivers. Bahzell would never be that generous, so he must have gone south along some unknown path the Guildmaster didn’t really care to follow.

They were well off the bridge when Chernion’s dark eyes spied the marks of stockinged feet and hooves on the downslope of the causeway. They were faint, but they were there, and they went straight into the river.

The assassin sighted thoughtfully along their course, and dark eyes lit on a huge oak that loomed like a giant among halflings. The bushy brows quirked. Sloppy of the Bloody Hand, the Guildmaster mused.

“There. They swam to that tree for some reason. Send one of your men to confirm it.”

“And if the Bloody Hand’s waiting with a bow?” Rosper asked.

“No fear of that,” Chernion said dryly. “The range is barely a hundred yards. If the Bloody Hand were there with a bow, we’d have bodies to prove it by now.”

“He might wait until we’re strung out crossing over.”

“No. He knows I’ll send a scout, and that without a satisfactory report, I won’t follow. He’s gone on.”

“But why? Why leave the road here, this way, instead of a dozen miles back?”

“Because he knows a trail,” Chernion said patiently, “and he doesn’t care if we follow him, or he would’ve hidden these marks. I don’t know where it leads, but there’s no other crossing to the east bank of the Snowborn short of South Bridge. He’s gone west into the Forest of Hev.”

“So they’re still bound for Sindor after all!”

“Of course. It was only a question of their route all along.” Rosper flushed as Chernion forbore to recall their earlier discussion. “As I feared, he knows the land better than we do. I only regret letting him lead me so far from the straight way to Sindor, or I might have met him outside its gates.”

“But we’re here now,” Rosper said diffidently. “What should we do?”

Chernion glanced at the Craftmaster from the corner of one dark eye. Rosper was chastened, but was he chastened enough? On the other hand, Chernion had no wish to lead dog brothers personally after Bahzell—not in the woods, and not when he obviously knew precisely where he was going.

“Send to that tree to see if there is indeed a trail,” Chernion said finally, and a volunteer plunged into the water, carrying one end of a coiled rope. If there was a trail, the rope would aid those who followed—and Chernion knew someone had to follow. There was no alternative.

The swimmer crawled ashore by the tree and clung to the bank, gasping. After a moment he vanished into the dense undergrowth, only to emerge ten minutes later and wave his arms vigorously in the semaphore of the dog brothers.

“So.” Chernion plucked a thoughtful lower lip. “They’ve taken a path we don’t know, headed we don’t know where, to take we know not how long to reach Sindor. I’m afraid we have to split our forces, Rosper.

“You’ll take seven brothers and follow them, marking if they turn aside. The four others and I will go to Losun, then south to Sindor. We can buy horses at each step, so we can leave you all of our extra mounts and still make good time. Meanwhile, you’ll strike if the opportunity offers. But remember, Rosper: your main duty is to
follow
. Attack only if you can find a way to use your skills and deny them theirs.

“If we don’t meet on the road, send word to the Windhawk in Sindor, but stay on their heels wherever they go. Don’t let them vanish again. The Bloody Hand’s cunning, and if he breaks clear, we may never find him again.”

“Yes, Chernion!” Rosper slapped his chest in salute and grinned. “You won’t wait long for us in Sindor. We’ll bury them in the Forest of Hev.”

“Be wary, Brother,” Chernion responded coolly, saluting in reply.

“There are only three of them!”

“And only eight of you,” Chernion replied. “Be wary, I said. The Bloody Hand is a champion of Tomanāk, and this isn’t the first time, or even the second, the Guild’s hunted him. We failed to take him before, and each attempt cost the Guild dearly. Never doubt that all he asks is to meet any three dog brothers sword-to-sword! You’ve served the Guild well, Rosper. It would grieve me if I had to spend precious time selecting a new southern master, so heed me!”

“Very well.” Rosper nodded. “I’ll be wary and cautious alike.”

“Clean killing, then, Rosper.”

“Clean killing, Chernion.”

They exchanged salutes once more and went their different ways. Chernion and four others pelted across the bridge, using their mounts mercilessly, while Rosper and his seven took up the sloppy, slippery, slithering pursuit among the trees of the Forest of Hev.

CHAPTER TEN

Unanswered Questions

“Is she awake?” Lentos asked, looking up from the paperwork on his desk as Trayn entered his austere office.

