He had seen the moment of his own death. The Fire Spirit had taken his hand. Thank you, she had said. I think we should be going now. At least she had chosen him; he had won salvation, not the damnation of the demon with the nightmare face. The world had gone dark.
Then his head was in her hands, and the burning liquid ripped down his throat, searing him with molten fire. He had gasped, had tried to fight it, only to find that her ministrations had filled him with a sense of well-being, a warmth that lulled him to sleep, easing his fear and his distress.
At least it had until the Abbot found him.
37
“Hurry up,” Achmed muttered. He was standing beneath the eaves of a harper’s shop at the edge of town, waiting for Rhapsody to return.
The sound of delight she had made when she first sighted the shop could have come from a two-year-old, it was so full of childlike joy. The sound had a music that stopped him in his tracks, had made her pleading impossible to resist. It was a dangerous sound, one that he would be wary of from now on.
I want to send some gifts to my grandchildren, and I deserve a new harp, she had said, I keep leaving all my stringed instruments behind.
It had taken an inordinately long period of time for her to choose another, however. The noise of the street, and the vibrations that the foot and cart traffic were generating, made his head throb. He was preparing to go into the shop himself to drag her out when she appeared at the door, disheveled and flustered, a decided look of anger in her eye.
“Bastard,” she muttered, handing him the three-stringed instrument she was lugging.
“Excuse me?”
“Not you, him,” she spat, gesturing at the shop door, then smoothing her hair back under the hood again.
“What happened?”
“Apparently harps aren’t the only things his fingers want to pluck,” she said angrily as they walked away from shop, joining the flow of human traffic again.
Achmed snickered as he passed the instrument back to her. “How did you react?”
“I tried to think about what Grunthor would do, and did my best imitation of it,” she said, slinging the package back under her robe. “Only I used the blunt end of my dagger; Grunthor wouldn’t have. So the arse-rag’s singing a soprano accompaniment to the organ, rather than missing one.”
“Must be descended from the Cymrians,” Achmed said wryly.
Rhapsody’s mood lifted a little with the joke. “Well, I certainly knew a lot of them in the old land who qualified as arse-rags. I can’t believe you said that to Llauron, though.”
“What did you buy?” Achmed asked.
“It’s a physician’s lyre; it’s supposed to help in songs of healing. Khaddyr had one, but he didn’t know how to play it very well. It only has three strings, and I’ve never actually used one before, so it may take a while to pick up. The instruments of this land are very different from home.”
He took her shoulder to navigate her away from a passel of soldiers standing on a street corner near the southeastern gate, laughing amongst themselves.
“Rhapsody, I hate to keep breaking it to you, but this is home now.”
He watched as she continued to walk, staring at the ground as though lost in thought. When they had exited the gate, she looked up at him.
“Perhaps for you,” she said. She looked back at the ground and kept walking.
Deep in the village at the outskirts of the city Rhapsody turned suddenly and grabbed Achmed’s arm.
“Are we being followed?”
The Dhracian nodded and continued to walk, dodging a stream of scurrying children and circumventing the acrid smoke of a barrel fire outside a shack where haunches of meat were being dried. He almost had to shout to be heard above the din of the crowd milling around them, the people who would never be allowed to walk the pristine streets of the city proper in Bethany.
“It’s Grunthor. He’s been shadowing us for a while.”
“Why? And where’s Jo?” Rhapsody craned her neck to see if she could catch sight of the large shadow again, but it was gone.
“Because I asked him to. Probably with him; we’re not far from camp.”
A piercing shriek rose over the cacophony; it carried with it the pain of a child in distress. Rhapsody turned to see a small boy on the ground, cowering, with his hands over his head. He was curled into a ball, trying to shield himself from the savage kick being aimed at him by a man with a grizzled black beard.
Rhapsody bolted forward, only to be hauled back by a tug on her arm born of Achmed’s superior speed.
“Don’t intervene,” he warned, watching the black fury on her face fade to gray shock at his words. “This is the way these people live, the way most people live. Look around you.”
Indeed, the passersby were milling past the child and his attacker, avoiding the scene or even oblivious of it. Rhapsody struggled to break away again. Achmed tightened his grip.
“Think about the beating that child will get later on if you get involved in this, Rhapsody. And you can’t adopt another one; if you try, I’ll abandon you and Jo here, in Bethany.” The child cried out again as another kick connected.
“Let go,” she snarled. The black fury had returned.
Reluctantly Achmed released her arm and faded back angrily. She charged across the street, head down, crouched in the position Grunthor had taught her called the Battering Ram. The situation was unspooling wildly; there was nothing he could do now but watch.
She connected just below the chest of the furious man as his leg was on the upswing. Caught off guard by the momentum of her attack, he reeled backward, both of them toppling into a row of barrels and small logs.
As the man’s head struck the ground Rhapsody drove the heel of her palm upward, breaking his nose. Blood sprayed the dirt of the roadway, leaving small dark stains on the cobblestones, now wide-spread and farther between as the street led away from the city.
The initial shock past, the man’s eyes cleared, and he made a grab for her throat.
