by Dragon Lance
“Apparently,” he said, “you’ve progressed quite nicely in your lessons.”
“Now they’re your troops,” she replied.
He looked about at the sweaty, bloody Ogres. He nodded. “And now we’re going to win some battles, instead of sitting and waiting for the humans to come and slaughter us.”
A shout of victory, of celebration, went up around him.
*
Khallayne had been left behind when Kaede had gone crashing down the slope, dragging Jelindra along with her. Her horse had almost thrown her.
Kaede was about to join the fighting when Khallayne caught up with her and tore Jelindra’s reins from Kaede’s saddle. Kaede had barely paused before turning her attention to the battle.
Khallayne took Jelindra into the valley, away from the worst of the fighting. Jelindra was dazed, caught up in some spell. She tried to get away. Khallayne rode her down, caught her by the back of her tunic, and held on as the girl kicked and screamed. Khallayne slid to the ground, still gripping Jelindra’s tunic.
“Jelindra! Jelindra, stop it! Let me talk to you!”
Jelindra kicked her, tried to run.
Khallayne tackled the girl, brought her down hard. When Jelindra rolled over and tried to fight back, she slapped her. “Stop fighting me!” Khallayne shouted.
Jelindra collapsed into sobs. “Please, let me go! Please, Khallayne, let me go. She keeps the thoughts away. Please let me go.”
“What are you talking about?”
The fighting had grown fierce near the stream. Khallayne held Jelindra’s face against her shoulder and watched the Ogre company sending the humans fleeing back into the forest. Their chance to escape would soon vanish if they didn’t leave now.
“She lets me forget,” Jelindra cried, pushing away from Khallayne. Her childish voice rose to a piercing scream. “She lets me forget Nomryh! She lets me forget that I killed him!”
Khallayne sat stupefied as the girl jumped up and ran back toward the group of Ogres who were congregating at the stream, toward Kaede.
She witnessed the end of the fight between Jyrbian and the Ogre captain. She saw Kaede send the dagger flying. Then she saw Jyrbian look around for her and send a handful of guards trotting across the field toward her. She sat on the cold ground and waited for them.
*
Jyrbian claimed the tent of the dead leader. No one disputed his right.
Kaede stood for a moment at the door, surveying the small room created by canvas walls. It housed a cot, which appeared fairly comfortable, a chest, and a small folding table. The table bore neatly folded squares of thick paper, obviously maps, which the Ogre captain had not seen fit to consult.
Jyrbian unbuckled his sword and laid it on the table, then sat on the edge of the cot and loosened the laces of his boots.
“You made the mistake of turning your back on him,” she said finally, part statement, part question.
He eased one boot off and stretched his foot out in front of him before planting it on the carpet. “You were there.”
She smiled at his confidence in her, at the appreciation in his gaze, and remembered with pleasure flinging her dagger and feeling the power of her magic send it to its target.
“Where’re Khallayne and the girl?” Jyrbian asked.
“The girl came back to me,” Kaede said smugly. “I’ll assign guards to keep them under watch, but she won’t stray.”
“No. I want them in here.” He removed the other boot.
Kaede’s expression went from joyous to disappointed, but she turned to follow his orders.
“But not now.” He reached out and caught her before she could take a step, caught the front of her tunic and used his grip to pull her close. With one arm around her, he tugged on the material again, and one of the carved bone buttons popped off.
He tugged again, harder, and thread snapped as two more buttons flew. As she reached for the front of the tunic to unbutton it rather than ruin it, he yanked more buttons off. “Never mind. You’ll need a new uniform for our return to Takar anyway.”
*
They rode into Takar at the head of the company, flags held high, symbolizing their victory.
The warriors’ uniforms had been altered as much as possible, stripes and decorations torn off. They all wore, as did Jyrbian, the crescent symbol of Sargonnas, God of Destruction and Vengeance, fashioned from the bones of their enemy. They were no longer of the Dalle Clan. They were Jyrbian’s.
