Tyrant Trouble (Mudflat Magic) (9 page)

“Ah.
I hope so, too. Nance, how high can the wings fly?”

“High?
Above the plain.”

“But
you can make them go up, like birds?”

Her
eyes narrowed. “High enough to fly over the mountain, Stargazer? No. They only
sail on air currents. They will not lift you that much.”

Guess
I already knew that gliders could swoop out and down, but they didn't have
engines, they weren't planes, and even if I had one with an engine, I had no
idea where I was. What I needed more than height was direction. Bread crumb
trails. Great big signs with arrows saying, “This way out.”

“I
would help you if I could.” She wrung her hands and tears trembled on her
lashes. “I know how sad you must be, so far from your home. Does anyone search
for you, do you think?”

Well,
yes, back in Seattle a troll would be wondering why I hadn't returned home. But
search? Uh. He only left his basement to go to work. He'd see the lights on in
my place and turn them off and he'd do it because he kept an eye on the place.
What can I say, I am careless about forgetting to turn off water and lights,
and I never remember to close windows. If it weren't for the troll, who cares a
lot more about my house than he does about me, I'd have wet floors after every
rain. Also, when I didn't return, he would fill my cat's dish.

Don't
think he actually cares about the cat, but he accepts it as part of the
household, like a leaking faucet, and tends to it.

The
bank manager would now have a really good reason to guarantee me unemployment.
The head of the Neighborhood Center would worry and ask around. And then she
would decide I’d gone off on a trip and forgot to tell her. Hate to put it this
way but truth is, my mother and her sisters have all skipped town more than
once, usually to avoid a boyfriend or a bill collector.

“Your
friends might guess you are here.”

That
drugged lot around the picnic table? Unlikely that Roman and company even
remembered I had been with them.

In
the morning my body ached in so many places I could barely help roll our
bedding and carry the glider to the hill. I lay on its slope where the sun
could warm me and watched Nance sail above the plateau. She gained only slight
lift, she was right, nothing near what was needed to go up over the trees.
There was no purpose in torturing my body to learn to control her glider.
Instead I gazed at the forest. If I could master this business of controlling a
horse and could find paths and avoid wild animals, perhaps I could discover a
way back.

While
Nance soared, I wandered down to the edge of the woods, found a stream. Follow
that, I thought, it flows downhill, must eventually lead me out of here.

A
rabbit crossed my path and disappeared. There was so much undergrowth, ferns,
salal, and all the things that flourish in the damp shade beneath miles of
Douglas fir. And then I saw something odd. Not a little rabbit. Who can really
track a rabbit? My eyesight isn't that sharp.

But
while I stood in the clearing staring at the trees, a full grown deer stepped
quietly onto the plain and no, it did not come out of the forest or the shadows,
it simply appeared. I shaded my eyes and stared. It turned slowly, took a step
and was gone. Not into shadows, not into forest, just gone.

If
I hadn't grown up with mages and all their tricks, I would have shrugged it off
as my imagination. Instead I walked toward the place where the deer
disappeared, an odd suspicion edging at my thoughts. I reached the end of the
grass, continued on into the trees, did not turn, and yet, a half dozen steps
into the forest I stepped out from the darkness into sunlight and was once
again on the plain. Walking out of the forest.

Across
the grasslands, Nance waved at me.

Okay,
call me crazy. I was beginning to figure out why the hikers had remained in
this land for fifteen years.

We
returned to the temple by starlight, riding down from the plateau and across
low hills until we circled behind the city to the less used slopes. Nance knew
every shadow. When we neared the temple, we slid off Black and Pacer and led
them quietly around to the stable.

Lor
was watching for us. From the shaking of his hands when he pulled the blankets
from the animals, it was clear he lived with terror every moment Nance was
gone.

Before
we entered the temple through the secret doorway, he whispered, “My lady, the
prince has come twice and knocked at the gates for you.”

Nance
stopped. “What was he told?”

“That
you were at prayer and would send for him when you wished to see him.”

