[Lyra 03] - The Harp of Imach Thyssel

by Patricia C. Wrede - (ebook by Undead)

  As he went on, the mist changed, so slowly that at first he did not even notice it. The air grew cold, and the smell of flowers faded. The mist thinned fractionally, barely enough for Emereck to tell that he was moving through trees. It seemed to be darker as well, though that was probably only his imagination.

  A long time later, he realized that the horse was no longer moving. If I’m not riding I should dismount, he thought fuzzily. He tried to swing his leg up, but his muscles did not seem to be working properly and he overbalanced. He felt himself falling, and then the ground hit him and he lost consciousness.

  Shalarn sat in the darkened room, staring at the dying embers in the brazier. Her black hair hung loose around her face, and her hands were clenched in tense concentration. The room was silent except for the sound of her breathing and the occasional faint crackle of the fire.

  Slowly a picture formed in the air before her, framed in swirling smoke. Men in armor stood before a large building, shouting words she could not hear. The scene shifted. Firelight flashed on steel, and a man fell. Her eyes narrowed angrily; she had ordered them to avoid fighting! With effort she controlled herself before she lost the vision, and saw that the scene had changed again. A line of mounted men blocked a courtyard gate, and dark smoke flowed out from them.

  Shalarn leaned forward eagerly. They had found him, then! She tried to shift the viewpoint, and caught a glimpse of two young men on horseback just in front of the line of soldiers. Behind them was a shadowy blur. She struggled to focus the spell, and suddenly a curtain of mist hid the scene. Shalarn gasped. Even through the seeing-spell, she could feel the echo of sorcery.

  The mist swirled, then parted to show one of the young men from the courtyard. His side was wet with blood, and he was alone. As she watched, he swayed and fell from his horse.

  On impulse, she murmured another spell. The picture shivered, and the other man appeared. The room faded from her awareness as she concentrated on him, drawing him in the direction she had chosen. It was much easier than she had expected. She brought him to a point almost on top of the wounded man, then let go of her spells. As the picture vanished, she wondered absently whether the two men even knew each other. Well, she had done what she could, and those blundering soldiers would have much to explain when they returned.

  With a sigh, she released the last threads of the seeing-spell. She would learn no more tonight. She stretched her cramped muscles and sat back, wondering whether she should try again the following night. The seeing-spell was unreliable at best, and it required considerable power. Then, too, there was always the chance that Lanyk would discover what she was doing. Her men would return in seven or eight days; perhaps she should wait until then for an explanation.

  Shalarn frowned. The raid had failed; that at least was clear. And there was sorcery involved, strong sorcery. The Cilhar had wizard friends, then. Perhaps that was the key to his importance. Or was he himself the wizard?

  Her frown deepened. There was still too much she did not know. The thought of a foretelling crossed her mind, but she dismissed it at once. She knew from bitter experience how misleading oracles and auguries could be. Again she considered making a second attempt at the seeing-spell. But a sorcerer might detect it, and that could bring everything to ruin once more.

  Shalarn straightened in sudden decision. She would wait the seven days for her explanation. In the meantime, she would build her strength for whatever confrontation might come. Her face relaxed into a smile, and she rose and left the room. Behind her, a wisp of smoke curled up from the brazier and vanished as the last of the fire winked out.

  CHAPTER

  THREE

  Emereck awoke to the smell of smoke and the hissing sound of fat dripping into a fire. For a moment, he was sure that this was their previous camp and the entire episode of the inn had been a dream; then he tried to move and the pain in his side told him otherwise.

  He opened his eyes and looked down. His chest had been crudely wrapped in the torn remnants of his tunic. He blinked, then rolled cautiously onto his good side and raised himself up on one elbow to look around.

  Judging from the sunlight, it was late morning. He was lying under a tree in the middle of a forest or a grove of trees. He saw no sign of the mist, the lake, or the village. His horse was tethered nearby, along with another mount he recognized as Flindaran’s. Flindaran himself was sitting on the opposite side of a small fire, scowling at a rabbit he had suspended over the flames. Emereck stared at him in disbelief.