The pageantry of the warriors drew a crowd of onlookers as they rode through the streets, stirring cheers.
Kaede was breathtaking in her red-and-white silks, her long, silver hair pulled back and braided warrior style.
Khallayne and Jelindra rode behind them, flanked by guards. Jelindra was swallowed up in her warrior tunic. Khallayne wore hers carelessly, showing her disdain.
Jyrbian proudly wore the same clothes he was wearing when he had left Takar, now bloodstained and well used. He’d cut his long hair to just above shoulder length and gathered it at the nape of his neck. His sword lay across his back.
The crowd responded to him, to the power they felt in him. They cheered and ran alongside the troops to keep him in sight.
Riding beside him, Kaede felt like laughing, and did so as the cobbled streets grew crowded and boisterous.
Chapter 16
SONG OF THE ISLAND HOME
Jyrbian faced the Ruling Council as dirty and bloody as the last time he’d stood before one of them. But this time, they were the ones who needed something, and he was the one in a position to bestow favors.
Kaede stood to his right. Jelindra was behind her, and Khallayne stood farthest away, back against the door.
The five members of the Ruling Council seemed smaller somehow, aged by the weeks that had gone by. Jyrbian stood, tall and proud, and did not perform the requisite bow. “I’ve come to offer my services as leader of all the troops of Takar.”
They glanced at each other, but before Anel, the leader, could respond, Jyrbian continued. “My proposal is this. I will consolidate the guards of the clans, and I will turn them into one army. I will reclaim the mountains from the humans. My army will make all the roads safe, as well as the passes and estates. My army will put the slaves back to work, where they belong.”
He took a step closer to the platform on which the five council members knelt and lowered his voice. “And when I have done that, my army will track down the heretic Igraine and his treasonous followers and bring them all back to stand trial for their crimes.”
He heard Khallayne’s soft gasp, but paid it no attention.
Without glancing at the others, Anel smiled and nodded to Jyrbian. “This plan you propose is indeed ambitious, Lord. We shall take it under serious advisement, of course. I’m sure you realize we’d like to discuss it first and hear the report of our agent.” Anel glanced at Kaede. “We —”
“Of course, I understand, Lady,” he interrupted smoothly. “But you must also understand, of course, that I will do these things with or without your approval.”
The gasps this time were from the council, and Teragrym and Enna both half rose, ready to challenge him.
Jyrbian waved them back down. “With you or without you. It is your choice.”
He left the audience chamber as abruptly as he had come, Kaede, Jelindra and Khallayne trailing in his wake. He spoke to the first Ogre he encountered in the hall.
“Who are you?” he demanded.
The Ogre, a male about Jyrbian’s age, but much smaller and paler, had obviously heard of their arrival. “I’m Ginde, Lord Jyrbian, general aide to the council,” he said nervously.
“Well, now, you’re my aide,” Jyrbian said brusquely.
The Ogre gulped, looking first at the door to the chamber, then at Kaede, then back at Jyrbian. “Yes, Sire.”
“I’ll be wanting new quarters. The larger ones on the southern side of the building will do nicely.”
Jyrbian started off down the ha
ll, the aide dancing alongside him, trying to catch his attention.
“But, Lord, those are occupied by —”
“I don’t care. Have them unoccupied. Now. And I’ll want my troops quartered in the section the king’s troops used to occupy,” Jyrbian said, banging open the door to the dining hall.
The room was half filled, busy for midafternoon, and the conversations died away as everyone looked at Jyrbian.
“I’ll be wanting all new things,” he said over his shoulder. “I left nothing behind of any importance. You can put Khallayne in my old apartment. And give Jelindra Lyrralt’s old room for the time being.”
Kaede nodded, leaving him at the door of the dining hall, motioning for the two of them to follow her. Jelindra obeyed with alacrity, Khallayne sullenly.
There were guards everywhere, at corners and doors where there had never been guards in the castle for as long as Khallayne could remember. And very few slaves, most of whom were wall-eyed and cowed.
