The Legend of Nightfall

by Mickey Zucker Reichert

  Caught up in his search for a specific man, Nightfall was startled by a movement to his left. He spun faster than appropriate amid so many strangers and found himself face to face with Kelryn. Her white hair formed a knotted, disheveled mane, spotted with leaves and entwined with twigs. Her hazel eyes bore a wild glint of determination.

  Anger welled up in Nightfall, liberally sprinkled with annoyance. He started to turn away.

  Kelryn seized his arm. "Listen to me."

  Nightfall shook off her hand. He headed toward the periphery at a brisk walk.

  Despite her limp, Kelryn caught him easily. She hustled to his side then stepped directly in front of him so suddenly he had to stop to keep from trampling her. He did so from instinct, wishing in the following moment that he had managed to keep moving. Instead, he stared directly into her eyes, focusing the same murderous rage into that glare that had quailed so many.

  Kelryn did not back down. Her soft, green-brown eyes remained fixed on his and did not skitter away. For the first time, Nightfall had met a person more desperate than himself. "You’re going to listen to me."

  "No." Nightfall took a backward step, but the eyes fascinated him. He would not look away first; he never had. Yet if he did not, he would have little choice but to hear. Every sense told him they stood alone, far enough from packing nobles and screaming spectators to go unnoticed and unheard. Nevertheless, he kept his voice low. "I’ll kill you."

  "I don’t care."

  Nightfall grabbed both of Kelryn’s-forearms, shaking just forcefully enough to show her he meant no bluff. The gesture broke the war of wills as well. "Are you deaf or just stupid? I will kill you."

  "Kill me, then, if you must. I don’t care anymore. Just hear my story first."

  "No."

  "Ned may be in danger."

  "I can protect the prince."

  "The way you protected Dyfrin?" Kelryn fairly spat the words at Nightfall.

  The question seemed nonsensical and frightening at once. Nightfall had never declared himself his friend’s defender; yet duty had little to do with the ice that seemed suddenly to clog his veins. “Dyfrin? What about Dyfrin?" The thought of his mentor in danger made him rabid, concerned enough to listen to Kelryn this once. It occurred to him that she might have used the name only because she felt certain it would fully seize his attention. Yet, he had never mentioned the Keevainian to her by name.

  Kelryn bit her lip, holding something back. "Dyfrin came to me several months ago. He talked about you, mostly, asked me to take good care of you. He believed I would."

  "He was wrong," Nightfall returned, not daring to believe Dyfrin had been taken in so easily. Always before, he had read people with an accuracy that seemed almost miraculous, a talent Nightfall had envied.

  "Dyfrin wrong about someone?” Kelryn’s statement echoed Nightfall’s thoughts closely enough to send a chill through him. "It would have been the first time." She raised her brows, eyes still locked on Nightfall’s and without a hint of guilt or doubt. "Dyfrin seemed to read emotion as easily as expression. He always knew your problems, your thoughts, your moods. He always knew what to say to fix the pain."

  Nightfall released Kelryn, as haunted by the constant use of past tense to refer to Dyfrin as by her ability to describe events and ideas she could know nothing about. He wanted to walk away, to make Kelryn believe she had all her facts wrong. But for all the hatred he harbored for this woman, he had to listen for Dyfrin’s sake. Clearly, she knew things she should not, and that truth could hurt him worse than any betrayal. It could harm Dyfrin. "How could you know that?"

  “He told me." Kelryn dropped her hands to her sides. For the first time, her gaze softened and Nightfall found the beauty that had captivated him into a trust that, he believed, had ruined him as well. "Marak, he was born with a talent. Dyfrin was a mind-reader."

  “A mind-reader." It was not Nightfall’s way to repeat things in stupefied horror, but realization left room for nothing else. A million, ancient questions died in mat moment, answered by a single pronouncement that should have seemed obvious. Dyfrin was a mind-reader. It explained everything, from his friend’s uncanny ability to select friends, enemies, and targets to his exceptional talent at consolation of even the worst kinds of pain. For an instant, Nightfall felt betrayed again. The friend whose judgment he had trusted implicitly, who had seemed loyal to the point of learning every nuance of action, expression, and behavior was a fraud.