“No, but I think she will be soon. She’s tougher than I expected.”

“The young are always tough, Trayn—and don’t forget her parentage. I’m less surprised she’s recovering quickly than that she survived at all.”

“Agreed. Agreed.” Trayn flopped into a chair and sighed in exhaustion, rubbing his eyes with both hands. “What in Semkirk’s name happened, Lentos?”

“I’d rather hoped you might tell me. You were closer to it than I was.”

“Closer!” Trayn lowered his hands and looked across the desk at his superior. “I was bouncing off her shields, and you know it. No, Revered Chancellor. You were better placed to observe things than I was.”

“Maybe so, but I don’t have any idea what it was, either. One moment we were losing her; the next, something ripped her shields apart—without killing her—and knocked us on our highly trained arses. Got any guesses?”

“You don’t suppose it was…?” Trayn trailed off delicately.

“I don’t know.” Lentos toyed with his quill. “I wondered, of course, but it seems too pat, too neat. I was sure it was Wencit for a moment, but be reasonable. Even he can’t do the impossible, and sorcery and the mage power can’t be
mixed
that way. The gods know he’s strong enough to
break
her barriers…but to not only avoid killing her himself but actually bring her out again after?”

Lentos shook his head.

“That’s the problem, isn’t it?” Trayn said slowly. “
Something
happened—something that
couldn’t
happen—and given her relationship with Wencit, I don’t think we can rule him out. But if he did it, something scares me more than the fact that he could.”

“I know,” Lentos said softly. “If he did it, then he’s lied to us, at least by implication, for thirteen hundred years.”

* * *

Kenhodan dismounted with a groan and swayed, massaging his posterior with both hands as abused muscles made their unhappiness known. Even Glamhandro seemed glad to stop, and both pack horses trailed with hanging heads. Only the courser seemed anything remotely like fresh, and Wencit’s shoulders sagged as he sat in the saddle. For once, even Bahzell’s exuberance was quenched, and the hradani spread his arms in an enormous muscle-popping stretch.

Damp trees surrounded them. The foliage was too thick for the rain to penetrate, but a wet mist dripped from the saturated upper branches. The trail snaked endlessly onward between dense trunks, narrow, slick, and muddy, but some winter storm had felled a forest giant to make the clearing where they’d finally halted at last.

“Well.” Bahzell lowered his arms, put his hands on his hips, and rotated his upper body while Wencit climbed wearily down from his saddle. The courser lipped the wizard’s silver hair affectionately, and Glamhandro sighed and blew in relief as Kenhodan removed his bridle and hung it on a branch.

“Well what?” Kenhodan asked after a moment of silence.

“Well,” Bahzell sighed, standing on one foot and raising the other to peer down at the sole of his boot, “it’s surprised I am I’ve not worn a hole clean through to the uppers! I’m ready to be stopping over for a while.”

“That makes seven of us.” Wencit flipped his poncho beneath him and eased down on the fallen tree’s dripping coat of moss with a groan of profound relief.

“Seven?” Bahzell repeated.

“Three two-footed travelers and four with four feet.”

“I’d say those with four have worked harder,” Kenhodan observed, stripping off Glamhandro’s saddle and blanket. The stallion shook himself, then rolled in the clearing’s moss, and fallen leaves and Kenhodan smiled as his legs waved ecstatically.

“True, but they’d had their vengeance.” Wencit winced and eased his legs. “Old bones aren’t all I have, and everything’s gotten a lot older since Korun, somehow.”

“Can we really afford to stop, Bahzell?” Kenhodan asked.

“It’s a matter of must, lad. The pack horses are after needing the rest.”

“All honor to them, but let’s have a little sympathy for this party’s senior rider, as well!” Wencit protested.

“It’s after needing more than a little ride to be killing the likes of you!” Bahzell stripped the saddle from the nearest pack horse, set it aside, and began rubbing down the exhausted gelding. Wencit watched him for a moment, then dragged himself up, limped over to the courser, and began loosening his saddle girth.

“I know you great warriors would never want to weaken my character by showing me pity or suggesting in any way that I’m not as hardy and capable as either of you. Still, I hope you’ll be able to see your way to assisting me in caring for this noble creature.”

