by Melanie Rawn
Lhoys snorted. “Only after I had my bellyful of guiding other people’s riches through the mountains, girl. There are less dangerous livings.”
Twilight guided them to a rocky outcropping. Lhoys shook her head in defeat. “Six horses, by the scars on the bushes where they tied the reins. They took the harder path from here. Not even I could find them now.”
“Lhoys, look over here.” Feylin picked up a small, shiny object that had caught her eye. “It’s a coin—no, a medallion.”
He took it from her, ran a finger over both surfaces. “Minted back when the Merida held Stronghold. They had a legendary goldsmith then. I recognize the work.” He spat again. “Merida—damn them!” As they went back to the others, he asked, “Did you ever see his princess?”
“No. All the times they’ve visited, I’ve been out chasing dragons.”
“Fire in her hair and called to her hand when she pleases—but nothing compared to the Fire that will kindle around the Merida when she learns of this. She’ll lead whole armies to get him back.”
“They’ll kill him if she tries!”
Lhoys’ eyes glittered in the dimness. “You’ve never seen the princess,” he said.
Beliaev rubbed at the ritual scar on his chin and glared at the shy slivers of the moons just visible between the jagged mountains. In only a few days they would rise full and provide light enough to ride by. As it was, he was in constant danger of slipping on treacherous rock or missing an essential landmark. The timing had been all wrong, he complained to himself as he rode, and the bitch princess was not going to be pleased. Well, that was her problem, Beliaev thought, and cursed as his gelding’s forelegs skidded on loose stones. How could he have known that fool of a prince would go out sightseeing dragons so soon? How could he have anticipated that Rohan would ride through the very hills where Beliaev and his men were scouting suitable ambush?
They had arrived only yesterday. That meager stand of brush would not have been Beliaev’s choice for cover, but he supposed things had worked out profitably despite the haste of the arrangements. He tugged the lead rein and indulged himself by spitting on the prince’s blond head. Rohan was slung across the saddle like a sack of grain. Rope tying his wrists and ankles passed tight beneath the horse’s belly. Beside him was one of Beliaev’s dead, with a heavy cloth wrapped around his nearly severed arm so dripping blood would not provide a trail. The royal sword responsible for that death and yet another was now in Beliaev’s possession, along with the prince’s knives—he’d been warned about those—and the sleeveless golden robe. He rubbed his cheek to his shoulder, smooth silk and prickly silver embroidery luxurious against his skin. A pity the garment had been ruined by rips and blood, but perhaps the princess’ women could mend and clean it. Now that they’d finished their hellish dragon tapestries, they had nothing better to do.
His mount’s hooves skittered again, and Beliaev yelped a warning to the men behind him. Two of them were wounded, two of them dead and tied across saddles, and one was holding the bound and gagged squire in front of him. It had cost precious time to secure the casualties, and the going was slow with three horses on leading reins. But leaving the men behind was unthinkable. They were Ianthe’s and identifiable as such by their clothes—and that damned arrow it had taken so long to find in the dirt. The prince’s people must believe that the Merida alone were responsible for Rohan’s capture; thus the medallion left where someone would surely find it. Beliaev grinned at the thought of Lord Chaynal riding north at the head of the Desert armies to the plains outside Tiglath—right past Feruche where Rohan would be kept until Ianthe had done whatever it was she planned to do to him. For his own part, Beliaev would just as soon have carved the prince up into interesting shapes to be sent back to his Sunrunner witch of a wife, but Ianthe had forbidden it. She had assured him that the eventual outcome would be much more satisfying, and there had been a feral glow in her eyes that made doubt impossible.
Not that he trusted her, he mused as he leaned slightly back in his saddle, trying to ease the ache in his back. Lord Farid had gotten in a powerful kick while still on horseback, and it had been a real pleasure to shove his sword into the old man’s side. There were bruises elsewhere, too, that riding did nothing to soothe. Thirty more measures to Feruche, and then he would bask in the attentions of the princess’ women while Rohan was given over to Ianthe. Beliaev trusted her not at all, but any change in plan would not profit him at this time. Possibilities teased him about her plans for the prince, but ended in a shrug. She could keep Rohan for a pet or throw him from the cliffs for all Beliaev cared.