  Yet Nightfall dismissed the assessment as soon as he made it, regret hammering him at the vileness of the thought. The mind-reading did not matter, only Dyfrin’s decision to use that talent to aid, rather than harm, Nightfall. The applications for such a potent natal ability seemed endless. Dyfrin could have channeled his energies into finding the locations and protections of the world’s most valuable treasures. He could have scanned every wager, discovering who really had the goods. He could have won card games and scams until he owned more money and power than any king. The possibilities became an endless parade, halted abruptly by truth. Instead, Dyfrin had lived in squalor, using his talent to rescue children and adults whom others abandoned as hopeless. Dyfrin’s gift only made him all the more remarkable and generous, and it shocked Nightfall to realize that, with a similar gift to help him understand the ugliness behind the mask most people presented, Edward could have been a second Dyfrin.

  Nightfall pushed aside that thought for ones more frightening, serious, and immediate. Suddenly, the other answers came, those so terrifying he could scarcely find voice to ask the questions. "Dyfrin’s dead, isn’t he?”

  Kelryn lowered her head, eyes suddenly blurred by tears.

  The description of Genevra, the Healer in Delfor, leapt suddenly back into Nightfall’s mind. "Dyfrin was the man the sorcerer killed in your room." Remembered pain from the Iceman’s attack made him cringe. Dyfrin had suffered more than any man should, and the idea suffused Nightfall with a pity that made him want to curl up in a ball and sob as well as a rage that drove him to vengeance and murder.

  "I froze." Kelryn wept. "I cowered in a corner. I was so scared, I just couldn’t do anything."

  Nightfall put the remainder together on his own. Chancellor Gilleran of Alyndar had killed Dyfrin with his ritual, ripping out the Keevainian’s soul for the mind-reading talent he coveted. He knew so much about Nightfall because he had read Kelryn’s mind afterward, leaving her alive as a means to gather more information about him should it become necessary. In Alyndar’s dungeon, Nightfall had believed Gilleran had a truth-detecting spell; but it was so much more. The idea of Dyfrin’s spirit writhing in agony inside a sorcerer made his stomach flop. He gagged on bile.

  Kelryn fought her own war of conscience. "If I had just done something. Anything. Maybe I could have saved him."

  Nightfall shook his head. "You could have done nothing but get yourself killed as well. And probably Genevra."

  Kelryn drew her head back, obviously surprised by his knowledge of Genevra.

  "I met her in Delfor," Nightfall explained. “She wanted you to know she was fine and well-protected.”

  Kelryn smiled slightly at a bit of good news among so much bad. She met Nightfall’s gaze once more.

  The hatred vanished, displaced by a grief tempered only by guilt. No longer confined, love filled the aching void. Nightfall felt as if he would drop dead where he stood if he did not hold Kelryn. He caught her in his arms, and she embraced him with equal fervor. "I’m sorry," he said, the apology seeming far from adequate.

  Kelryn clung, apparently needing nothing more. "I love you. I always did. I always will."

  Why? Nightfall wanted to scream. Why? It made no sense for a woman so perfect to care about one so unworthy, and he wondered why the holy Father had so blessed him when so many good people had so little. Yet, he knew he would not have long to enjoy his fortune. Within months, Gilleran seemed likely to add his soul to the collection. Nightfall would join Dyfrin one more time, in an agony that would end one wa
y of two: with his soul and talent spent or, upon the sorcerer’s death, replaced by the eternal torment of the Father`s hell. Dyfrin, at least, Nightfall believed, would find paradise. Carefully, he unwound himself from Kelryn’s hold. “Kelryn, it would be better for both of us if we went our separate ways."

  Kelryn jerked back, clearly stunned. "But I . . . We finally . . ." She concentrated on completing a thought. "You still don’t believe me?"

  "I believe you," Nightfall assured. "And I truly am sorry for everything I put you through." He recalled the incident in Noshtillan’s eatery, and realization added another depth of honesty to his already forthright account. "If I ever hit you again, just kill me. I’ll let you. I promise."

  "Don’t be absurd."