They passed a small woman slave carrying a tray, and she recoiled against the wall as if she expected to be struck as Kaede brushed by her.
Had the slaves always been so afraid of them? Had they always walked with bowed heads and cringed at the slightest sound of a raised voice? Khallayne glanced back at the woman, but kept walking.
“In here.” Kaede held open the door to Lyrralt’s old apartment and waited for Jelindra. As soon as the girl was inside, Kaede pulled the door closed and locked it, tucking the key inside her jacket.
Khallayne heard Jelindra scream.
“Kaede —!” She wheeled toward Jelindra’s door, then toward the rooms that would be hers – Jyrbian’s old apartment. The door was already closing behind Kaede. Khallayne surged forward, realizing that, now that Jelindra was safely locked away, Kaede had released the spell that had bound the child’s memory.
Khallayne banged the door open, slamming it into the wall.
Kaede looked up from a chest set against the far wall, her eyes narrowed, dangerous, as she waited for Khallayne to speak.
“Looking for something?”
Kaede stood and allowed the lid of the chest to bang shut. “Evidence.”
“Of what?” Khallayne pulled her jacket close against the chill in the room. It smelled damp and musty, of being closed up for weeks. Without moving a muscle, she lit the half-burned logs in the fireplace.
Kaede didn’t blink. “Of the Song of History.”
“The what?” Khallayne covered her quick intake of breath by turning toward the crackling fire and holding out her hands. Every ounce of her willpower was required to not look at the window, at the sill, to see if Jyrbian’s collection of crystals still stood there.
“The Song of the History of the Ogre.”
“I don’t understand,” Khallayne lied, pretending to examine the figurines on the mantel. Surreptitiously, she glanced at Kaede in the mirror that hung above the fireplace.
Kaede had the door to the wardrobe open and was fingering Jyrbian’s clothes. “Bakrell and I are the last of the Clan of the Keeper.”
“I thought the Keeper was the last.”
“My mother was not born in a sanctified marriage, but we are blood nonetheless!” Kaede said the last fiercely, as if daring Khallayne to deny it.
When Khallayne said nothing, Kaede continued, “I’ve never felt the Song was dead. Never. There would be a silence in me if it were gone.”
“So … where is it?”
Kaede looked frustrated. She went to the center of the room and turned slowly, eyes closed tightly, as if sampling the air. She sighed. “I don’t know. But I feel it strongest when I’m with Jyrbian.”
Khallayne nodded. “Why haven’t you just asked him?”
Kaede grinned. “Obviously you don’t know Jyrbian as well as I thought you did. If he knew I really wanted it, he’d never give it to me.”
The room was beginning to warm. Khallayne slipped off the heavy riding jacket and tossed it across a chair. “If you know what kind of Ogre he is, I don’t see why you follow him.”
Kaede laughed mirthlessly. “Obviously, you really don’t know him.” She was still laughing as she left the room without bothering to lock Khallayne in.
Khallayne ran on light feet to the door and opened it just a crack. She could hear Kaede’s laughter dwindling as she strode down the hall.
She retrieved her jacket and forced herself to wait several more minutes before venturing out into the hall.
A guard was stationed at the intersection of the corridor at the other end of the hall, and she straightened as Khallayne emerged. Khallayne concentrated, striking with a mental blow, right above her eyes, as hard as she could.
The guard dropped with a clatter of sword.
Khallayne held her breath. She waited for someone to come to the guard’s aid, but the hallways remained silent. She pressed her face against the heavy carving on the door, but there was no sound coming from Jelindra’s rooms. “Jelindra?” She called softly.
No answer.
She was afraid of what the girl might have done when all the memories, of her nightmare and the death of her brother, were unmasked and given back to her.
Khallayne breathed deeply, forced herself to control her fear. She concentrated as she hadn’t concentrated since the battle in the forest, drawing power from inside.
She had intended to blow the door off its hinges, to blast it into tiny pieces, but at the last moment, she changed the spell. Made it something delicate and precise. She slipped it into the keyhole in the door, into the tiny passages in which the key fit. Click. Click. Click.