The courser snorted in obvious amusement and swatted the wizard gently with the side of his head.

“I’m not so sure of all that.” Bahzell winked at Kenhodan. “I’m thinking as each rider should be caring for his own mount, even if some of ’em are after being a mite bigger than the others.”

“Let me rephrase that,” Wencit said pleasantly. “I
know
you’ll help me look after him properly—and help with both pack horses—just as I know you won’t find your breeches full of Saramanthan fire ants.”

“Well, now! Put like that, it’s after seeming reasonable enough!” Bahzell said hastily.

“Why you to start on that, I’ll find some dry firewood,” Kenhodan offered with equal haste.

“The light’s going fast,” Wencit said, “so you’d best hurry.”

“I imagine you won’t have time to do more than groom the horses and throw up a lean-to before I get back,” Kenhodan said, and slid into the concealing forest with a grin as the wizard shook a fist at him.

He carried a strung bow, not that he really hoped to chance across anything for the pot in such dim light. Nor did he, but he did find a dead stump, sodden and punky on the outside but dry and hard at its core, and he chopped away the outer husk and cut a plentiful supply of chips and slivers of dry heartwood to nurse wetter fuel alight. He bundled the tender in the skirt of his poncho and moved noiselessly back towards the camp, pausing beside the fallen giant whose death had made their clearing to watch thoughtfully.

Wencit and Bahzell had finished with the courser and the pack horses and started on the lean-to, and he grinned. It wouldn’t take them long to finish it, and there was no point distracting them from their work. He found a spot under the fallen trunk and stretched out on the relatively dry moss with his poncho load of tender for a pillow, whetting Gwynna’s dagger slowly and glancing out occasionally to see how they were coming along.

Bahzell dumped another load of boughs and helped Wencit spread them over the frame, weaving them together into a crude roof that wasn’t completely watertight but was close enough to it to keep off the worst of the wet. The hradani glanced up and started to speak as Wencit’s hands paused, then stopped as he recognized Wencit’s distant expression. No one had truly seen Wencit of Rūm’s eyes since long before the fall of Kontovar, but he appeared to be gazing off into depths only he could see. Then he began to smile.

“Wencit?”

“A moment, Bahzell.” Wencit chuckled and his fingers curled strangely. They seemed to twirl briefly, and his eyes pulsed once. “There,” he said with satisfaction. “Let’s finish this up; Kenhodan will be back soon.”

“And will he now? I’m thinking he’s found a comfortable spot to watch us work from, and it’s little I blame him.”

“That’s because you are a charitable soul, Bahzell, while I… Well, let’s just say I’m a little less generous than you.”

Wencit’s hands paused again and the wizard glanced over his shoulder at the precise moment Bahzell heard a yelp of outrage.

The hradani straightened with a jerk, turning toward the sound and reaching for his hook knife, only to pause in amazement as Kenhodan levitated over the fallen tree and dashed into the camp. Bahzell had never seen him move so quickly, nor had he ever heard sounds quite like those Kenhodan emitted as he ran. The hradani’s eyes narrowed as the red-haired man yanked at his belt while he danced in place like a madman.

Bahzell glanced at Wencit as Kenhodan dropped his breeches to stamp on them with both booted feet. Wencit began to chuckle, and Bahzell grinned. Surely not. Even Wencit wouldn’t
really
—!?

Kenhodan stopped yelling and stood in his drawers, glaring accusingly as the wizard mastered his chuckles. Wencit looked back imperturbably as the red-haired man picked up a crushed insect and thrust it under his nose.

“And what, do you suppose, might
this
be?” Kenhodan snarled.

“Why,” Wencit said innocently, “it looks like a Saramanthan fire ant to me. Did you bring the firewood, Kenhodan?”

* * *

Kenhodan mopped the last savory stew from his bowl with a piece of bread. Bahzell was an astonishingly good cook, and Kenhodan felt almost human again as the stew warmed his belly. Of course, “almost human” wasn’t quite the same thing as “comfortable,” and he shifted and fingered the rudely stung portion of his anatomy. He wanted to be angry over it, but he couldn’t. He’d deserved it, and the experience had been a sort of initiation. He could no longer doubt he truly was part of the wizard’s inner circle, or Wencit would never have done it to him.