He stretched, unable to spare a hand from reins or lead rope to rub his spine, and thought about the speediest way to get word to his brothers in the north that preparations would have to be hastened. The attack on Tiglath—bold stroke, that—would have to begin earlier than planned. Ianthe and Roelstra had warned against it, but there would never be a better time for the obliteration of the city. The High Prince, in collusion with young Prince Jastri of Syr, would soon be conducting military maneuvers on the Syrene side of the Faolain River. It was Roelstra’s plan to use these armies to annihilate in one swift battle all the troops the Desert could muster. Thus he had ordered the Merida to make no move against Tiglath which would compel Lord Chaynal to split his forces to north and south. But Tiglath lay there ripe and waiting, and if the High Prince thought the Merida would pass up this chance, he was very much mistaken. If the horse-thieving Lord of Radzyn’s army divided to defend Tiglath as well as the Faolain border, too bad for Roelstra. Actually, Beliaev told himself, he’d be doing Roelstra a favor by taking care of half the Desert for him. And, too, with Tiglath in Merida hands, Roelstra would have no way to renege on his promise that the northern Desert would return to its rightful owners. Beliaev did not trust the High Prince, either.
He glanced down as Rohan’s fair head moved and a strangled groan escaped his throat. Sliding his foot from the stirrup, he delivered a careful kick just above Rohan’s ear. No further damage could be risked for fear of Ianthe’s wrath. The prince subsided back into senselessness. Feeble moonlight shone off the bloodstain on his shoulder, and Beliaev smiled. Rotten timing or no, he had Rohan secure and would deliver him as promised. By winter the Merida would rule from Stronghold once more.
This happy thought sustained him through the next few measures of winding mountain tails. At last the sun began to finger tentatively at the eastern sky, and Beliaev picked up the pace a little. He cursed the necessity of swinging wide around the Desert garrison below Feruche, for the back route added another ten measures to an already interminable journey. But it would all be for nothing if Rohan’s men spotted this strange party riding into Feruche.
The sun was summer-hot overhead all day, and by dusk was still brutal. At long last Beliaev led the group through the narrow back pass. Startled guards at lonely posts called down challenges he answered with a snarl. The castle spires rose beyond the rocks, tantalizing him for a full three measures before he finally reached the gates. Inside the courtyard he swung down off his horse, aching in every muscle, and seized the waterskin off the first servant who approached. After emptying it down his throat, he heaved a vast sigh and turned as Ianthe called imperiously from the staircase.
“What are you doing here so soon?”
“Be happy I’m here at all,” he snapped back. Goddess, but the woman was beautiful, he thought. His gaze ran over the perfect body barely concealed by a yellow silk bedrobe. Her hair was in tangles and her feet were bare, and it was obvious that she had been aroused from a nap by his arrival with her prize. As her face suddenly lit with an inner fire, he knew she had spotted Rohan.
“He’s not hurt, is he?” she asked, anxious as any mother, though there was nothing tender in her sharp dark eyes.
“Not much. A nick in his shoulder and a sore head. He’s all yours, princess. Do what you want with him.”
“I intend to,” she said, and gestured to her hovering women. Th
ey maneuvered the prince to the ground and two men came forward with a litter. As Rohan was carried into the keep, Ianthe caught sight of the boy. “What’s that?”
“His squire, I should think. Farid died in the skirmish. I didn’t think you’d mind about that, but I do draw the line at killing children.”
“So you do have limits. How interesting. Untie the gag. I want to hear what he has to say.”
Stiff from a long night and longer day spent slung across a saddle, the boy’s blood quickly warmed with the chance to vent his fury. He spat on the ground as the cloth was removed from his mouth, then spat once more, this time at Ianthe.
She backed off a pace, scowling. “Don’t try that again, brat! What’s your name?”
He set his jaw stubbornly and glared at her.
“Speak while you’ve still the tongue to do so!”
Green eyes widened, but he said nothing.
