Stormwarden

by Janny Wurts

  Hearvin did not trouble himself with a denial. His manner seemed unruffled, yet Emien suspected that fury burned like acid beneath his placid exterior.

  "I came because of Tierl Enneth," the sorcerer said unexpectedly. This time his voice showed an edge.

  Tathagres interrupted. "I'm amused. Do be more explicit."

  "That's unnecessary." Hearvin moved. Emien flinched, braced for violence, but the sorcerer only clasped his hands behind his back. "Why belabor the obvious? I've seen enough. You wish the source of Anskiere's power for your own twisted passions. The King's will was simple convenience, and his resources your playthings. From the start, you were unfit to command any of the lives placed at your disposal. I swore no oath to Kisburn. But for reasons of my own I see fit to protect the royal reputation. You shall not return to Cliffhaven. The Kielmark will be subdued by other means, and I forbid you the Keys to Elrinfaer." He lowered his voice, until Emien had to strain to hear. "Seek elsewhere, Merya. I have tested your mettle and found it wanting."

  The name made Tathagres pause. The flush drained from her cheeks, and her eyes widened, startled. But the gap in her poise lasted only a second. The viperish look she bestowed on Hearvin sent chills down Emien's spine. She would never accept the sorcerer's authority, he observed. And threatened, suddenly, by the fact that his own fate was entangled with hers, the boy dug in his pocket and closed his fingers over the cool rounded surface of his last throwing stone.

  "You speak quite nicely," said Tathagres to Hearvin. "Tell me, can you act?"

  She baited him, Emien saw. But the sorcerer also knew guile. He pushed the black cloth of his hood back over his shoulders, and his crown gleamed in the firelight, lending him an air of elderly vulnerability.

  "Be warned, woman. I will challenge. If that happens, you'll be sorry for it."

  Tathagres sobered instantly. "You meddle. Were you trained by the Vaere? If not, your threats are wasted. I shall return to Cliffhaven. Prevent me at your peril."

  Hearvin bowed his head, his stance gone strangely rigid. "You will be stopped."

  White light flared at the sorcerer's feet. Emien cringed, fearful of the spell. On Imrill Kand, Anskiere had always known when others watched his work covertly. But Hearvin remained oblivious and Tathagres seemed absorbed, intent as a hawk covering prey. She lifted her hands, touched the golden torque at her throat.

  "I regret this," she said. But nothing of remorse showed in her expression. "You might have worked with me and been rewarded." She tilted her chin, then spoke a word to focus her defenses. Sparks crackled across her flexed wrists and caught like frost in her hair.

  Hearvin waited, motionless. From hiding in the thicket, Emien saw a second spell flicker to life between the sorcerer's fingers, this one harsh and red, a needle-sharp geometric of light. Since Hearvin's hands stayed clenched behind his back, Tathagres was unaware of any additional threat. Emien dared not warn her; Hearvin would count the boy's life cheaply in this contest of wills. Miserably afraid, the boy huddled deeper into the thicket. He could not so much as call out, even for his mistress' sake.

  Tathagres lifted her hands from the neckband and a golden haze of illumination quivered in the air above her palms. Poised like a quartz figurine, she pitched the energy at the sorcerer who opposed her.

  Light met light with a tortured shriek of sound. Blinded by the flash, Emien buried his face in his hands. The night air shivered with the harmonics, as if tempered steel struck glass which would not shatter. Over the din, Emien heard Tathagres' shout of surprise. He forced himself to look. Through a glare of unbearable brilliance, he saw Hearvin had loosed his second spell; Tathagres struggled like a fly in a web of shimmering strands. She reached for her necklace. But Hearvin riposted with a curt gesture of his hand. The spell snapped into a spindle, symmetrically scribed as a crystal's matrix. Trapped, Tathagres renewed her attack. The energy she summoned backlashed, and an agonized scream escaped her throat. Emien panicked.

  Ruled by terror, he ripped the stone from his pocket and flung it at the sorcerer.

  His throw struck true. Hearvin swayed and slowly crumpled, blood on his temple. The spell which imprisoned Tathagres unravelled into smoke. But Emien saw nothing. Sorcery clove his awareness, sudden and bright as lightning, and he pitched downward into deepest unconsciousness.

  * * *

  Emien wakened gradually, his mouth foul with the acrid taste of ash. Water dripped down his neck, and someone shook his shoulder urgently.

