“Huhnn. I ... thought I heard you saying that....” The Archivist raised his head with care, and opened eyes that looked a bit dazed. “Gods. What am I?”
“A crippled-up old peasant woman. Warrl says you’ll do yourself more harm than good by riding asleep; he wants you to talk to me.”
“How ... odd. I thought I heard him speaking in my head again. I seem to remember him saying just that....”
The partners exchanged a startled look. Evidently Jadrek had a mage-Gift no one had ever suspected, for normally the only folk who heard Warrl’s mind voice were those he intended to speak to. That Talent might be useful—if they all lived to reach the Border.
“Let’s get on with it,” Tarma broke the silence before it went on too long, and glanced at the rising sun to her right. “We need to get as far as we can before they figure out we’ve bolted back there.”
They stopped at a good-sized village; there was a market going on, and Tarma rode in alone and bought the supplies they were going to need. By mercenary’s custom, they’d kept all their cash with them in moneybelts that they never let out of their sight, so they weren’t short of funds, at least. Tarma did well in her bargaining; better than she’d expected. Even more encouraging, no one gave her a second glance.
Poor Jadrek had not exaggerated the amount of pain he was going to be in. By nightfall his eyes were sunken deeply into their sockets and he looked more than half dead; but they found a barn, full of new-cut hay, dry and warm and softer than many beds Tarma had slept in. The dry warmth seemed to do Jadrek a lot of good; he was moving better the next morning, and didn’t take nearly as much of his drugs as he had the day before.
And oddly enough, he seemed to get better as the trip progressed. Kethry was wearing Need at her side again, after having left the ensorcelled blade with her traveling gear in the stables. Tarma was just thanking her Goddess that they hadn’t ever brought the blade into their quarters—no telling what would have happened had it met with the counterspell on their rooms. Of a certainty Raschar would have known from that moment that they were not what they seemed.
Fall weather struck with a vengeance on the sixth morning. They ended up riding all day through rain; Rethwellan’s fall and early winter rains were notorious far and wide. Jadrek was alert and conversing quietly and animatedly with Kethry; he seemed in better shape, despite the cold rain, than he’d been back at the palace. Now Tarma wondered —remembering the enigmatic words of Moonsong k‘Vala, the Tale’edras Adept—if Need was working some of her magic on Jadrek because Kethry was concerned for him. It would be the first time in Tarma’s knowledge that a male for whom Kethry cared had spent any length of time in physical contact with the mage while she was wearing the blade.
As for Kethry caring for him—they were certainly hitting it off fairly well. Tarma was growing used to the soft murmur of voices behind her as they talked for the endless hours of the day’s ride. So maybe—just maybe—the sword was responding to that liking.
As the days passed: “Keth,” she asked, when they’d halted for the night in the seventh of a succession of haybarns. “Do you remember what the Hawkbrother told you when we first met him—about Need?”
“You mean Moonsong, the Adept?” Kethry glanced over at Jadrek, but the witchlight she was creating showed the Archivist already rolled up in a nest of blankets and hay, and sound asleep. “He said a lot of things.”
“Hai—but I’m thinking there’s something that might be pertinent to Jadrek.”
Kethry nodded, slowly. “About Need extending her powers to those I care for. Uh-huh; I’ve been wondering about that. Jadrek certainly seems to be in a lot less pain.”
Tarma snuggled into the soft hay, sword and dagger within easy reach. Behind her, Warrl was keeping watch at the door, and Ironheart and Hellsbane were drowsing, having stuffed themselves with fresh hay. “He’s not drugging himself as much, either. And ...”
Kethry settled into her own bedroll and snuffed the witchlight.
“And he’s not the bitter, suspicious man we met at the Court,” she said quietly in the darkness. “I think we’re seeing the man Idra knew.” Tarma heard the hay rustle a bit, then Kethry continued, very softly, “And I like that man, she‘enedra. So much that I think your guess could be right.”
“Krethes, ves‘tacha?”
“Unadorned truth. I like him; he treats me as an intellectual equal, and that’s rare, even among mages. That I’m his physical superior ... doesn’t seem to bother him. It’s just ... what I am. He’ll never ride ‘Bane the way I do, or swing a sword; I’ll never be half the linguist he is, or beat him at chess.”
“Sounds like—”
“Don’t go matchmaking on me, woman!” Kethry softened the rebuke with a dry chuckle. “We’ve got enough on our plate with tracking Idra, the damned weather, and the mage we’ve got on our backtrail.”
“So we are being followed.”
“Nothing you can do about it; my hope is that when he hits the Comb he’ll get discouraged and turn back.”
Tarma nodded in the dark; this was Keth’s province. She wouldn’t do either of them any good by fretting about it. If it came to physical battle, then she’d be able to do some good.
And for whatever the reason, Jadrek was able to do with less of his drugs every day, and that was all to the good. They were making about as good a headway with him now as they would have been able to manage alone. And maybe ...
She fell asleep before she could finish the thought.
Now they were getting into the Comb, and as Jadrek had warned, the Comb was no place to be riding through with less than full control of one’s senses.
