The Ruins of Ambrai

by Melanie Rawn

  He followed Orlin back outside. While Renne and Veliaz built a pyre of rocks taken from the path border, Col took the identity disk from Verald’s neck and the small gold-and-amethyst pendant from his right earlobe. There was a wristlet as well, made of gold links set at intervals with chips of dark green jade carved into flowers. When he tried to give the items to Renne, the man shook his head.

  “You take them,” he said. “You were friends.”

  “I hardly knew him,” Col replied gruffly. But he didn’t refuse the jewelry. He’d give it to Sela—but not now. In a week perhaps, once the new baby was born and the shock of her husband’s death had worn off. If it ever did.

  Elom and Jeymi came out to help gather more rocks. Veliaz placed them as they were brought to him, constructing a flat stone mound as long and wide as a man. Jeymi then asked if he ought to bring wood from the pile.

  His father replied, “No, Gorsha will see to the fire.”

  And so it was, once Sela’s pains eased, slowed, then finally stopped. She and Tamsa slept while Verald’s body was set alight by Magefire. No words were spoken, no dirge was sung; no one had the voice for it, especially not the Minstrel who’d been his friend. The only tribute paid the Master of Roseguard Grounds was the handful of flowers Collan threw into the fire. Another bouquet. It made him sick.

  The body was scarcely burning when Desse faced them all across the fire. “We must go to the one place they will not seek us. Ryka Court.”

  Col waited for someone to protest. No one did. He couldn’t believe it; they all trusted this crazy old man who’d abandoned them at dusk and returned too late to use magic in their defense.

  Riddon collected his brothers with a glance. “We’d better see if they’ve got a wagon.”

  “And blankets for Domna Trayos,” Elom added.

  A minute later only Collan and Gorynel Desse remained, on either side of the fire. The young man watched the old man; the old man watched the flames.

  “It isn’t so great a risk as you think,” the Warrior Mage said at last. “The Ladder is accessible. I found that out tonight.”

  “Forgive me if I don’t sing your praises,” Col snapped.

  “It was necessary. I did what I could to keep you safe. I went as quickly as I could—and when I heard the swords and shouting I—”

  “You didn’t get here in time. Verald’s dead. What’re you going to do with me, now that he’s not here to knock me over the head?”

  “I understand your loss—”

  “My loss? What about that girl in there? She’s lost her husband—and she might lose her Mageborn baby as well! I don’t know what you’re talking about with Ladders, but—”

  “No, you don’t know what you’re talking about. The child will be Mageborn,” Desse replied, not appearing at all surprised that Col knew. “And safe-born.”

  That was something, anyhow—if he could trust the white-haired old madman. Col held his tongue for all of two minutes, seething. At last he said, “If what you said when we got here is true, and every Mage is in danger of death, why are you here? Why Lady Agatine and Orlin Renne? Why me?”

  “For reasons I hope you will never know.”

  “Damn it, that’s no answer!”

  “It’s all you’ll have from me, boy.” The Mage Globe changed color, from rosy-gold to white and then to a brilliant green sharp as bottle-glass shards in sunlight. Just the color of the eyes that suddenly stared into Col’s, and although green was not a color of fire he felt singed to his soul.

  “Do you understand, Collan?”

  As he felt himself nod, he wondered what he was agreeing to.

  A short while later, a wagon was brought around to the back door. The mare between the traces shied at the smell of smoke, but Veliaz held her head and talked to her, and she soon settled. After Lady Agatine and Tarise arranged a bedding of blankets, Veliaz lifted Sela in, then went back for Tamsa. Both were still asleep.

  Col and Orlin Renne hauled the Council Guard dead into the farmhouse. Elom came to help once he shooed the last of the animals from the barn into the fenced field beyond. This time the fire came from a match; the bodies, the farmhouse, the barn, and especially the tool shed must burn more quickly than Magefire, and burn to the ground. No one would ever use this Ladder from or to Roseguard again.

  6

  “Which way did they go?”

  Auvry Feiran shrugged. “There are four sets of wagon tracks beneath this morning’s snow, all of them reeking of magic, all leading in different directions.”