  "Emien?"

  Gentle fingers traced his cheek. The boy stirred, fuzzily aware Tathagres leaned over him, her hands still damp from the stream.

  "Emien?"

  Her tone of voice might have moved the boy to joy under other circumstances. But with his head aching and his senses confused with dizziness, just opening his eyes was an effort. Speech became more than he could manage.

  "Boy, you did well," Tathagres said, her manner more kindly than ever he might have imagined. "Had you not struck Hearvin, I could not have won free so easily."

  Emien blinked. Briefly he wondered whether she could have escaped the red spell at all without help. Memory returned with the precise clarity of an etching; Emien recalled the conflict, the stone, and blood on Hearvin's face. In his mind he felt the soft limp fur of the rabbits when he recovered them, still warm, from the grass. Yet this time his prey had been human; revulsion tore through him. He battled a sudden urge to be sick.

  Tathagres held him, her touch gentle against his brow. As if she understood his distress, she spoke again, concern in her violet eyes. "You did right, Emien. By your oath of service you had no other choice." Her fingers lingered on his cheek. "You shall accompany me to Cliffhaven. After we deal with Anskiere, we will return to Kisburn. My liege will be told of your courage in defending me. He is no mean King. You shall be well rewarded."

  Distressed by the warmth of her praise and unable to escape the sting of his conscience, Emien tensed under her hands. Raised in bitter hardship, he had been taught to treasure life. Appalled to discover how easily he had struck a man with intent to harm, he searched the delicate planes of Tathagres' face with his eyes. She held his gaze. Emien studied her amethyst eyes, all shadows and depth, and complex as weather to fathom. How alike we are, he realized, and shrank at the thought. He drew an aching breath. Speech came at last, with difficulty.

  "Hearvin," he whispered. "What happened?"

  "He is dead." Tathagres shifted, settled herself in the leaves at Emien's side. Her fine hands went loose in her lap. "You killed him cleanly. Kor's Divine Fires, how fortunate you chose a rock! Had you thrown a knife, or any other object crafted as a weapon, the defense ward which grazed you would certainly have taken your life. But a stone could not be traced except by direction. Hearvin was caught off guard. He died instantly."

  Emien turned aside, rejecting her approval. Though Tathagres intended comfort, her words wrought only remorse. He had killed. Neither logic nor circumstances would alter the wretched truth; the act was beyond pardon. The details revolted him. The boy gasped, desperately needing to weep. But no tears flowed, and a spasm of nausea wracked him.

  Tathagres caught his shoulders firmly. Emien felt the warmth of sorcery in her touch. His retching eased, then stilled, and a queer dreamlike peace flowed over his jangled nerves. Yet not even drowsiness could blunt his need to acknowledge the consequence of his deed. In a voice gone dry and bleak, he said, "That was murder." The word ached in his throat.

  Tathagres bent close and sighed. White hair brushed his face, while her eyes gazed down, lovely as jewels, and for once clear of intrigue. "By the Alliance's charter, yes, you committed murder. But you serve me, Emien. I am subject to none but the King. By Crown Law, Hearvin was a traitor. You shall never come to trial, I swear it. And the sailors will never talk. They shall be sold to the galleys and we will use the silver to buy passage to Cliffhaven." She paused and traced Emien's brow with her fingertips. Her touch brought weariness and his lashes drooped.
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br />   "Sleep now." Tathagres' voice softened, blended into distance like rain over leaves. The boy sank into slumber.

  "We begin our vengeance against Anskiere tomorrow morning."

  * * *

  Emien slept. Dreams rose and burst in his mind like bubbles from a well's black depths; he saw sun, and sky, and the swells which rose green and mild off the coast of Imrill Kand. His hands were smaller, younger, less callused, and he struggled with a child's strength to stow the soggy brown twine of a net.

  "No! Emien, not like that!" Drawn out of memory, his father's voice rebuked him, gruff and annoyed, yet still filled with love. But in the dream, as on the day during his tenth summer, the warning came too late. The net tumbled overboard.