  At the rustle of Emereck’s movement, Flindaran looked up, and his expression lightened. “Emereck! You haven’t—I mean, you’re…”

  “Flindaran, what are you doing here?” Emereck demanded.

  Flindaran’s answering grin held profound relief. “Taking care of you, you ungrateful croaker. You’re lucky I found you.”

  “I’m not sure ‘lucky’ is the right word.” Emereck pushed himself up to a sitting position, wincing as he did. “What happened to Ryl and Kensal? And how did you find me in all that mist?”

  “I don’t know. We had to fight our way out of the courtyard. I lost Ryl and Kensal just outside, so I turned left and headed for the woods, the way Kensal suggested. I thought I saw Ryl ahead of me a couple of times after I got into the trees, and I tried to follow her. I lost her again just before the mist started to clear, and then my horse practically tripped over you. It was more luck than anything.”

  The explanation sounded a little odd to Emereck, but it was no more unlikely than some of the things Flindaran had done in the past. Emereck shook his head. “I can’t get rid of you no matter how hard I try.”

  “Just for that, you get the burned section when the rabbit’s done.”

  “You mean there’s going to be a part that isn’t burned? Your cooking must be improving.”

  Flindaran made a face at him and reached quickly to turn the rabbit. “Now tell me what happened to you. You went galloping through those Syaski like one of the heroic idiots in those tragic ballads you’re so fond of; I was afraid you were going to get killed.”

  “They weren’t—wait a minute, you don’t think I took off like that on purpose, do you?”

  Flindaran stared.

  “My horse ran away with me.”

  A reluctant smile began tugging at the corners of Flindaran’s mouth. “Well, you never have been much of a horseman. Go on.”

  Emereck described his encounter with the swordsman, but skipped lightly over most of the nightmarish ride that followed. When he finished, Flindaran shook his head. “I keep telling you and telling you, you ought to learn how to handle a sword. Maybe now you’ll listen to me.”

  “I’ll think about it.”

  Flindaran grimaced. “You’re lucky all you got out of it was a scrape on the ribs! I’m not Philomel the Healer, you know.”

  “Just a scrape?” Emereck shifted, and winced again. “It feels a lot more serious than that to me.”

  “That kind of wound usually does.” Flindaran paused, looking worried. “I tried to clean it off a little, but I’m not sure how good a job I did. And I wasn’t sure which of your herbs were supposed to be good for bleeding, so I didn’t use any.”

  “It’s just as well, though I suppose you’d have managed not to kill me. But it sounds as if you did all the right things.” Emereck stopped and studied his friend. “Don’t worry so much. It would have been worse if things had happened the other way around.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “What would your father say if the two of us rode up to his castle and you were the one with his chest wrapped up like this?”

  “He’d probably say I deserved it. And he’d be right; those Syaski were lousy swordsmen.”

  “They weren’t Syaski.”

  Flindaran shrugged. “Maybe the first bunch weren’t, but I’ll bet you a new harp the second batch were.”

  “The second… That’s what he meant!” Emereck said, startled.

  “What who meant?” />
  “The soldier who came charging around the inn right before the one on the horse started doing… whatever it was. I only caught a few words of what he said, but it fits. He must have been warning the Lithmern that there were real Syaski coming down the road!”

  “You’re sure they were Lithmern?”

  “Positive. Their accents were right, even if their armor wasn’t.”

  “Maybe they’re just hiring their swords to Syaskor for a while. That would explain the armor.”

  “Lithmern working for Syaskor?”

  “Sure. Half the Lithmern army has turned mercenary in the past couple of years. There wasn’t much else they could do after Alkyra wiped out their invasion.”

  “It’s a pity Lithra and Syaskor aren’t neighbors,” Emereck commented. “They deserve each other. But if the Lithmern we saw were working for Syaskor, why were they worried about more Syaski showing up?”

