"Andy?" Karl Cullinane didn't question his fortune; he took a step toward her.
"No," she said, in Titania's voice. She shook her head and stood back, the features melting. "And it seems I've hurt you again. You humans are so . . . delicate, aren't you? Is this better?"
Again, he must have blinked; she had become some sort of compromise between Andy and the beautiful woman she had been moments before: Andy, but without the wear that the years had laid upon her; no bend in the nose, no laugh lines around the eyes, none of the scattered gray hairs.
Andy. He missed her so much. They had been together ever since the Hand tabernacle, and in that time he had never had another woman. It wasn't that there hadn't been opportunities, it wasn't that he hadn't been tempted, it was something very simple: She could chase away the darkness, if only for a while.
And this creature had the gall to mock her form. He let a distant coldness sweep over him. "That will be enough of that, faerie."
"It wasn't mockery. Maybe this would be best," Titania said, the voice now issuing from a dark patch in a mass of mist. "I do have something to show you."
"Why?"
"Because I'm bored, and you're entertaining. Be nice to me and I might even have an offer to make you."
The air in front of him shimmered, and then solidified into an aerial view of a shoreline. The viewpoint had to be at least a thousand feet up; Karl couldn't make out any of the individuals below, although he could see a dozen or so Mel outriggers on the sands below, and a two-masted ship of some sort bobbing in the waves offshore.
"Ahrmin," Titania said, "is there. Waiting for you. You've now distracted him sufficiently. Were your son wandering loose around Pandathaway, he would remain safe; the guild's attention is elsewhere."
And I get to be elsewhere. That was good, if true; things were going according to plan. "Why are you showing me this?"
"This was beginning to bore me; you didn't have a chance."
He kept his voice slow and steady. "You think this is all a game, Lady?"
"Don't be silly; threatening me is nothing better than absurd. Your sword can't cut mist.
"Besides, I didn't mean it that way. What I mean is that by the time you and your friends arrive, the slavers will have you. One ship is out at sea to cut off escape that way; the populace of village Eriksen has been driven away. Most of them.
"Karl Cullinane, if you wait for a ship heading toward Melawei, by the time you get there, the trap will have already been laid out. Ahrmin will simply take you, either dead or alive. I offer you two choices. Turn around here, and ride back. Or . . ."
"Or?"
"Or I will weave mist and light and air, make you a boat, and send that boat to Melawei. Just you and a few knapsacks, no more." She laughed again. "You will arrive stark naked."
"Why?" He didn't understand any of this. It was as though she was playing with him. But why?
"Amusement. Don't look for deep motivations, Karl Cullinane. You will find none in me. All I offer you is a little chance to escape alive, but more chance to save those you care for." The mist grew firmer. "Choose."
"Why?"
"Why do I help you? Beyond the fact that I'm bored and you're fun?" The mist swirled. "If you need a reason—your kind always needs these reasons, don't you?—then think that I'm doing it because the guild is of Pandathaway, and Pandathaway is human magic, while I am faerie magic. The two are not the same, nor particularly friendly."
That wasn't news. "But why help me?"
"Reasons, reasons, reasons. You want a reason? Because I owe it to Arta Myrdhyn for all the amusement he and you have provided me."
Anger rose. "I take no favors from Arta Myrdhyn. And I'm not going to abandon my men."
"As to your second point, they will think that you ordered them home. As to your first, it is not a favor from Arta Myrdhyn. It is the gamble of a powerful and weary creature to prolong a game she finds entertaining. Even if you, Karl Cullinane, are now beginning to bore me."
The world twisted, again, and all of the gear that Kethol, Pirojil, Durine, and he had brought was in front of him.
"Choose."
He pointed to his sword, to the bag of explosives, to the . . .
"Enough. I see your method. Very well." Again, the world twisted.
* * *
Karl Cullinane found himself stark naked beside the Ehvenor dock, the pile of goods he would have selected in front of him.
Beside the dock . . . he was on a five-meter-square platform woven of light, mist, and air. It was solid, but not persuasively so; it stretched and gave, threatening at any moment to give way beneath his feet.