“Those aren’t just Rohan’s colors you’re wearing,” Ianthe mused. “The blue and silver are his, but the black and green—” Tapping a finger against one flawless cheek, she began to laugh. “Oh, I should have known it by the eyes! You’re related to the Sunrunner witch, a kinsman from River Run!” Turning to Beliaev, she said, “How wise of you not to kill him. He’ll be my messenger back to Sioned. Do you know what you’ll be telling her, boy?” she directed at the squire with a viciously sweet smile. “That an army of Sunrunners won’t get her precious prince back for her, not even with Andrade at its head and down on her knees before my father the High Prince. Rohan is all mine now, little one, as he should have been from the start. I’ll let you keep your tongue after all, so you can tell Sioned exactly what you’ll see while you’re here.”
“She’ll kill you!” the boy burst out.
“A faradhi, kill? Never! She hasn’t the courage. None of them do. But I’m a different sort, as your prince will find out soon enough. Beliaev, see that the brat is cleaned and fed. I want him in good condition for his journey back to Stronghold.”
“What are you going to do to my lord?” the boy cried out.
“Things you won’t be interested in until you’re older,” she laughed. “But I may let you watch so you can be educated—and so you can tell that green-eyed bitch exactly what sort of care I gave her beloved.”
She swept away up the stairs, calling for her women to minister to the prince’s wounds. Beliaev, understanding at last what she really wanted from Rohan, remembered the dragon tapestries and was very glad they had not been stitched with himself in mind.
Chapter Twenty-two
Kleve had spent fourteen of his forty-four years traversing the northern princedoms, accompanied only by two sturdy mountain ponies. The solitary life of an itinerant faradhi suited him; he avoided any place larger than a village with the same zeal that he avoided crossing water. But each spring he spent a little time in Tiglath, enjoying the company of a certain innkeeper’s widow and congratulating himself on a life spent away from walls and cities.
Kleve presented himself as usual at Lord Eltanin’s small palace of sun-yellow stone—a sad court since the death of lovely young Lady Antalya. Kleve expected that his lordship would as usual require him to contact Princess Sioned with reports too sensitive to be entrusted to parchment and which faradhi oaths kept secret. But Eltanin, whose face was scored by lines that made him look nearly Kleve’s age, had only two messages for the princess: the Merida threatened, and Prince Rohan was many days overdue.
Thus it was that Kleve saw only one sunrise in Tiglath before setting off into the Desert again. The princess had told him on the sunlight to head for Skybowl with the twin purposes of finding out where her husband was and to give warning about the Merida. Her colors had been strictly controlled as befitted a ranking faradhi and a princess, but beneath them Kleve had felt a black terror that had given urgent depth to her orders.
Eltanin had provided a horse half again as large as Kleve’s own faithful pony, and the gelding’s strong, smooth gait proclaimed him one of Lord Chaynal’s blooded stock. Kleve had never bestrode an animal as fine and fast as this one, and made silent apology to his abandoned old friend for his disloyal enjoyment of the gelding’s speed.
But swiftness alone could not have saved him from the threat that appeared on the first afternoon of his journey. Four riders came toward him out of the sun. Kleve tightened his fingers on the reins to feel the comforting pressure of his rings. Only five, but enough to defend himself with Fire and a judicious bit of conjuring if necessary. In his years as a roving Sunrunner he had encountered his share of bandits and thieves who had scant respect for his calling. He had always obeyed the injunction against killing, but he had never scrupled to leave his attackers much the worse for their foolishness.
He reined in the gelding and began his preparations as the four riders bore down on him. When they were near enough to see him clearly, he held up his right hand, fingers spread and angled to catch the light on his rings.
“Thank the Goddess!” a young voice shouted. “Sunrunner, we’re in need!”
Kleve stayed where he was as they rode up—a youth, a girl of about the same age, a man older than Kleve, and a boy with green eyes blazing in a bruised, angry face. He noted swords, knives, and telltale colors at a glance as well as the quality of clothing beneath the dirt. A young knight, a man-at-arms retired to more peaceful pursuits, a squire, and a girl whose position was not immediately clear. The faradhi nodded to himself, relieved. The only threat they posed was to the health of their horses, which bore all the signs of having been ridden too hard and too fast.
