Briar King

by Keyes, Greg

  “Yes, and she answered with nonsense. I was scared then, too scared to demand better answers. Now I want them.”

  “You can’t always have the things you want.”

  “But you—she—wants me to do something. Everyone wants me to do something. Act one way instead of another, go to a coven, promise this or that. Well, here I am! If you want something from me, explain it or stay out of my dreams!”

  “You came here this time, Anne, of your own free will.” The masked woman sighed. “Ask your questions. I’ll try to be more helpful than my sister. But you must understand, Anne, that we are far less masters of ourselves than you are, however you might feel. A dog cannot speak like a man and a cloud may not sound like a lute. The dog can bark, the cloud can thunder. It is how they are made.”

  Anne pursed her lips. “Your sister said that Crotheny must not fall, and that there must be a queen in Eslen when your mysterious ‘he’ comes. At the very moment she told me that, my mother the queen was nearly killed. Did she know about that?”

  “She knew.”

  “Why didn’t she tell me?”

  “What good would it have done? The attempt on your mother was over before you returned to Eslen. My sister told you what you needed to know.”

  “She didn’t tell me anything. Who is this man who is coming? Why must there be a queen? And mostly—mostly— what must I do?”

  “You’ll know when the time comes, if you only remember what she said. There must be a queen. Not the wife of a king, you understand, but a queen paramount.”

  Anne’s jaw dropped. “No. No, I didn’t understand that at all. But still—”

  “You must see that there is a queen, Anne.”

  “You mean become one?”

  The woman shrugged. “That would be one way.”

  “Yes, an impossible one. My father and mother and brother and all of my sisters would have to be dead … before …”

  For a moment she couldn’t go on.

  “Is that it?” she asked, feeling cold. “Is that what’s going to happen?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Don’t tell me that! Tell me something real.”

  The woman cocked her head to the side. “We only see need, Anne. Like a good cook, I know when the roast needs more salt or a bay leaf, whether it needs to stay on the spit for another bell or not.”

  “Crotheny is not a roast.”

  “No. Nor is the world. Perhaps I am more like a chirgeon, then. I see a man so wounded and infected that parts of him have begun to rot, and the worms, growing bolder, begin to devour what is left. I feel his pain and disease, and know what salves he needs, where fire needs to be put to the wound, and when.”

  “Crotheny isn’t rotting.”

  The woman shook her head. “It is very nearly dead.”

  Anne slashed the back of her hand in the woman’s direction. “You’re a cloud, you’re a chirgeon. Crotheny is a roast, it’s a wounded man. Speak plain words! You suggest that my country and family are in gravest danger, and that I must be queen or queen-maker, yet here I am in Vitellio, a thousand leagues away! Should I stay or leave? Tell me what to do, and no more nonsense about roasts and invalids.”

  “You’re where you are supposed to be, Anne, and I’ve already told you what to do. The rest you must discern for yourself.”

  Anne rolled her eyes. “No better. No better. Then answer this straight, if you can. Why me? If you can’t really see the future, why am I needed, and not Fastia, or Mother, for love of the saints?”

  The woman turned her back on Anne and walked a few paces. Her back still turned, she sighed. “Because I feel the need for you,” she said. “Because the oaks whisper it, even as the greffyn kills them. And because, of all living women, you are the only one who can come to me like this, unbidden.”

  “What?”

  “My sister summoned you when you walked widdershins under the sun. I did not summon you—you summoned me.”

  “I … how?”

  “I told you. You made a pact with Saint Cer. When you send prayers by the dead, there is always a cost, there is always consequence.”

  “But I didn’t know.”

  The woman uttered a chilling little laugh. “If a blind man walks over the edge of a cliff, does the air ask if he knew what he was doing before it refuses to hold him up? Do the rocks below ask what he did or didn’t know about them before they break his bones?”

  “Then Cer has cursed me?”

  “She has blessed you. You have walked her strangest faneway. You are touched by her as no other mortal.”

  “I never walked any faneway,” Anne said. “Faneways are for priests, not for women.”