She
flashed her smile at him. “I will send for Tarvik tomorrow.”

After
we finished our supper, Nance splashed a little water on her face and went to
bed, still wearing the dirt and sweat of days of traveling with horses and
nights of camping. I could not possibly sleep with the grime of the journey
clinging to me. Right, Seattle built a reputation for grunge bands and people
still remember, but trust me, sweat and grime were never what grunge referred
to.

In
the courtyard I built up the cook fire, checked the bolt on the gate against
the guards stationed outside it, and then warmed water in a large basin. I
knelt over the basin and washed the dust out of my hair, then stripped and
washed the rest of me, dipping a cloth into the water and scrubbing. I dearly
missed the hot shower and scented soap at my own house. I cleaned my cuts,
wincing when the water burned my skinned knees. I had barely pulled a fresh
tunic over my head when a heavy rapping rattled the gate.

I
stared at the gate, unable to think what to do. Nance slept. The guards would
not allow any passerby to knock.

“Who's
there?”

“Tarvik.
Let me in, Stargazer.”

I
thought of refusing, considered the listening guards and decided that shouting
at him through a closed gate would not add to my image as a keeper of the
temple.

After
I opened the gate, then closed and bolted it behind him, I led Tarvik to the
center of the courtyard beyond hearing of the guards. “Nance is asleep.”

“I
do not wish to see Nance.”

“What
do you want?”

“I
saw the smoke of your fire and knew you must no longer be at prayers. Why did
Nance not send for me? Was she given my message?”

I
shrugged and turned away from him so that my face would be in shadow. “There's
a lot of rituals and duties.”

“I
will beat that old man!” Tarvik cried.

“Lor?
He brought your message. Nance knows you have been here twice.”

“Then
I will beat Nance.”

“Beat
the priest of the Daughter?”

In
the glow from my fire, his pale face and hair shone. Slowly the deep frown
softened. His gaze wandered over me, puzzled, searching. Reaching out his hand,
he touched my hair.

Surprised,
he said, “Your hair is wet.”

“I
just washed it.”

“Washed
it?” He looked around the courtyard and saw the kettle hanging from the metal
arch over the embers and the basin on the ground beside it. “What is all that
for? I thought you must be cooking something.”

“No.
I heated water to bathe.”

“At
night? In the courtyard?”

“Where
do you bathe?”

If
there was a tub in the castle, I was going to demand one be placed in the
temple.

His
eyes widened.

“That's
what you were doing when I saw you in the river!” he exclaimed. “I wondered why
you ducked your head beneath the water.”

“Tarvik,
tell me you didn't come pounding on the gate to ask me how often I wash my
hair, because that is creepy.”

“No,
but I will now. How often do you wash your hair?”

“What!
Why do you care?”

He
shrugged and said, “You have such long hair. It is very beautiful. It must take
forever to get dry.”

“And
you came at night from the castle to discuss my hair?”

“I
often stop here to talk with Nance. There is no one to talk to at the castle,
no one at all. Just guards and servants and slaves, and they have nothing to
say even if they would talk.”

Hard
to believe. Lor seemed to know everything, and probably Tarvik's household had
its gossip line, but out of his hearing. “I told you. Nance sleeps.”

“Yes
- yes - only it is not Nance - that is, I wish to talk with you tonight,
Stargazer.”

“About
what?”

“Just
- just to talk.” He stood with his sturdy legs wide apart, his hips a bit
forward and his shoulders back, his square chin jutted out. He reminded me of a
child trying to decide whether to smile or fight. “I had a nursemaid when I was
small. In the evenings she would sit with me and tell me stories. I suppose it
is childish to think of, but she knew stories about everything, about gods and
warriors and famous battles and heroes and the monsters who live in the western
mountains, and, oh, all sorts of things. Do you know any stories?”

“What,
you want me to tell you a bedtime story?”

He
scowled at me for a moment, which was about as long as Tarvik could scowl, and
then he grinned. “Yes, do that.”