Soundlessly, the raft pulled away from the pier, accelerating smoothly, evenly as it passed into the bay.
Even in the darkness, he could see three figures on the shore, spurring their horses toward the dock, calling to him. Kethol, Pirojil, and Durine.
He lifted his arm and waved a goodbye as the accelerating raft left the docks far behind.
"Better see to your gear, Karl Cullinane. You'll be in Melawei by morning. Farewell." The voice went convincingly silent.
"Fuck," he said. "What have I gotten myself into now?"
Mmmm . . . perhaps it was just as well. Karl didn't need the others to draw Ahrmin away from chasing Jason. In fact, he had already drawn Ahrmin away.
Now it was time to make the distraction permanent.
There is a notion, he had said, many times, called the last run. The idea is this: None of our lives are taken cheaply.
He swallowed three times, hard. None of our lives are taken cheaply.
Hell, he even had an outside chance to survive. Whatever the slavers were looking for, it wasn't going to be Karl Cullinane arriving on a faerie raft. They'd probably be expecting him to arrive on dragonback. But if Ahrmin's spies knew that Ellegon couldn't leave the Middle Lands now—or if Ahrmin had helped to arrange events so that Ellegon was needed in Holtun-Bieme or to resupply Daven's team—the slavers would be expecting him by some overland route or, more likely, via ship.
But if they were following his path, via magic, they'd see that he was moving, even if they couldn't triangulate on his exact location.
His hand fell to his knapsack and brought out his amulet. He could even put it on and sneak up on them.
No. Not yet, he decided. It was important to keep the slavers chasing him, not giving up on a wild goose chase. He would put the amulet on when he reached Melawei, not before. If Ahrmin couldn't locate Karl, he'd assume that Karl had backed off, and might divert his men and his attention toward finding Jason.
He clutched the amulet tightly, then shrugged his shoulders and tucked it back in his pouch.
What next?
Better check the gear, he decided.
His sword and his Nehera-made bowie were both fine. He eyed the Damascus striations on the knife.
The knife had never been blooded. That was about to change.
His four pistols were laid out in a row next to his rifle and shotgun, his repair kit and powder horns beside them.
He stooped to check the contents of the next two knapsacks. Yes, the fifty cylinders of foot-long steel tubing, each containing a hefty charge of guncotton, were still intact, each bomb in a tightly sealed tube of pig intestine for waterproofing—like a steel sausage. They looked fine, as did the blasting caps in their separate bag.
A role of fusing and a firekit completed his sapper's bag.
It finally hit him: He was scared as all hell, but he was looking forward to this.
The young Karl Cullinane, the one who had vomited in horror after killing those men outside of Lundeyll, was gone. Slaughter had become second nature to him; he'd missed it since the war had ended.
His only regrets involved the people he was leaving behind. It had been too long.
And what does that make me?
He didn't care, he decided, as he stretched out on the too-soft surface of the raft and willed himself to sleep.
* *
*
He was never sure how many hours later the raft beached itself on the Melawei shore; until the harsh grinding of sand underneath the craft woke him, he had been sleeping. Sleeping soundly, for the first time since he'd left Biemestren.
As it pushed itself ashore, the half-solid raft, woven by faerie out of mist, light, and air, suddenly became mist, light, and air; with a deep sigh it vanished underneath him, leaving him lying upon the wet sand, only half awake.
Even sleepy, warrior's reflexes took over. In an instant, he had scooped up his gear and dashed for the treeline, his ears straining for the sound of a cry or gunshot.
But there was nothing. Only the lapping of waves on the sand, the whisper of wind through the trees, and a distant mocking call of a crow.
Nothing.
He peered out onto the beach. It was empty.
There was no sign of habitation; he was between villages, or beyond the Mel range of settlement.
The first was more likely, he decided.
Dawn was still some time away; the sky was barely beginning to brighten in the east.
He couldn't tell where he was, but a bit of exploring would see to that. The first thing was to find a place to cache what gear he wouldn't need for a quiet stalk, and the second was to hide out for the day.