  A smile drew across the woman’s thin and bloodless lips. “The tomb below Eslen-of-Shadows is a sedos,” she said. “The womb of Saint Mefitis is another, its twin. They are two halves of the same thing. A very short faneway, I suppose, but very difficult to find. You are the only one to walk it in more than a thousand years. You will be the last to walk it for another thousand, perhaps.”

  “What does it mean?”

  The woman laughed again. “If I knew, I would tell you. But I do know this: It needed to happen. Your prayer to Saint Cer brought you here and set in motion every consequence of that trip. Including this one. As I said, you are where you were meant to be.”

  “So I’m to stay in the coven, even if they throw me in the earth to rot? No, I see. They were supposed to throw me down here, because Saint Cer willed it.” She snorted. “What if I choose not to believe you? What if I think you’re some shine-crafting witch, trying to trick me? You come into my dreams and tell me lies and expect I will eat them like gingercake.”

  A sudden thought occurred that struck her straight to the middle. “What if you’re a Hanzish shinecrafter? That you and your sister bewitched the knight into trying to murder my mother? Of course, you must be! How stupid of me!”

  The implications made her knees buckle. Everyone in Eslen was looking for someone with the power to bewitch a Craftsman and at the very moment it happened Anne had been holding conversation with just such a person.

  And she hadn’t told anyone but the praifec, who hadn’t believed her, and now here she was, caught in the grip of sadistic nuns a thousand leagues from anyone she trusted.

  Even Austra had made her promise not to run away. Maybe Austra was bewitched, too.

  “You’re a liar,” Anne said. “A liar and a witch.”

  The woman shook her head, but Anne couldn’t tell if it was a denial. She started to walk off, into the woods.

  “No! Come back here and answer me!”

  The woman waved her hand, and all was darkness.

  “No!” Anne wailed again. But she was back on the cold stone floor of the cave. She pounded the floor with her fists, tears of anger wincing from her eyes.

  After calling herself stupid a few hundred times, Anne came to one very certain conclusion: She could not and would not trust Sister Secula to let her out of the caves. The masked woman had told her there was another way out. It was probably a lie, but she remembered now the stories in which caves figured, and indeed there usually was more than one exit.

  And so, very carefully, moving very slowly and on all fours like a beast, she crossed the boundary the nuns had warned her not to cross, and passed onto the unknown, uneven floor of the cave.

  It was easier than she expected it to be. Each dip and curve in the floor seemed to be somehow where it ought to be, and exploring quickly became more like remembering. It was both frightening and exciting. What if she really had somehow walked a faneway, like a priest? Like Genya Dare and her heroes? What if this strange new sense wasn’t her imagination, but exactly what it seemed to be?

  Imagination or not, she grew more and more confident of her way, and stood up. The echo of her footsteps told her when she was in a large gallery or small. A colder feel to the air warned her of a deep cleft in the rock, and the taste of the cave’s breath suggested water. The
taste grew stronger as she went along, until finally she could hear a merry trickling. And, after crawling up and down through passages—some almost too small to move through at all—she saw light.

  Dim light.

  Real light.

  Soon the light was bright enough to be painful, and she had to stop to let her eyes regather their strength after so many days of darkness. But finally, when the sun’s rays were no longer daggers, she advanced farther to the mouth of the cave, and for a while she did nothing more than luxuriate in the feel of the light and wind upon her skin. Then she began taking in her surroundings.

  The cave opened from a hillside thick in olive, bay, and juniper. Anne reasoned it was the same long ridge that the coven stood upon, but a few careful glances showed the towers nowhere in sight, which meant she must be on the other end of it. She carefully picked her way toward the top until she finally could see the coven, and see as well that it was quite a distance away. Satisfied that she knew where she was, Anne made her way back down and began to explore, being careful to fix the landmarks near the cave firmly in her mind.

  The flatter land below the cave was lightly forested, the lines of trees broken often by grassy clearings. It must once have been pasture—probably for the stupid sheep—but she saw no recent signs of grazing.