“Bitch,” he panted, swinging his arm wildly at her. “What—”
Achmed sighed as he saw Rhapsody, now astride the peasant, pull back for her famous right cross, the blow Grunthor had commented on admiringly. She connected impressively, a direct impact to the man’s bloody nose, snapping his head back with a resounding crack.
As the man lay sprawled on the street Rhapsody rose and wiped the spatters of his blood off her forehead. The passersby who had not stopped to notice the child being kicked were beginning to slow now, staring at the scene.
“Why were you kicking that child?” she demanded, panting.
The man blinked and squinted into the fading sun above him, then grimaced.
“He’s—my son,” he muttered, his words choked.
“Really?” Rhapsody asked sarcastically. “That’s why? Glad you told me.” She gave his testicles a savage stomp, causing him to curl into the same position his child had been in the moment before. A man watching nearby recoiled in horror.
“There; hopefully you won’t have any more, then. You’re obviously not fit to.” She turned to the little boy, who was still curled up on the ground, and bent down to him.
Achmed’s attention was drawn up the roadway to where another commotion was occurring. A team of soldiers on horseback had stopped in the midst of the traffic. One was bent forward, listening to a man who was gesticulating wildly, pointing in Rhapsody’s direction. He looked back at her.
She was soothing the ragged child now, touching his face comfortingly, asking him if he was all right. The little boy was nodding, staring up into her hood, slack-jawed. Rhapsody turned back to his father.
“What’s your name?” she demanded.
The man leaned up on one elbow, trying to stanch his bleeding nose.
“Styles Nielsen.” The words were a whisper.
Rhapsody bent close to him. “Hear me, Styles Nielsen,” she said, her voice low and musical. Even across the roadway Achmed recognized the tone; sh
e was using her Naming lore.
“It is your life’s mission from this moment on to protect this child, to raise him lovingly, to tend to his needs. When your actions are in keeping with that mission, you will feel pleasure. If you violate this edict in any way, if you hurt him, you will feel his pain tenfold. If you abuse him with words, it will feel like your skin is on fire; do you understand me?” The man nodded, staring into her hood the way his son had a moment before.
Achmed saw the guards move in a second too late, his attention diverted by the soldiers up the roadway. The first grabbed her by the arm and hauled her into the street, while the other pulled her hood down with a vicious tug. Achmed ran across the road.
Pandemonium broke loose. From up the street the soldiers were riding in, toppling the citizenry right and left before their horses. The crowd that had been hovering, watching the assault in horror, swelled forward, grabbing at Rhapsody, trying to touch her, hold on to her. Achmed pushed forward with them. He was almost within reach.
Her shining hair, once bound by its standard black ribbon, came billowing loose, streaming in the winter wind. The crowd gasped, then began grabbing for it. Achmed saw Rhapsody disappear beneath a sea of humanity, a multitude of hands and arms flailing around her. He ducked as another swell of people rushed in, trying to get nearer to the strange, compelling creature in their midst. The population of the village swirled in blind commotion like waves in the sea.
The soldiers on horseback rode into the throng, stopping next to the thickest part of the mayhem. One shoved a woman aside and began to dismount, a club in his hand.
Achmed struggled to remain upright. He reached through the morass of limbs, following the sound of Rhapsody’s racing heart, the only pulse he could hear other than his own. He seized the tiny wrist just as the soldier was upon her.
Then the air and the frenzy around them was shattered by a familiar roar. An ear-rending scream of fury, it rumbled through the street, sending waves of panic through the crowd, beginning with the horses, both of which bolted in terror.
As the crowd swirled in fright, Achmed dragged Rhapsody through the chaos and ran, head down, toward the edge of town, shoving aside anything that got in his way. When he hit the first clear patch he stopped long enough to pull her hood up, then cast a glance behind them.
The hubbub was beginning to slow, as the villagers looked around them, trying to find the woman with the shining hair. The soldiers were still working to quiet their mounts, at the same time attempting to keep them from trampling anyone.
Achmed looked into Rhapsody’s face. She was staring blindly ahead, looking back over her shoulder.
“Come on,” he said, pulling her forward. Without another word they walked as quickly and inconspicuously as possible out of the roadway and away from the frenzy she had caused in the streets of Bethany.
Twilight came and settled over the fields of the Orlandan Plateau long before they stopped walking. Achmed had paused long enough for Rhapsody to sing her devotions, noting the same melancholy tone that had been present the morning after he had left her at Llauron’s. There was pain in the music, deep as the sea, and it clarified many of the fragmented assumptions that had been running loose in his mind. He heard her whisper the names of Stephen’s children into the darkness.
As the shadows grew longer they came to a sheltered knoll, where a deep swale in the field had been overgrown with trees and brush. Grunthor had suggested this area as one that was hidden largely from the paths of the wind. Now, upon seeing it for himself, and feeling the vibrations of the air abate a little around it, he concurred. This was the place.
He led Rhapsody inside the tree-shelter and brushed a pool of melting snow off an enormous fallen log.
“Have a seat,” he said. “We need to talk.”