  Glenin kicked at a large stone that had been part of someone’s funeral pyre. Magefire could not be smothered by snow, and nothing was left of the corpse. Not even the large bones. But the farmhouse had not burned completely, nor the barn, and even from fifty feet away Glenin could practically smell magic coming from the tool shed.

  “Gorynel Desse is no fool,” Feiran went on, idly stroking his horse’s neck.

  “No—we were, for not coming here ourselves.”

  “The risk was too great. I won’t put you in danger, Glenin. Not again.”

  “I’m Malerris trained, Father,” she reminded him. “I know things he doesn’t, I can do things he can’t, and—”

  “You’ve never faced a true Warrior Mage,” he snapped. “Tamos Wolvar was a Scholar. He’d never applied his knowledge to a real Battle Globe in his life—and he would never, ever use lethal magic. Gorsha Desse has no such compunctions, I assure you. Your knowledge may or may not exceed his—but don’t ever underestimate him.”

  She changed the subject. “What about the Ladder? Where does it go?”

  “I had no idea it even existed. It’s useless now in any case. But it proves you right, Glenin. Their destination is Ryka Court—the last place we’d expect them to go.” Pride deepened his voice as he added, “Thanks to you, it’s the first place we’ll look for them.”

  “Now all we need do is find them.” She grimaced, tucking her gloved hands inside her trouser pockets and kicking once more at the rock. “How many thousand people are at Ryka Court these days?”

  “It won’t be that difficult. They’ll hide for a few days, trying to make us believe they’ve gone elsewhere. It may take some time, but they’ll show up. This is the only set of Ladders available to them.”

  “We can’t use the Council Guard to watch every one,” she mused. “We need Malerrisi. I’ll send to the Castle this afternoon.”

  “That’s where you’re wrong. We can’t use any of the Lords—Gorsha would sense them half a mile off.”

  Glenin frowned slightly, wondering if he’d even heard the second use of the diminutive. If he still thought of the great enemy by an intimate nickname. . . .

  “He expects only three Mageborns: you, me, and Anniyas,” Feiran went on. “If he discerns any more—”

  “Where can he go?” she challenged, spinning on her heel. “He has to use a Ryka Court Ladder. You and I and Anniyas can’t watch them all. We can’t Ward them—he’ll feel that, too.” She stopped, catching a breath that froze her lips and tongue for an instant. “By the Weaver, we don’t have to watch every Ladder—or any Ladder at all!”

  “What do you mean?”

  She laughed softly, and made a sweeping gesture toward the farmhouse. A score of tiny fireballs, none of them larger than a cherry, flew from her fingertips to the smoldering half-ruin. It took fire, and this time would burn even in a blizzard.

  “Let’s go back home. I’ll tell you along the way.”

  7

  Collan had never been to Ryka Court. He didn’t want to go there now. But he went, because honor said he must.

  Not that he owed the Rising anything. He’d rendered up dead Council Guards in payment for getting him out of Roseguard. All accounts were settled. But he owed it to Verald to see Sela and Tamsa safe.

  Survival had a lot to do with it, too. He followed Gorynel Desse to Ryka Court b
ecause he had no other way off the island. If that message in flowers and herbs was correct, Rosvenir was a Name on Anniyas’s list. Heading straight into her lair was the very last thing he wanted to do, but he had to admit it was also the very last place she’d look for him.

  Because of the horse, the Warrior Mage could not Fold the road. Horses, he explained, refused to believe that ten miles wasn’t really ten miles. Desse walked ahead of the wagon—casting no spells or Wards lest they attract Malerrisi, but ready nonetheless to do so if necessary for safety’s sake. Col hoped he would, anyway. He kept a hand on his sword under his cloak all the same. Orlin Renne did likewise.

  Just before dawn it began to snow softly. Sela woke with a stifled groan. The jostling of the wagon was doing her and her unborn baby no good at all. There was no shelter, no hope of any within miles. So they pulled to the side of the road, tented a blanket over the wagon, and waited out the snow.

  By midmorning they were moving again. By late afternoon they had reached a modest little manor, empty as the farmhouse had been empty. A crimson ribbon was stretched diagonally across the door, secured at either side by the large seal in wax of the Council Guard.