  A little farther on she again heard the trickle of water, and to her delight found a spring-fed pool. A flight of birds darted up from the trees surrounding it, such a bright yellow in color that she exclaimed aloud.

  Finishing her survey around the pool, she tested the water and found it cool. She looked around again, until she convinced herself she was quite alone, then stripped out of the smelly habit and eased into the water. It felt wonderful, and after a little swimming she was content to rest in the shallows, submerged to her chin, and close her eyes. The insides of her eyelids shone red, and she tried to forget about her experiences in the womb of Saint Mefitis—and to forget, too, that she had to go back there. Whether the woman of her vision was a liar or not, there was still her promise to Austra, and she would not break that.

  She might have dozed, for she came awake certain she had heard something but wasn’t at all sure what it was. Suddenly frightened, she looked quickly around the pool, realizing this wasn’t Eslen, that there could be any number of wild beasts around that she knew nothing of.

  But it wasn’t a beast staring at her with wide, dark eyes. It was a man, a tall, young one, in black doublet with brown hose and large-brimmed hat. He had one hand draped on the pommel of a very long sword. He smiled a smile that Anne did not like at all.

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  A QUICK DECISION

  WHEN BROTHER SPENDLOVE AND HIS MEN were out of sight, Stephen urged Angel into a walk that angled them away from the direct path that led back to d’Ef. Spendlove had walked the faneway of Mamres, but he had also walked the same faneway that Stephen had. Each person who walked a faneway received different gifts, but it was reasonable to suppose that Spendlove’s senses had been heightened, as well— and prudent to suppose he could hear at least as well as Stephen.

  Once Stephen couldn’t make out their voices anymore, he turned Angel to a parallel path back to the monastery and urged her to a gallop.

  Riding a running horse with a saddle on a trail was one thing; doing so bareback in the forest was another. Stephen gripped his knees against Angel’s flanks, dug his fists into her mane, and kept his body low. Angel splashed through a stream, stumbled climbing the opposite bank, then recovered. Stephen prayed the mare wouldn’t step into some leaf-hidden hole or den, but he couldn’t afford to spare the poor beast; he knew to his marrow that if he didn’t reach d’Ef before Desmond Spend-love, Aspar White was a dead man.

  He swallowed his fear at the breakneck pace and did his best to hold on.

  He and the mare broke from the woods into the lower pasture, where a handful of cows scattered from their path and the two brothers tending them gawked curiously. Once in the clearing, Angel’s pace went from breathtaking to absolutely terrifying. The two of them pounded up the hill to where he had last seen Ogre.

  The big stallion was still there, watching their approach with suspicious eyes. Stephen slowed as he neared, cleared his throat and shouted, “Follow, Ogre!” in the best approximation of Aspar White’s voice he could manage. He was startled by how good the impersonation was. To his ears and memory, it sounded exactly right.

  Ogre hesitated, stamping. Stephen repeated the command, and the beast tossed his head before—with a steely glint in his eye—he began trotting after Angel.

  Together, they raced through the orchard, whipping past Brother Ehan. The short fellow shouted something Stephen couldn’t hear. Stephen ignored him; he didn’t have time to go back, and there was no need to involve the closest thing he had to a friend in this mess. He had to reach Aspar. With the possible exception of Brother Ehan, there was no one else at d’Ef he could count on. The holter would never survive alone in his condition, and anyway, Stephen himself would be in danger for helping White.

  They would have to flee together, and though he felt shame and failure and all of those things his father would see in this flight, he also had to admit that he was damned well ready to leave the monastery d’Ef. There was too much wrong here, too much darkness, and he wasn’t equipped to deal with it. Furthermore, if the queen of Crotheny was in danger, it was his duty to warn her.

  He halted Angel at the very foyer of the nave and leapt down, then rushed into the cool dark, hoping he wasn’t already too late. Aspar lay where he had been, eyes closed and pale, but before Stephen was within five strides the holter’s eyes flicked open and he sat up.

  “What?” Aspar grunted.

  “You’re in danger,” Stephen said. “We’re in danger. We have to go, and right away. Can you do it?”