  "I’m not joking. People who hit those they love don’t deserve the life the Father gave them."

  "I agree." Kelryn kept her expression as somber as Nightfall’s, making it clear she would not allow him to hurt her again. "But at the time you slapped me, you hated me. And you had every reason to believe you should have done far worse.”

  "But I shouldn’t have-"

  Kelryn interrupted. "Drop it. Don’t dwell on it. One lapse doesn’t make you evil. Under the same circumstances, I probably would have hit you, too." She waved off a response. "We have more important things to talk about right now. Edward might be in danger.”

  A nudge from the oath-bond turned Nightfall’s thoughts immediately to this new problem. "How do you mean?"

  I Kelryn cocked her head, as if seeking permission to give him details. "The Iceman came to me to find you. He wound up in a fight with the sorcerer who killed Dyfrin."

  "Gilleran," Nightfall said, suddenly recalling his glimpse of and search for the chancellor.

  Kelryn continued the story. "He killed the Iceman.” She cringed, apparently at the image of the ritual. "But first he said some things that terrified me."

  Nightfall contemplated the consequences of the stand-off. Gilleran’s power had doubled if he’d slaughtered Ritworth and added the Iceman’s spells to his repertoire. The thought sent a shiver through Nightfall. The killer freezing spell, flight, and the mud doll tortures had all become the property of an already too-powerful sorcerer. The situation seemed concerning enough, but Nightfall probed for the specifics of Kelryn’s worry. "What did he say?"

  Kelryn ran a hand through her white locks, the movement stopped by a stick snarled into a tangle. "At the time, he was trying to win the Iceman’s trust, so he may have exaggerated or lied outright. I don’t know whether he meant any of it, but he claimed to be next in line for Alyndar’s throne. And he told us the princes would die in tourney."

  "Die in tourney‘?" Nightfall spoke aloud as he considered. A few of the competitors had sustained minor injuries from practice weapons or falls from horses, but he had no reason to suspect that death during the nobles’ games occurred more often than rarely. The only way Gilleran could know such a thing was if he planned to arrange it, yet that idea had its flaws as well. If Gilleran planned to harm Edward or Leyne, why did he wait so long? Unless he had more faith in Edwards’s abilities than everyone else, he would have to believe he would arrive after the younger prince was already eliminated from competition. The oath-bond continued its steady, discomforting hum, apparently still uncertain whether the danger to Edward had become concrete or serious. As Kelryn said, Gilleran had been talking to impress Ritworth.

  “Die in tourney. That’s what he said." Her gaze followed a spectator hurrying toward a private corner near the gates. A roar from the crowd indicated the end of the current match. "You should also know I’m bound to say nothing negative about Gilleran that Ned or his relatives might overhear, and I have to tell him he’s safe from sorcerers now. Ritworth is dead."

  "Bound?"

  "Magically bound."

  "Aah.” Nightfall knew that spell too well.

  "So you’ll have to warn Ned.”

  Nightfall saw the difficulty Kelryn missed. "I tell Prince Edward what you saw and heard, then he asks you about it and you have to deny the danger." He shook his head. "He’ll think I made the whole thing up."

  "I’ll tell him about the magical binding." Kelryn cringed, apparently in response to some prodding from her own oath-bond. "Or you could tell him about it."

  Needing to protect his own apparent loyalty, Nightfall thought it better that Prince Edward know nothing of oath-bonding. "Bad idea."

  Kelryn sighed in obvious frustration. "What do you suggest?"

  "We don’t put the prince in the position of choosing between our allegiance and that of a chancellor he’s probably known and trusted since birth. We handle Gilleran on our own."

  Kelryn looked stricken.

  Nightfall amended. "Or I handle him. It’s just as well that you don’t get involved any more than you already have." The oath-bond intensified, rising and falling in sickening waves of warning.

  Kelryn bit her lower lip, obviously struggling with words. "Marak, I know you’ve done many things no one else would dare. But it’ll take more than one man, even one with your reputation, to handle a threat like Gilleran."