Rhapsody sighed, a look of utter desolation in her eyes. “Please don’t berate me now, Achmed. I know it was a stupid thing to do, but I didn’t have an alternative. I just couldn’t stand there while that man—”
“This is not the topic of the conversation I want to have now,” Achmed said quietly. Rhapsody dissolved into astonished silence. “You were given a piece of false lore today, a polluted story of ancient origin. I want to help you purify the lore.”
Her eyes opened wide. “What?”
Achmed sat down across from her and rested his elbows in his knees, his folded hands in front of his lips.
“Wait for the onset of night,” he said, looking into the dusk at the last vestiges of day disappearing beyond the horizon. “It will be easier if we hold off until dark.”
38
Gerald Owen burst through the door of Haguefort’s library.
“M’lord—”
“I see them, Owen.” Stephen Navarne was standing at the eastern window, staring ruefully out at the panoramic view of his lands coming to light with the dawn.
The newly built rampart was swarming with moving bodies, men locked in deadly conflict, under a banner of black smoke that rose eerily from behind the great stone wall.
From the shells of each guard tower, recently erected and not yet complete, hung at least one body, sometimes more, twisting endlessly in the wind generated by the attack. Lord Stephen watched, stone-faced, as a falling victim slammed into one of the hanged men, sending the corpse spinning into the wall.
“What in the name of the Creator is happening?”
Owen bent over at the waist, his hands on his knees, red-faced from the exertion of running.
“They attacked just—before dawn,” he gasped. “Burned—three closest villages, and the eastern guard post. Got the—stables, too.”
“And the soldiers? What happened to the eastern barracks?”
Owen’s red face paled. “In flames, m’lord. No one—got out, best as we can tell.”
“Sweet All-God.” Lord Stephen strode out of the study and into the dining room, stopping before the southern window. The scene was much the same, though the wall seemed to have held better on this front. He glanced over his shoulder at the portrait of his family, then turned to Gerald Owen again.
“All right, Owen, pay close attention. I want you to take my entire personal guard retinue and get Melisande and Gwydion out of here. Go through the tunnels to the wine cellar and out through the western stables. Take Rosella with you, and try not to alarm them all unduly. Head for Llauron’s; send word to Anborn on your way.” Owen nodded and started for the door.
Lord Stephen leaned his head on his forearm, unable to look away from the scene of carnage.
“Owen?”
“Yes, m’lord?”
“One last thing before you go: summon the quartermaster and tell him to bring my gelding ’round. In the absence of the soldiers from the eastern barracks, I’m going to have to rally the villagers to their own defense.”
Owen’s words were filled with pain. “M’lord, the attackers are the villagers.”
Well, you’ve finally seen fit to come and report, have you?”
Gittleson sat back, fascinated at the upcoming exchange, but afraid to draw undue attention to himself. It was dangerous enough being the only witness.
The man beneath the gray mantled cloak bowed stiffly, then took down his hood. A cocky smile wreathed the handsome face, blue eyes twinkling merrily.
“We’ve lost the House,” he said cheerfully.
The air in the small room became suddenly warmer, and Gittleson found himself breathing shallowly, trying to escape notice.
The red-rimmed eyes of his master were firmly fixed on the smirking Rakshas, however. When he spoke, a moment later, his voice was measured, with a hint of threat below the surface.
“Despite your limited capacity to reason, I assume you know that this is a very bad setback,” he said dryly. The Rakshas nodded, his red-gold curls catching the light. “Then why are you grinning like an idiot?”
The Rakshas dropped into a chair and swung his legs up over the arm. “Because of who we lost it to.”
“Don�
�t play games with me, toy. Who was it?”
“I have no idea.” The Rakshas sat forward suddenly, a wild look in the crystalline blue eyes. “But there were three of them.”
Gittleson recoiled as his master rose.
“What are you babbling about?” The cultured voice dropped to a menacing whisper.
The Rakshas’s voice was warm and rich as honey. “Look, I may not be the most acute thinker, but even I can count. There were three of them, a woman and two men, I think, though I only got a glimpse of one close up. Ugly as sin. They drove us out of the House, took down my troops around me. And at least one of them seemed to have as much control over fire as I do.”
“Impossible.”
The Rakshas shrugged. “Suit yourself.”
“Where are these three now?”
“Couldn’t say exactly.” The Rakshas stretched out, hands behind his head. “They were headed east last time I knew, towards the Krevensfield Plain.”
“Canrif.” The word was a whispered hiss. Gittleson, in his corner, shuddered at the sound. “They’re heading to Canrif.”
“Perhaps.”
The red-rimmed eyes turned suddenly, fixing their gaze on Gittleson. He could feel the blood drain from his face.
“Gittleson, I may have need of your services shortly.”
39
They sat in silence for a long time, listening to the wind in the distance, watching the darkening sky. Finally Achmed looked at Rhapsody. Her face was calm, but concern resonated in her eyes.
“Can you play that new instrument enough to have it cover the vibrations of what we are saying, so that they don’t get onto the wind?”
She nodded and pulled out the physician’s harp, loosing the ties that had held it under her robes. With a gentle tug she pulled off the soft cloth cover and ran her fingers over the strings.
“Any particular song?” she asked.
He shook his head. “Just something to distract the wind, keep it from carrying what we have to say anywhere else.”
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