Night was the time to stalk.
He slipped the thong of his amulet over his head. For now, he would hole up in the woods, but he would have to find a more permanent place eventually.
Where to hide?
Of course! There was only one place, and he had been a fool for not thinking of it sooner.
"Now you see me, now you don't," he whispered, "but I'll see you."
He cursed himself silently for talking aloud. Asshole. It wasn't time for gestures; it was time to get to work.
He took a piece of hard cheese from his knapsack and wolfed it, then washed it down with a quick swallow of water from his canteen.
His smile was that of a stalking tiger.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE:
"Ta Havath, Jason"
But patience, cousin, and shuffle the cards, till our hand is a stronger one.
—Sir Walter Scott
Slaver rifle slung over one shoulder, Jason Cullinane walked along the beach in the early-morning light, following Hervian, the leader of the five-man squad. As far as he could see, the sand, beaten down by last night's rain, was unmarked save for their own footprints and the deep hoofprints of the two horses that had been ridden out to relieve the distant watch at dawn.
"Just as well," Hervian said. "I don't see no sign of 'em. We'll have a good hunt-down for later. Maybe get your wick dipped for you, boy, if you can earn it," he said with a genial, gap-toothed smile. "For a good bowman, you make a sorry gunner, Taren."
Pelius, a lanky, spade-bearded fellow, chuckled at that. "True, true. I don't think you're going to enjoy much of those Mel girls. Then again, if you need it, you could try the cook, although meat that old is too tough and stringy for me."
The villagers had long since scattered; undoubtedly they were back in the hills someplace, waiting until the slavers left.
Ahrmin had made no attempt to sneak up on Eriksen village; he had merely sailed the ships along the coast, letting the Mel run and hide. This wasn't a slaving raid, after all; the purpose was to set up to capture or kill him, not procure hard-to-train Mel as slaves. A confrontation might have necessitated using some of their hard-purchased magical defenses against Clan Eriksen's wizards—the only magical facilities the slavers had with them, as no guild wizard had been willing to risk going up against the possible combination of Karl Cullinane and Arta Myrdhyn's sword.
It was easiest to chase the Mel away, although Ahrmin and the first party had managed to seize a dozen or so; the men had been killed when they proved too intractable for immediate taming, the seven women had been impressed into service in a hut that was used as a bordello by the slavers, a treat to be withheld for poor performance of duty.
Jason had chosen to be a dreadful shot with the slaver rifle; while he couldn't do anything about the screams at night, at least he didn't have to participate.
He was more than vaguely sickened by his inaction. But what was he supposed to do? Take on more than a hundred men all by himself?
It wasn't fair. It was already too great a demand of an already overexacting universe that he kill Ahrmin to prove himself and save his father from getting killed; adding the additional requirement that he rescue some Mel he didn't even know or kill off two companies of slavers was just ridiculous.
He wouldn't do it; he didn't feel obligated to try. Not really.
Several bowshots offshore, Scourge bobbed lazily in the waves. Flail was somewhere over the horizon, waiting to locate Karl Cullinane's ship if he came that way, or to prevent its escape if it managed to slip into Melawei—assuming he could find someone foolish enough to grant him passage to Melawei. The scuttlebutt was that he'd try the overland route; if so, there was going to be at least another tenday until he stepped into Ahrmin's trap. Ahrmin had announced yesterday that Karl Cullinane was definitely on his way toward here, and that everyone ought to keep alert for him.
Plenty of time, Jason thought.
All he needed was a chance. Just let him get close to Ahrmin with either a loaded gun or bow, and he'd finish that problem.
The chance hadn't come, yet. On the trip out, Jason and Doria had been on the Scourge, while Ahrmin had traveled ahead on the Flail, a faster, less-broad-beamed sloop, the same ship now lying off the coast to the west, waiting to drop off a horseman on shore to report that Karl had been spotted, or receive a signal from shore to reinforce the Pandathaway forces in Eriksen village.
I'll get him, Father, he thought.