  When Collan asked, Orlin replied grimly that this had been the home of a prominent family secretly connected to the Rising.

  “Obviously not so secret,” Col remarked.

  This earned him a furious glance from Tarise Nalle, and he shut up.

  All doors were similarly sealed. Collan showed off a talent for burglary by opening a back window without leaving so much as a scratch on the casement—thanking Pierga Cleverhand for the childish simplicity of the lock. His previous experiences with windows had more often been to get out rather than in, but the principle was more or less the same on either side of the glass.

  The place was pitiably abandoned. Dinner rotted on the kitchen table, the evening candle unlit. A child’s cloak puddled at the bottom of the stairs. A book lay open on the floor near the main room’s cold hearth, and an overturned basket spilled bright yarn onto the rug.

  The basket suddenly gave forth a sound that nearly stopped Col’s heart: a plaintive mew? followed by a low and unmistakably canine growl. He clenched his fists to stop their shaking and knelt, whistling softly. The basket moved, and from its warm woolen depths slunk a spotted hound puppy and a round of tawny fur that looked like a baby lion.

  Collan smiled as the kitten arched against his outstretched hand, purring. The pup was warier, nipping at the finger he extended. Neither had gone hungry very long, but there was that in their eyes which pleaded for more than food. He thought at once of Jeymi and Tamsa. Delighted by his inspiration, he scooped up a wriggling fur-ball in each hand—trying not to think of the child whose cloak lay on the stairs.

  They stayed four cold days in the house. They lit no fires, lest the smoke be seen; Desse cast no spells, lest the magic be sensed. The bedrooms yielded blankets, quilts, and clothing the owners would never need again. There was food in the larder, cold fare but adequate to their wants, and the cellar was stocked with wine enough to warm the adults. As Collan had hoped, the two small animals warmed the children.

  Jeymi gave the puppy a grandiose name from an adventure story his sister Sarra had read him, but this noble moniker was soon replaced by plain, simple, eminently appropriate Spot. Tamsa was slower to accept the kitten, though the kitten immediately established ownership of Tamsa. A nudge here, a purr there, and a night curled beneath the little girl’s chin were all it took for Velvet to acquire a name and a fiercely reciprocated devotion.

  Sela, watching the miniature lion pretend to stalk Tamsa across the rug, smiled quietly at Col. “Thank you.”

  “I had nothing to do with it,” he said at once.

  “All the same—” She bit her lip. The pains were controllable, not so much through any art of Magelore—Desse was not a Healer, after all—but because Sela feared birthing her child in a place where they couldn’t even boil water. Simple determination was, Collan discovered, a powerful thing.

  The morning of the fifth day, they left. Nobody bothered to ask the Mage if it was safe to do so; they’d run out of food, another storm threatened, and time was against Sela. Her baby would come soon no matter what happened. They had to get her to safety.

  Ryka Court was a classic spoked-wheel city, centered on the All Saints Temple at its hub. Around this were the wedge-shaped blocks of Guildhalls, law courts, great merchant houses, and banks. The real center of Ryka Court, however, was on the edge of the city overlooking Council Lake. Here were the domed edifices of Assembly and Council, military barracks and parade ground, and residence towers for senior officials.

  Rillan Veliaz drove the wagon the long way around, taking the Ring Road so it would seem they had come from the northeast and not the west. Collan could hardly control the nervous shift of his shoulders as he walked past pile after vast round marble pile, most of them inhabited by persons he’d rather not meet. Morning traffic on the Ring Road was sparse, a manifestation of uncertain times. With Mages and adherents of the Rising rumored to be anywhere and everywhere, most people stayed in their houses. Only the produce wagons rolled in from outlying farms, brightly painted with pictures of their contents: fruit, vegetables, flowers, fodder.

  Their own wagon—decorated with a cornucopia of root vegetables—merged anonymously with the others. Collan wondered at that: surely the other drivers saw that their cargo was women and children, not sacks of potatoes. Then he noticed that each driver stared only at the road between his horse’s ears. No greetings were called back and forth, no eye contact was made, despite the fact that these men must know each other, having come this way every day for years. The silence was numbing, oppressive. Col wondered if it had spread throughout the world—a horrifying thought for one whose life and livelihood were music.