  “I don’t know.” Flindaran frowned. “I don’t like the smell of the whole thing. Lithmern in Syaski armor, real Syaski who can’t fight—none of it makes any sense!”

  “Don’t forget the magic.”

  “Magic?”

  “What do you think Ryl and that Lithmern were doing, reciting Varnan poetry?”

  “Oh, that. That’s not what I was talking about; magic never makes any sense.”

  “At least not to swordsmen.”

  Flindaran ignored him. “I wish I knew why they thought Kensal was important enough to send a raiding party for him.”

  “We could go back and look for him; maybe he knows.”

  “Are you out of your mind? We barely got away as it was.”

  “It was just a suggestion.”

  “Your curiosity is going to get you killed one of these days. Besides—are you sure you should ride?”

  “I don’t have much choice. We can hardly camp here for a month while my side heals.”

  “We have a couple of weeks to spare before we’ll be missed at Minathlan; Father’s expecting us to come in with the caravan. At the rate Goldar was going, it’ll be at least three and a half weeks before they get there. We should be able to do it in a week, once your side is healed.”

  “You’d go out of your mind from sitting here doing nothing, and I’d do the same from watching you. Riding may wear me out, but I doubt it’ll do me any real harm.”

  Flindaran looked at him sharply, then grinned. “All right, then. We’ll head for Minathlan. But first we eat.” He leaned forward and reached for the rabbit.

  It was mid-afternoon by the time they were ready to leave. Flindaran helped Emereck mount, then swung himself into his own saddle. “All right, pick a direction.”

  “I thought we had decided to go on to Minathlan.”

  Flindaran grinned. “Yes, but which direction is that?”

  “You mean you don’t know where we are?”

  “I haven’t the foggiest notion.”

  “Oh, we’ve ‘mist’ our way?”

  Flindaran groaned. “I surrender.”

  Emereck shook his head. “Why didn’t you mention this earlier?”

  “What difference would it make? We’d still be lost.”

  “You and your shortcuts. I don’t suppose you have any idea how to get us out of this?”

  “Well, we don’t want to go back to Tinbri, and I think that’s west of us. Minathlan ought to be somewhere north and east. So why don’t we… why don’t we…” Flindaran frowned, staring into the trees. “That way,” he said suddenly.

  “What?” Emereck squinted up at the sun, then looked at Flindaran in puzzlement. “But that’s almost due east; you just said we have to go northeast to get to Minathlan.”

  “It feels right.”

  Emereck stared. “What are you talking about?”

  “It feels right,” Flindaran said stubbornly. He hesitated, then continued with more confidence, “Besides, it’ll be easier to find out where we are if we go east.”

  “Oh, really.”

  “There’s a road the caravans take that runs northeast from Kith Alunel; we should come to it before too long. Then all we have to do is follow it and we’ll get to Minathlan.”

  “That sounds as if it makes a little more sense.”

  “And when we get to the road, we’ll be on a regular route again.”

  “You just convinced me.”

  Flindaran nodded absently and they started off. Flindaran went first, and Emereck followed, gritting his teeth. Despite his reassurances to Flindaran, he was in no condition to enjoy the ride. Even at a deliberately slow walk, his side was painful. He tried to take his mind off it by watching the trees, but it only made matters worse. The trees all looked the same; watching them gave him a headache.

  Flindaran moved surely through the forest, seldom checking their direction. After a time, Emereck began to feel uneasy. How could Flindaran be so certain of their way? Emereck looked up, trying to determine the position of the sun for himself, but the heavy canopy of leaves made it almost impossible. Finally he rode up to Flindaran and asked bluntly, “Are you sure you’ve never been in these woods before?”

  “Of course I’m sure. What kind of question is that?”

  “I just thought—” Emereck was suddenly at a loss for words to explain his nebulous suspicions. “Never mind. I’ll just be glad when we’re out of this forest.”