  Aspar’s mouth pinched, probably around a caustic remark, but then he snapped his head in assent. “Yah. I’ll need a horse.”

  Stephen drew a deep breath of relief, surprised and gratified that the holter took his word so readily. “Ogre is just outside,” he said.

  “You have weapons?”

  “No. And there isn’t time to find any.”

  “Will we be pursued?”

  “I’m sure we will.”

  “I’ll need weapons. A bow. Do you know where you can get one?”

  “Maybe. But, Holter—”

  “Go.”

  Exasperated, Stephen sprinted back outside, remembering that a bow used for shooting at deer in the orchard was kept in the garden shed. He had never seen any other weapon at d’Ef, unless the butcher’s cleavers counted. There must be an armory somewhere, but he’d never thought to discover it.

  He nearly bowled over Brother Recard on the way out.

  “Brother!” the Hanzish monk asked. “What’s the matter?”

  “Bandits,” Stephen improvised. “Maybe fifty of them, coming through the orchards! We’ll need to defend against them. Ring the alarm.”

  The monk’s eyes went wide. “But why did you come in here?”

  “Because I know the bandits,” Aspar grunted. “They may have followed me here. Outlawed cutthroats from beyond the Naksoks. Bloody-handed barbarians. They’ll not respect your clericy. If you don’t fight them, they take you alive and eat one eye while you watch with the other.”

  “I’ll ring the bell!” Recard said, already racing to do so.

  “I’ll get your bow, now,” Stephen said.

  “Yah. The horses are outside? I’ll meet you there.”

  Stephen reached the shed and took the bow down from its peg, checking quickly to make sure the sinew was there and grabbing the quiver of eight arrows hung next to it. On the way back out of the shed, he noticed a swingle-blade leaning against the wall, the kind used for clearing underbrush. He grabbed that, too, and hurried back to the nave. He found the holter outside, his face white and sweating as he tried to mount Ogre. Monks darted past him, going to the places assigned them in the event of an
attack on the monastery, there to await orders from the fratrex.

  The fratrex, who stood in the doorway of the nave, watched the holter mount with a frown.

  Stephen approached warily. The fratrex shifted his gaze.

  “Brother Stephen,” he asked mildly. “Are you behind this commotion? Why are you armed?”

  Stephen didn’t answer but handed the holter the bow and climbed upon Angel, keeping the swingle-blade in his hand.

  “Answer me,” the fratrex said.

  “Brother Spendlove is coming to kill this man,” Stephen said. “I will not allow it.”

  “Brother Spendlove will do no such thing. Why should he?”

  “Because he’s the one murdering people in the forest, doing the blood rites on the sedoi. The same blood rites you’ve had me research.”

  “Spendlove?” the fratrex asked. “How do you know that?”

  “I heard him say it,” Stephen said. “And now he’s going to murder the queen.”

  “One of our own order?” the fratrex asked. “That’s not possible, unless—” His eyes went wide, and wider still. He gurgled, spit blood from his mouth, and collapsed. From the shadows of the nave behind him, Desmond Spendlove stepped into the light, his men just behind him.

  “Congratulations, Brother Stephen,” Spendlove said. “To spare this holter, you’ve killed the fratrex.”

  Once again, Stephen’s orderly world of assumptions collapsed around his ears.

  “But I thought …”

  “I know. Very amusing, to think this doddering old fool was at the bottom of anything. Did you ever think him wise?” He looked up at Aspar. “And you. I have friends looking for you. I suspect they will be happy enough with some token of your death. Your head, perhaps. And stop trying to string that bow, or I’ll have you cut down right now.” He looked back at Stephen. “Brother, despite your trespasses, you can be forgiven. Well, perhaps not forgiven, but certainly spared. You can still be useful.”

  “I won’t help you anymore,” Stephen said. He swallowed a hard lump of fear, but to his surprise he felt in his chest something stronger forming. “I won’t betray my vows or my church or the people of my country. You’ll have to kill me, too.” He raised his makeshift weapon. “I wonder if you have the courage to kill me yourself.”