  Nightfall shrugged, trying to look unaffected though he felt like a landlubber riding the deck in a sea gale. The oath-bond would keep him from harming any official of Alyndar, including the sorcerer. That complicated the matter to the boundary of impossibility. "I think you should leave while you still can."

  "No." Kelryn seized Nightfall’s hand. “I won’t lose you a second time. Not without a fight. I’ve frozen twice when it came to helping others stand against Gilleran. Not again. He’s an evil that needs destroying.”

  Nightfall considered. He would prefer that Kelryn fled to safety. Barring that, however, he might need her to battle a sorcerer he could not harm by his own vow. "Very well, then. Let the hunt begin."

  Kelryn and Nightfall had not located Chancellor Gilleran by the time the last match before the finals ended and Edward headed back toward camp. As the cheers and applause thundered across the pasture, they rushed back to camp to meet Edward, trying to look casual.

  Many neighbors returned first, discussing winning maneuvers with a detail that told Nightfall more than he ever needed to know. Leyne had bested Hartrin’s Prince Irbo after a lengthy bout with maces and shields. An overlord’s son from Grifnal, named Sander, would face each Nargol in the upcoming finals. No matter the end results, three matches would be fought, with sword and shield. Each contestant would engage in single combat with the other two, no matter the outcome of the first match. Therefore, even should Sander best one of the princes, Leyne and Edward would fight. The victor of the duchy would have to win both of his matches. Nightfall considered the logistics. Obviously, only one contestant could possibly win two battles. The difficulty would come if each won one and lost the other. Yet, Nightfall suspected, such a circumstance would not upset any official or spectator, only prolong the excitement to the following day.

  Shortly, Edward returned, expression somber as he considered the upcoming competition and, Nightfall guessed, the need to stand against his brother. As he drew closer, his gaze fell on Kelryn and a light sparked through his blue eyes. His stern look brightened into a delighted smile. "Kelryn!" He swept her into a joyful embrace.

  Nightfall watched placidly, wishing the happy reunion looked a bit more friendly and less sensual. Now that he and Kelryn had renewed their relationship, the concern he held for her closeness with Edward withered to simple jealousy. The two made a spectacularly good-looking couple, and the affection they held for one another seemed obvious, at least to him.

  "Kelryn, I’m so glad you found us. I’ve been worried about you.” Edward’s expression changed to one of regret. "We had to leave quickly, a misunderstanding with the duke."

  Peering around Edward, Kelryn flashed Nightfall an interested look that suggested she would expect a full explanation later.

  Edward continued, oblivious to the exchange. "You got Sudian’s note, I presume."

  K
elryn rescued Nightfall from his alibi. "I got it. I came straight here. It took me longer on foot, and I ran into some trouble.”

  Prince Edward disengaged to study Kelryn’s features. "Bandits?" Nightfall could not see his face, but his voice indicated horror at the possibility that highwaymen had ambushed Kelryn while alone.

  "No." Kelryn gave Nightfall an uncomfortable glance. "The Iceman. Your chancellor arrived just in time, though, and dispatched him. He told me to tell you you had nothing more to fear from sorcerers."

  "Good old Gilleran." Edward brushed hair from Kelryn’s cheek. "Always there to remind me there’re kindly sorcerers as well as the bad ones."

  Kelryn said nothing.

  Nightfall rolled his eyes at the naive innocence to which he had grown accustomed. Kelryn had spoken her piece. Now, he hoped, her oath-bond would cease to control her.

  Edward took Kelryn’s hand and steered her to his blanket. He gestured her to sit.

  Kelryn obeyed.

  Nightfall aided Edward, who would not brag. "You came just in time. My master made the finals. If he bests two more opponents, he becomes the duke."

  "Really? Congratulations.” Kelryn smiled so prettily that Edward blushed.

  "Now, Sudian. I’m just glad to make it this far." Edward glanced at Kelryn apologetically. "It’s not likely I’ll get any further, but you still might want to watch. My opponents are worthy."

  “He’ll do tine." Nightfall politely contradicted. “He’s just a bit anxious because he has to fight his older brother.”

  Edward turned his squire a pointed glare, clearly prepared to lecture about the rudeness of emphasizing a master’s weakness.