The door swung open with just the tiniest pressure.
“Jelindra?” Her voice was soft, as delicate as the spell.
The room was in darkness, even colder than hers, but she was loathe to light it with magic. She bumped into the bed and felt across the uneven surface until she touched Jelindra’s hair, spilling out over a pillow. “Jelindra?”
A tiny sob escaped the bundle of blankets.
“Jelindra. It’s me. I’ve come to take you out of here.”
The girl sat up and folded herself into Khallayne’s arms, erupting in a torrent of tears. “She gave it all back, Khallayne. She gave it all back. After she promised! She made me remember it all.”
Khallayne held her for a moment, then pulled back the covers. “You knew you couldn’t forget forever, didn’t you?”
Jelindra tried to pull away.
“She takes away the good memories, too. And you don’t want to lose those, do you?
Jelindra began to cry again, but she shook her head. “No, I don’t. It’s just that – it’s just that it hurts so much. And I’m afraid.”
“I know. I am, too. But it’ll get better. I promise.” Khallayne held out her hand. “Come on. We’re leaving.” Jelindra took it and allowed herself to be pulled up and out of the room.
Khallayne led her through passages remembered from another lifetime. The walls were familiar, the rooms they passed likewise, but they seemed to belong to a past unconnected with her own. The guards they passed, one after another, were also from another life altogether. Khallayne disabled the first two, then after that, used a “sleep” spell to save energy.
They reached the stables without arousing any suspicions. Jelindra was breathing hard, but moving with quick steps. With another blow, Khallayne incapacitated the stable guard. She waved away the slave working in the stalls, and he shrank fearfully into the shadows.
Khallayne led their horses from the stalls, grabbed blankets and saddles, talking as she did so. “Jelindra, listen to me, okay? And try to remember all this. If we’re separated —”
Jelindra started, tears welling up in her eyes, and Khallayne wasted precious minutes calming her. “Just listen. I’ll be right behind you, okay? But in case something happens, ride for the western gate. Okay? Get away from the city, but stay on the main trail. I’ll come that way as soon as I can. Okay?”
Jelindra nodded and vaul
ted onto the back of her horse. “The west gate. I’ll wait for you.”
They started out of the courtyard, riding slowly in the watery winter sunlight. Khallayne would have preferred the darkness of night to cover their movements. She magically muffled the sound of their horse’s hooves slightly, hoping nobody would hear them.
The gates of the courtyard loomed overhead, casting a shadow over the cobblestones. She breathed a sigh of relief. They were going to make it.
Suddenly, a cry of alarm went up from the castle. She glanced back and saw Jyrbian, standing at the top of the steps, pointing at her.
“Stop them!” he shouted. “Don’t let them get away!”
Khallayne slapped the rump of Jelindra’s horse. “Go!” she screamed. “Run!”
The horse leapt forward and streaked through the gate, Jelindra bent low over its back. Khallayne wheeled to face Jyrbian.
Guards poured from the castle and from the exercise yard behind the courtyard, running for the stables. If they reached their horses, they would catch Jelindra for sure!
Power hummed along her nerves. She cast it out, slamming the doors to the stables, fusing the hinges. The guards beat against the doors, then turned and headed toward her.
She spoke a word, a simple word, and a wall of fire sprang up to meet them. The guards fell back.
An arrow whizzed past her, far off to the side. She heard Jyrbian scream, “Don’t hurt her! I want her alive!”
She could see him, through a haze of heat, gesturing at the guards. His lips were moving in spell casting, and she felt the power of the fire waver. She breathed the wall of flame higher.
She wheeled her horse again, turning toward the city. The animal, frightened by the fire, scrabbled for purchase on the cobblestones, almost fell, then righted himself. The gate flashed past as he leapt forward. She was clear! She was free!
Something smote her, something like a giant hand. It jarred her teeth, jolted her muscles, then lifted her up off her horse and dropped her with skull-crushing force. She cried out, braced for the impact.