He
slipped out of his cloak and wrapped it around my shoulders. And then, like
Nance, he caught my hand and led me over to the fire. He sat down with his legs
crossed yoga style, drawing me down beside him. I pulled my hand free and was
about to tell him to stop grabbing me when he looked at me and smiled a very
sweet, very boyish smile.

“Are
you warm enough?” he asked. When I nodded, he added, “Good, then tell me a
story.”

Did
I know any stories? Of course I did! Movie plots, TV sci-fi shows, but all long
enough to require way too much explanation and I was tired. Perhaps I could
make up something short?

“Umm.
All right. Once upon a time there was a careless girl who forgot to check the
battery on her cellphone.”

“Explain
the cellphone.”

“Just
something she carried and lost. And she had wandered off into the woods without
a compass, really dumb.”

“What
is a compass?”

“A
magic thing that tells direction.”

“Oh.
Go on.”

“So
the careless girl got thoroughly lost until a boy found her and dragged her
back to his castle, even though she told him loud and clear that she did not
want to go with him. He had a nice little cousin who was dying of loneliness in
a drafty stone mausoleum and wished for a friend. The careless girl sat around
staring at the fire and wishing she had a hot shower. The spoiled boy was
bored, bored, bored and didn't know what to wish for. And no one lived happily
ever after.”

When
I stopped talking he looked perplexed. “That's the end? What does it mean?”

“That
I have told you a story and now it is time for you to leave.”

He
shook his head. “When my father returns to the castle, I do not know what he
will think of you. He may not believe you are a priest of the Daughter. He may
think you are merely from another tribe, and he might want to kill you. You do
know that, yes?”

“And
you didn’t like the end of my story? Huh.”

“Are
you afraid?”

“Tarvik,
I am stuck here because you brought me here. If your father accepts me as a
templekeeper, we’re good. If not, got an idea about how I can change his mind?”

He
leaned close to me, his face almost touching mine, and said softly, “That is
what I wish to say to you. I will do what I can to help you. If he will not
accept you as a priest, then I will ask him to give you to me.”

“Do
what!”

He
jumped up and stood over me, glaring. “I captured you! I have every right to
claim you as my slave. Or perhaps you would rather be dead?”

I
had to use my hands to push myself up from where I was sitting. He moved so
easily he made me feel clumsy, which added to my anger because I did not want
to admire anything at all about the stupid brat. I pulled off his cloak, threw
it at him and snapped, “Perhaps I would.”

Tarvik's
head jerked back as though I had slapped him. The fire's glow reflected off the
gold ring in his ear and glittered in his narrowed eyes. “Have your own choice,
Stargazer. Even a templekeeper cannot mock Kovat's son.”

While
I clamped my mouth shut over the retorts flooding my thoughts, he strode to the
gates, stopped, stared hard at me and then demanded, “Your knees, what has
happened to your knees?”

My
knees burned. The scrapes were all too visible in the dim light. I didn't think
he'd buy a jest about long prayers.

“Replacing
candles in the ceiling holders is not simple. A fall from a bench set on a
table is quite painful.”

“You
lie,” he said softly, opened the gate and left without glancing back at me.

“I
don't owe you the truth,” I said to the closed gates, because being Kovat's son
didn't earn him any extra respect from me.

Ah.
That's because I hadn't met Kovat.

CHAPTER
6

Kovat
the Slayer returned.

The
guards who rapped at the gate and brought the message were stiff with terror,
their faces drawn down in frozen frowns. They were large men dressed in leather
and arm bands, with swords hanging from their belts. They usually looked
fierce. Now they looked terrified.

To
me one said, “Templekeeper, tell the lady Nance the prince sends word that his
father, great Kovat, approaches.”

“Great
Kovat. I will tell her, thank you.” I smiled at them as I often did when I
opened the gate.

Nance
had told me they were free men who could look at us and speak. Did I want to
figure out the social structure of this place? Not until my life depended on
it. Then I'd give it a thought. Until then, the whole thing made me want an
aspirin.

The
guards had always returned my smile, sometimes with a nod. Today their
expressions remained grim.