He stretched gratefully. Adventures weren’t all they were reputed to be, but his present relaxation was all the sweeter because of the strenuous exertion which had preceded it.

“That was delicious, Bahzell,” he said lazily, “but I’m a little uneasy about taking things so slow now.”

“Never fear, lad. I’m thinking they couldn’t’ve reached the bridge before midmorning, and they’ve no knowledge at all, at all, of the trail. They’ll not be making up much on us through the trees, even if they’re mad enough to press on all night.” He shook his head. “We’ll not see them before sometime tomorrow.”

“Then at least we can have a night’s rest,” Kenhodan said.

He glanced up past the corner of the lean-to and fell silent. Their clearing ripped a hole in the canopy of leaves, and he could see the sky. The misty rain had paused, and as he watched the clouds parted to free the moon. He stared at it, and an inarticulate longing woke within him. It didn’t clash with his languorous content; rather, it seemed a part of it, like a soft, sweet ache, and his hand reached for his harp case almost involuntarily.

“Lad,” Bahzell rumbled, “I’m not so very sure that’s after being wise. It’s certain I am in my own mind we’re well ahead of them, but—”

“Let him be, Bahzell,” Wencit said softly.

The hradani’s eyes narrowed, but Kenhodan never noticed. He opened the harp case, his gaze fixed on the moon, and there was a strange, answering glow in his green eyes. He felt himself drifting on the impossibly bright moonlight, and he sensed a distant thrill as something within him stirred.

He sat up, settling the harp on his knee, and his fingers curved to the strings. He touched them with his fingertips, and they seemed to quiver, begging him to give them voice. His brow furrowed dreamily at the thought, for he had no idea what he wanted to play. He had no ideas at all—he’d been emptied of thought by the silver light. Emptied so suddenly and gently he hadn’t even noticed.

Yet if he had no idea what to play, he had no choice but to play it anyway. A compulsion was upon him as the wounding beauty of the cloudy moon possessed him, and his fingers struck the strings with a will of their own.

They wrought merciless magic in the night.

Music poured up from the harp, rich and vibrant, singing through the trees. The Forest of Hev hushed. Animals and birds froze in the darkness, as mesmerized as his companions by the loveliness flowing through the quiet, misty aisles of silver struck green and black.

Kenhodan knew no name for the music he made. It was sweeping. Powerful. Too beautiful to endure. He drifted on it, less important than the wind, but even through the wash of notes he saw the glitter of Wencit’s eyes. The wizard’s seamed fingers quivered as if they, too, longed to caress the strings, yet Wencit’s face and body were rigid as the music surged like the sea.

Kenhodan never knew how long he played. He lived with and in the music, floating on it, reaching out through it, and wondering from whence it had come. It poured through him like the sea itself and spent itself in the heart of mystery, and he was one with it, caught up in something greater than himself, wondering where the music ended and he began—or if there actually was a division at all.

And then the harp notes changed abruptly. The melody’s haunting beauty remained, yet it took on a darker, harsher, harder edge that hurled him down dizzy corridors of light and dark, flashing towards destruction even while he knew he sat under a dripping lean-to and stroked the harp. Images stabbed him—dreadful images, and he knew they were the half remembered nightmares which haunted his sleep. Cavalry thundered across waving grass, beating it flat, exploding into an army of horrors and soaking the earth with blood. He saw screaming men, dwarves, hradani and elves, hewing and hewn, dying in agony as steel ripped flesh. He saw the boil of sorcery, a red banner with a crowned, golden gryphon, and cities flaming as they were sacked. He saw temples blaze under lurid skies, alters defiled with butchered priests and ravished priestesses.

He saw the ruin and anguish of conquest, and the images filled him with a burning fury more terrifying than any battle madness. They twisted him on a rack of sorrow, and the music raced—furious and savage now, hurtling towards a conclusion far worse than simple death. He saw an island in the sleeping sea, its rugged coasts sheer, and a city of white walls and towers that gleamed under a weeping, blood-red moon. He floated above it, his brain afire with the surge of music, confused as glowworm lights crawled in the sky. They gathered, weaving together, growing stronger, burning like Vonderland’s northern lights. He cringed before their power as they hummed and crackled in the night sky, and then they exploded. They streaked away like lightning bolts, and the harp music crested in a crescendo of anger and sorrow that hurled him from his dreams.