The timing would have to be right. He'd have to find the opportunity sometime before his father arrived, and it would have to allow for an opportunity to get Doria out. Jason felt responsible for her, and was more than a little aware that she felt responsible for him. His woodsmanship was good; given a knife and bow, Jason could feed the both of them off the land on the trip overland.
"Deep thoughts, eh, lad?" Vikat said. The well-muscled blond fellow was only a year or so older than Jason, but, as a junior journeyman of the Slavers' Guild, he outranked all the rest in the squad, save only Hervian, the senior journeyman slaver. "Taren, Taren, whether you're going to join the guild or no, you're going to have to learn to concentrate on the task at hand."
Hervian chuckled again. "Fine one to talk, guild brother. I remember when you gelded that Salke for Lord Lund." He gave Jason a friendly nudge. "His hand was shaking so hard that instead of just cutting off the bugger's balls, he sliced all the way through—"
"Shut your festering gob, guild brother," Vikat hissed. "Will you mock me in front of outsiders?"
Hervian gestured an obviously insincere apology, and fell silent, only to furrow his brow. "We haven't walked so far that we've neared the watch post, have we?"
Jason followed his gaze. The hoofmarks, instead of hugging the waterline, led up across forty meters or so of sand toward the treeline.
One of the mercenaries started to break into a trot.
"Carefully, now." Unslinging his rifle, Hervian stopped him with a gesture. "Slow and steady, now, we'll take it slow and steady. Check your loads, all."
The five men crept toward the treeline, Jason taking up a position a bit to the right and front, separating himself from others, just in case. They found the horses hitched, a short way into the woods. The two animals, stripped of saddle and all gear except for an improvised rope halter, were idly chewing on some ferns around the base of an old oak.
"Look, over there," Jason said.
Off in the distance, Jason thought he could make out a shape, but it wasn't him.
Hervian pushed past him. "No."
Faces pale, almost yellow in death, both slavers hung upside down by one heel from an overhanging branch, their arms outstretched toward the ground as though raised. Each
man had been neatly slitted under the chin, unmarked save for that.
Flies buzzed around their wounds, and around the clotted blood marking the sands beneath them.
"Cut them down, Taren," Hervian said, his voice quavering. "Cut them down."
Jason swarmed up the tree, then steadied himself on a limb, drawing and reaching out his bowie, neatly slicing through first one rope, then another, the riflemen below easing the bodies to the ground.
Jason dropped lightly to the trail as Vikat snatched at a piece of parchment that had been tied to a nearby tree.
The young slaver's hands trembled as he read; wordless, he handed it to Hervian, who read it and handed it to Jason.
In steady Erendra script, the brown letters said, "I understand that you want to see me, Ahrmin. I wait for you."
It was unsigned.
Despite his rising gorge, Jason almost smiled. The dead slavers were all the signature that Father needed.
"Karl Cullinane," Hervian said. "He's here sooner than expected. Are you enough of a horseman to bring the news back to camp, Taren? For Master Ahrmin's eyes only, on my authority as a journeyman guildsman, understood?"
"Understood."
* * *
Doria was busy at work next to the big stewpot on the lee side of camp when Jason rode up.
In a strange sort of way, the hag illusion was starting to wear a bit thin. It wasn't that pieces of Doria were poking through, or anything like that. On the contrary, her illusion of Enna, the old, ragged, overweight cook, was too unchanging: Enna's wrinkled skin didn't redden or darken under the sun, her sparse, dirty gray hair neither grew longer nor lighter, the ragged sack she wore as a dress didn't become more ragged or fall apart.
He didn't like it. There wasn't time to talk to her, though; he had to report to Ahrmin.
"Cook!" he shouted out imperiously as he dismounted and tossed her the reins. "You will take care of the horse." As he passed the reins, their fingers touched momentarily; it was as though invisible sparks passed between them.
Her eyes didn't widen, but she nodded slightly, then shook her head. "Patience, boy, patience," she whispered. "There's nothing we can do to help him. Not yet."
Guardians of the Flame - Legacy Page 22