  Desse took a sudden turn off the Ring Road down a narrow street like a gully in a white marble canyon. Another turn took them into an even narrower alley. This led into a small kitchen courtyard where another wagon was being lightened of its burden of winter melons. A man in faultless white who looked more like a wrestler than a cook supervised, thundering condemnations as he inspected every crate.

  “Help them unload,” the old man murmured to Orlin Renne, who slapped Col’s shoulder and gathered two of his sons with a look.

  Two large wagons and two big dray horses and ten busy men made for admirably cramped quarters. Col saw Rillan Veliaz disappear, supporting Sela. After handing off another crate, he followed.

  Orlin, Riddon, and Maugir were close behind. Renne led the way up a curving service stair, which led to a curving hallway, which led to a door with a sign above it: MINISTER OF MINES. Through the door, along another small passage, and Collan entered an office cluttered with maps, books, and piles of documents.

  The big, handsome man who emerged from a tangle of Slegin sons strongly resembled Lady Agatine’s husband. Brothers? Col wondered. The relationship was confirmed when the two giants embraced hard enough to crack spines.

  “You look like hell, Orlin.”

  “So do you, Telo.”

  Lady Agatine was enfolded much more gently in the elder Renne’s arms. “You, on the other hand, are more exquisite than even my most evocative dreams.”

  She managed a smile. “Still trying to convince me that I married the wrong brother?”

  “After twenty years with him, it’s my turn.” He kissed her cheek, then said, “Before you ask, Sarra’s safe as far as I know.”

  Gorynel Desse broke into the reunion. “We must move quickly, Telomir. I had to spell a few people getting here.”

  The Minister nodded. “The Ladder’s still a secret. But they’ll know when you go through.” He stopped, a tiny smile touching his lips. “Is that Collan? Yes, I see it must be. Well, well, well.”

  Well-well-well what? Col thought.

  Before he could open his mouth to ask, Telomir Renne continued,
“Be gentle when you knock me out, little brother. I’m not as young as I used to be.”

  Orlin shook his head. “You’re coming with us. Telo, you have to! I won’t leave you here—”

  “You need somebody at Ryka Court. That somebody is me.”

  “Damn it, Telo—” growled Orlin.

  Desse interrupted. “Listen to me, son. He’s right. It’s no longer safe for you to be here.”

  “Is it safe anywhere, Father—for any of us?”

  “No,” intoned another voice.

  Until the day he died Collan would never be certain what happened next. He had the impression of another massively tall man, and angry lightning that flashed from a pair of glowing spheres, and the flash of swords almost as deadly bright—including his own. But his vision was clouded, his perceptions muddied, the pain in his head crippling.

  Somebody was dragging him somewhere. Every moment set a new agony stabbing through his skull. There was darkness, and dizziness, and he felt his stomach heave.

  Strong hands persuaded the sword out of his fist. He let it go. The same hands guided him to something blissfully soft and warm. He fell onto it, into it, wanting nothing but oblivion.

  A voice snared him back to consciousness. Raw with grief, thick with weeping, stammering out names: “. . . Agatine . . . Orlin . . . Verald . . . Elom. . . .”

  And one other name: “Auvry Feiran—”

  Col struggled to sit up. Someone else lay beside him on the bed. Sela and Tamsa—thank the Saints, once again in the merciful sleep Desse could spell for them. He wished he could join them. He smoothed the little girl’s hair, winning a defensive hiss from the kitten tucked into her coat pocket.

  Col swung his legs off the bed and swayed to his feet. Over in a corner was a little knot of people. He peered into the dimness, trying to identify each.

  Jeymi Slegin, huddled in a chair with his face buried in the puppy’s neck. Tarise Nalle. Rillan Veliaz.

  His temples throbbed suddenly, and in the center of the room three more people appeared. Riddon and Maugir Slegin stumbled immediately toward their brother. Telomir Renne supported Gorynel Desse. A Mage Globe flickered, died. The old man collapsed against his son’s shoulder.