  The child started, pulled his hand back, but not fast enough. A coil snared his wrist, whipped taut, and jerked his arm across the gunwale. Wood skinned his elbow. Emien cried out in pain. Yanked off balance, he lunged awkwardly, but failed to recover the snarl of weights before they tripped overboard and splashed into the sea. The drag on his arm increased. Emien braced his weight, tried frantically to tug free. But the twine tightened, hauling him inexorably after the net. He slipped on the floorboards, bashed his side against the thwart. Crying now from hurt and fear, he saw his father lean over him and slash once with the fishing knife which hung always at his hip. The twine fell away, swallowed by the sea.

  Emien tumbled limply against his father's chest. Though the man's huge hands cradled him the boy could not stop weeping.

  "There, son," soothed his father, impossibly close and warm; his comfort was only an illusion born of troubled sleep. Though the boy stirred restlessly, the dream continued, brutal for its clarity; for Emien yearned to erase this moment from memory. The burden it had left upon his heart was unbearable.

  Familiar fingers ruffled his hair. "Little harm is done, child. You're too young for Event's work, I know. When he gets well, the net can be replaced. Dry your tears. The weather will soak me well enough without you adding to it, see? I think a squall is coming."

  Emien looked up, saw the clouds which rolled like ink across the windward horizon. He sniffed and rubbed his chin on the grimy cuff of his tunic, old enough to understand the loss of a net was no slight misfortune. Illness had kept Evertt ashore for nearly a fortnight and the coppers were nearly all spent. His mother and small sister might go hungry until his father brought in a catch. And now under the threat of storm the sloop's sail must be shortened. Already the loose canvas slapped and banged against the sheets. Emien made a valiant effort to master himself.

  His father squeezed his shoulder and smiled. "Good boy. Take the helm, could you? I'll not be long with the sails."

  Emien moved aft, rubbing skinned wrists with fingers still stinging from the twine. He perched on the wide sternseat while his father uncleated the main halyard. Gear rattled aloft. The mainsail billowed, nearly ready for reefing, and the boy curled small hands over the tiller. A gust hissed out of the north, raking his hair and clothes. Canvas smacked taut, and the sloop heeled steeply. Spray boiled over the lee rail, ragged as frayed silk. Emien tried to steer, but strangely the helm would not respond.

  "Head up!" his father shouted, impatient, for the boat yawed on an unsafe heading.

  The boy pitched the sum of his strength against the wooden shaft. He strained until his muscles ached, but the rudder had fouled, caught in the twisted coils of the net recently lost overboard. With tiller stuck fast, the sloop reeled, sails thrashing thunder aloft. Tossed by rising crests, she bucked under cloud-darkened skies.

  Emien's father abandoned the reefing. Slapped by fresh gusts, the sloop's patched canvas flogged with a fury no man could subdue; short of slashing the halyards, the choices left were few. Huddled miserably in the stern, Emien watched his father through a moment of agonized indecision. Green as he was, the boy understood; cut the sails down, and without steering, the boat would be abandoned to the violence of the squall. An unlucky wave might broach her, and everything would be lost. But if the rudder were cleared first, the sails could be brought safely under control. The net might be recovered as well. Emien saw his father assess the waves, the wind, and the oncoming weather with experienced eyes. Then he reached for a spare line and knotted it securely around his waist. The older, dreaming boy wished desperately to cry out, to freeze that moment in time and reverse its fatal outcome. His father would dive only to drown, entangled by the nets as the storm's contrary winds jibed the rudderless sloop again and again and again.

  Yet the nightmare granted no respite. With cruel clarity Emien watched his father spring over the gunwale, never to surface. The boy screamed, jerked the unresponsive tiller until his palms blistered and split. Blind, bestial panic overturned his reason as the boom and thunder of the squall savaged the ocean. Rain fell in whipping sheets. Winds keened through the rigging, unravelling the whitecaps into driving veils of spindrift. Buffeted by the elements and trapped in stormridden meshes of horror, Emien lost all sense of continuity. The sloop's crude, hand-hewn timbers smoothed under his fists, transformed to the slim lines of Crow's pinnace. Emien leaned over one thwart, nails gouged deep into vanished spruce. Showered by blown spray, he strained to reach a brandy cask which bobbed just out of reach in a trough.

  He licked salty lips, shouted. "Taen!"