“How may I help?” Kleve asked politely.
“Where do I begin?” the girl asked bitterly, raking her hair from her face.
“Names might help,” he suggested. “Mine is Kleve, and I think I’m the person you rode out from Skybowl to find.”
“Exactly,” the young man said. “We have news for Princess Sioned that can’t be entrusted to couriers—and she’s far from Stronghold in any case.” Then he paused, blue eyes narrowing. “How did you know we’re from Skybowl?”
Kleve smiled, accepting the belated tribute to powers of observation and deduction drilled into him at Goddess Keep, and declined to answer the question. After all, Lady Andrade never did. He cast a look at the sun, which barely topped the western hills. “Tell me quickly what message you wish to send, before the light fails and it becomes impossible for me to reach her before moonrise.”
“They’ve taken him!” the boy burst out. “Princess Ianthe has stolen my lord to Feruche!”
The young knight hushed him with a glance and began the tale. Their names were Walvis, Tilal, Feylin, and Lhoys, the latter two of Skybowl, the former from the prince’s own suite at Stronghold. Only Lhoys contributed nothing to the telling, and sat glowering on his horse as the other three traded the story quickly back and forth. Kleve readied himself as he listened, boiling all down to essentials even as he began the lightweave that he would ride to Faolain Lowland where the princess was. Along the ribbons of fading sun he flew, his second such journey today. He was grateful for her instantaneous response and her strong, steadying touch on the light.
Goddess blessing, my lady. Hear me quickly, for the sun dies and I have but five rings. Your prince, seeking dragons, found ambush instead and is now held at Feruche. His squire was released unhurt and found others who were crossing the Desert to me at Tiglath. Your garrison below Feruche is slaughtered. Skybowl has no troops for storming the castle. Lord Farid is dead. Tiglath cannot help, for the squire learned that the Merida will attack within days. Give me your orders, and I will relay them to Walvis.
ROHAN! Her anguished cry nearly shattered the sunlight itself and Kleve marveled that the other four could not hear it. She then disciplined herself to calm, but the colors of fury seething in her made Kleve wince.
Goddess blessing, Sunrunner. Send Walvis to Tiglath with news of the Merida. In my name he will summon the north for battle there. Accompany him, and send to me a
t noontimes when the sun is strongest. I will gather up the southern armies and—and by the Goddess, I will raze Feruche to the dead sands!
And then the sun left the high ridges in darkness, and Kleve gathered himself back into himself. He took several deep breaths to calm his racing heart, for it had been a near thing. Another few moments and the dusk would have claimed him, shadow-lost.
When he could speak, he detailed the princess’ orders. As might be expected of so young a knight, Walvis was torn between the intense desire to battle his prince’s enemies and the equally deep need to rescue him from Princess Ianthe.
“Lord Eltanin can lead the north,” he said at last. “My duty lies with my lord.”
Feylin glared at him and snapped, “We argued this all the way from Skybowl! It was not your fault that the prince was taken! How could you have known? How could anyone? Your duty is to obey the princess and lead the north to victory against the Merida!”
Kleve bit back an untimely smile as the pair faced off. Both of them just under twenty winters, by his estimate, full of prickly pride and youthful impatience. He caught Lhoys’ eye and saw the same amusement there before the older man’s expression smoothed and he spoke.
“Go,” he told Walvis. “She orders it. Tilal will return to Skybowl with us. He’ll be needed to tell her about Feruche.”
Walvis cast a stern glance at the squire, who had jerked upright in outraged protest. “Be silent,” he commanded. “You’ll go back with them. But I should be there, too.”
“Goddess above in glory!” Feylin exclaimed. “Why are men so stupid? Princess Sioned ordered you to go. So go!” She turned to the boy. “There are pens and parchment in my workroom. Lhoys can show you. Draw as much as you can remember of the castle and the cliffs around it, and write down all that goes on inside, how many troops you saw, everything. Goddess keep you, and give my respect to the princess.” She looked a challenge at Walvis. “Are you coming, or are you going to waste more time debating pretty points of duty when the Merida are poised for attack?”