  “You will? Why?” Flindaran’s voice was surprised and puzzled. “I like it. It’s so green.” Emereck did not reply, and Flindaran went on in a musing tone, “You know, my grandfather claimed our family originally came from somewhere around here, back when Minathlan was still desert.”

  “Really? I didn’t think there were any records that went back that far.”

  “There aren’t. It’s just a family legend about some ancestor who left this area and settled in Minathlan.” Flindaran looked up at the trees. “No doubt he had a good reason,” he added sourly.

  Emereck swallowed the reply he had intended and said nothing. Flindaran did not speak often of his home, but Emereck had heard descriptions from minstrels who had been there. Minathlan was a flat country with few trees, tending to a dusty yellow-brown in summer and a muddy gray-brown in winter. The land had been reclaimed from desert many centuries before by some anonymous wizard, and the Dukes of Minathlan had worked it well since then. But neither magic nor diligence could coax more than a mediocre harvest from most of the land, and though Minathlan was not poverty-stricken, it was far from prosperous. Emereck did not find it surprising that Flindaran preferred the forest.

  They rode on in silence. Emereck’s headache receded, but his side still pained him. He bore it as long as he could, but finally he was forced to call a halt. Though it was still early they made camp, and Emereck fell quickly into an exhausted sleep.

  In the morning they went on. Though Flindaran was as sure of their way as ever, they rode for most of the morning without finding any sign of a village, a road, or even of the end of the forest. “Are you sure we haven’t been going in circles?” Emereck asked at last. “I thought we should have found that road of yours by now, even at this pace.”

  “No,” Flindaran said absently.

  “No, we’re not going in circles, or no, we shouldn’t have found a road?”

  “I meant—” Flindaran stopped and his head turned. “What was that?”

  Emereck paused, listening. The forest was silent; not even a breath of wind rustled the leaves. “I don’t hear anything.”

  Flindaran pulled his horse to a halt and gestured. “It was over that way.”

  Shaking his head, Emereck peered into the trees. A sudden gust of wind swept through them, bringing with it, faint but clear, a whisper of music.

  “There!” Flindaran said. “Did you hear it?”

  “I heard it.”

  “Who would be playing flutes in the middle of a forest?”

  “I don’t know. But those weren’t flutes, or any other instrument I’ve ever heard. And if you don’t mind, I’d like—�
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  “—to go find out what they are,” Flindaran finished. “And you claim I have a one-track mind!”

  “It didn’t sound as if they were too far away,” Emereck offered.

  The two men looked at each other. Flindaran grinned. “Let’s go, then.” They swung their horses around and started off in the new direction.

  CHAPTER

  FOUR

  As they went on, the stirrings of wind became a steady breeze and the music grew gradually louder. It was a haunting tune that changed constantly just as it seemed about to slide into a familiar ballad or song. It made Emereck uneasy even as he admired the skill of whoever was improvising it. He thought of the legendary swamp-spirits of Basirth, whose flickering lights lured unwary travelers on until they became hopelessly lost. The music behaved similarly; whenever Emereck and Flindaran began to drift off the path, a breath of wind would bring them another snatch of melody.

  Emereck shivered. He realized with a start that he had fallen well behind; Flindaran was just disappearing over the top of a low rise. Emereck called to him to wait and urged his horse forward, heedless of the pain it caused in his side.

  At the top of the rise, the trees stopped. Emereck squinted against the sudden sunlight and took a deep breath, then coughed at the heavy, unexpected scent of flowers. Belatedly, he realized that the slope below was a solid mass of blue halaiba flowers. A wake of crushed and bent plants marked Flindaran’s route down the hill, and the air was sweet with their scent.

  The flowers ended at the base of a long, high wall almost in the center of the open area. Even from where Emereck stood, the milky stone of the wall showed signs of weathering. Treetops showed above the wall, and Emereck could see a flash of white further on that might be a tower. The scene had an air of unreality about it, like a mountain seen through bright haze on a summer day.