  The cask and his sister's fate were somehow entangled. But Emien's need was not great enough to abandon the pinnace and follow her. In the desperation of his dream, he snatched up an oar and stretched outward, trying to hook the cask and draw it to the boat. But a white tern appeared out of the mist. Ringed by the harsh aura of a sorcerer's craft, the bird dove at his face. Blinding light burst upon Emien's retinas. Then someone gripped his shoulders and shook him painfully. The brilliance vanished, muffled in darkness.

  * * *

  "Emien?"

  The boy woke with a start. He blinked, momentarily disoriented. Tathagres bent over him, her white hair enhanced by the pearly glow of dawn.

  "You must get up," urged his mistress. "We travel at daybreak."

  Emien braced himself awkwardly on one elbow. "I dreamed." He paused to steady the shake in his voice. "I saw my sister Taen floating in a brandy cask after the wreck of the Crow. She was under a spell by Anskiere. Could this be so, Lady? Should she be alive I-"

  "No," Tathagres interrupted. "You saw nothing but a nightmare."

  She released the boy and turned her face away. "Rise at once, Emien. If we're to cross the heights of Skane's Edge before nightfall, we'll require an early start. And I would prefer dinner and a bed in a tavern."

  Emien clambered stiffly to his feet, too preoccupied to observe the glint of speculation in his mistress's eyes. He banished all memory of the dream, forgetting in his grief his island heritage, that any vision he had experienced could hold more truth than any word of Tathagres'.

  * * *

  Far south of Skane's Edge and well beyond the farthest archipelago under the Alliance's charter, the cask which had sheltered Taen since the wreck of the King's war fleet at last neared its destination. It rolled gently, unmolested by the surf which broke and creamed whitely over the coast of an islet never marked on any chart. Drawn safely to the shallows by Anskiere's geas, the cask grounded with scarcely a bump. The tern perched on the rim stretched slender wings, and a wavelet arose, curling under its tail feathers. The cask lifted on the crest, and was propelled shoreward, and the water receded, chuckling over dampened sand, its burden delivered to firm soil.

  None came to greet the Stormwarden's protege upon her arrival. Breezes rustled through serried tufts of dune grass, and tossed the boughs of cedars whose majestic growth had never known the bite of an axeblade, nor any other abuse of man's invention. The tern hopped to the sand, head cocked to one side. It pecked at the barnacles which crusted the side of the cask. Taen stirred within, roused from her enchanted sleep.

  The Stormwarden's spell released her gradually. Protective as a mother's embrace, the warmth which cradled her limb
s faded gently away. Wakened by the light which leaked through the bunghole in the top of the barrel, Taen stretched. Though she recalled taking refuge in the cask while Tathagres held her captive in Crow's dank hold, she felt no fear. She heard the boom of surf muffled by the staves, and the solid stillness of the land beneath reassured her.

  Taen shifted into a crouch. The bunghole let in a cloud-flecked view of sky, and the smells of tide wrack and cedar. Intently she listened, yet heard no sound but waves and the shrill cries of sand swallows; as far as she could tell, the beach outside was deserted. The girl hammered her fists against the top of the barrel. Barnacles grated, then yielded their grip on the seams. Sunlight flared through a crack and the weathered boards loosened and fell aside.

  Blinking against the glare, Taen stood upright and clung to the rim of the barrel. Except that her shift was speckled with mildew, she seemed little the worse for her journey by sea. Anskiere had delivered her from Tathagres' hands, she was certain; her acceptance of his stewardship went deeper than childish faith. In a manner which had disturbed the villagers on Imrill Kand, Taen often perceived things no youngster should have known. She was fey, her peers had accused in whispers. Their taunts had quickly taught her to value silence. Graced by recognition that the Stormwarden had not taken her destiny in hand without reason, Taen braced her elbows against the raw ends of the staves and gazed about.

  A tern pecked the sand in the barrel's shadow, but there all sense of the ordinary ended. The islet was as beautiful as a dreamer's paradise, uncanny in its perfection. Daylight shone with transcendent clarity upon beaches bejeweled with crystal reflections. Taen raised her eyes to the spear-tipped ranks of the cedars beyond and felt her skin prickle with uneasiness. She had landed on a northeast shore. Raised where life was tyrannized by the moods of weather and sea, she knew the fury of storms from that quarter. Yet if the trees on this shoreline had ever known the brunt of a winter gale, they suffered no damage. Their symmetry was faultless. The place where they grew seemed possessed by a presence older than man's origins, brooding, silent, and eerily sentient.