The range of hills along the Northern border called the Comb was among some of the worst terrain Tarma had ever encountered. The hills themselves weren’t all that high—but they were sheer rock faces for the most part, with little more than goat tracks leading through them, and not much in the way of vegetation, just occasional stands of wind-warped trees, a bit of scrub brush, rank grasses, and some moss and lichen—enough browse for the horses—barely, and Tarma was supplementing the browse with grain, just to be on the safe side.
It had been late spring, still winter in the mountains where Hawksnest lay, when they’d headed down into Rethwellan. It had been early fall by the time they’d made it to the capital. It had been late fall when they bolted. Now it was winter—the worst possible time to be traveling the Comb.
Now that they were in the hills the rains had changed to sleet and snow, and there were no friendly farmers, and no inns to take shelter in when hostile weather made camping a grim prospect. And they no longer had the luxury of pressing on; when a suitable campsite presented itself, they took it. If there wasn’t anything suitable, they suffered.
They’d been three days with inadequate camps, sleeping cold and wet, and waking the same. Kethry had dropped the illusions two days ago; there wasn’t anybody to see them anymore. And when they were on easy stretches of trail, Tarma could see Kethry frowning with her eyes closed, and knew she was doing something magical along the backtrail—which probably meant she needed to hoard every scrap of personal energy she could.
Jadrek, predictably, was in worst case. Tarma wasn’t too far behind him in misery. And sometimes it seemed to her that their progress was measured in handspans, not furlongs. The only comfort was in knowing that their pursuers—if any—were not likely to be making any better progress.
Tarma looked up at the dead, gray sky and swore at the scent of snow on the wind.
Kethry urged Hellsbane up beside her partner when the trail they were following dropped into a hollow between two of the hills, and there was room enough to do so. The mage was bundled up in every warm garment she owned; on the saddle before her the Archivist was an equally shapeless bundle. He was nodding; only Kethry’s arms clasped about him kept him in the saddle. He had had a very bad night, for they’d been forced to camp without any shelter, and he’d taken the full dosage of his drugs just so
that he could mount this morning.
“Snow?” Kethry asked unhappily.
“Hai. Dammitall. How much more of this is he going to be able to take?”
“I don’t know, she‘enedra. I don’t know how much more of this I’m going to be able to take. I’m about ready to fall off, myself.”
Tarma scanned the terrain around her, hoping for someplace where they could get a sheltered fire going and maybe get warm again for the first time in four days. Nothing. Just crumbling hills, overhangs she dared not trust, and scrub. Not a tree, not a cave, not even a tumble of boulders to shelter in. And even as she watched, the first flakes of snow began.
She watched them, hoping to see them melting when they hit the ground—as so far, had always been the case. This time they didn’t. “Oh hellfire. Keth, this stuff is going to stick, I’m afraid.”
The mage sighed. “It would. I’d witch the weather, but I’d do more harm than good.”
“I’d rather you conjured up a sheltered camp.”
“I’ve tried,” Kethry replied bleakly. “My energies are at absolute nadir. I spent everything I had getting that mage off our trail. I’d cast a jesto-vath, but I need some kind of wall and ceiling to make it work.”
Tarma stifled a cough, hunched her shoulders against the cold wind, and sighed. “It’s not like you had any choice; no more than we do now. Let’s get on. Maybe something will turn up.”
But nothing did, and the flurries turned to a full-fledged snowstorm before they’d gone another furlong.
“We’ve got to get a rest,” Tarma said, finally, as they gave the horses a breather at the top of a hill. “Jadrek, how are you doing?”
“Poorly,” he replied, rousing himself. The tone of his voice was dull. “I need to take more of my medicines, and I dare not. If I fell asleep in this cold—”
“Right. Look—there’s a bit of a corner down there.” Tarma pointed through the curtaining snow to a cul-de-sac visible just off the main trail. “It might be sheltered enough to let us get a bit warmer. And the horses need more than a breather.”
“I won’t argue,” Kethry replied. “I can feel ‘Bane straining now.”
Unspoken was the very real danger that was in all of their minds. It was obvious that the snow was falling more thickly with every candlemark; it was equally obvious that unless they found a good campsite they’d be in danger of death by exposure if they fell asleep. That meant pressing on through the night if they didn’t find a secure site. This little rest might be the closest to sleep that they’d get tonight.
And when they got to the cul-de-sac, they found evidence of how real the danger was.
Huddled against the boulders of the back was what was left of a man.
Rags and bones, mostly. The carcass was decades old, at least. There were no marks of violence on him, except that done by scavengers, and from the way the bones lay Tarma judged he’d died of cold.
“Poor bastard,” she said, picking up a sword in a half-rotten sheath, and turning it over, looking for some trace of ownership-marks. “Helluva way to die.”
Kethry was tumbling stones down over the pitiful remains; Jadrek was doing his best to help. “Is there any good way to die?”
“In your own bed. In your own time. Here—can you make anything of this?”
Jadrek dug into his packs while the women were occupying themselves with the grisly remains they’d found. He was aching all over with pain, even through the haze of drugs. Worse, he was slowing them down.
But there was a solution, of sorts. They didn’t need him now, and if the weather worsened, his presence—or absence—might mean the difference between life and death for the two partners.
So he was going to overdose. That would put him to sleep. If they did find shelter, there would be no harm done, and he would simply sleep the overdose off. But if they didn‘t—
If they didn‘t, the cold would kill him painlessly, and they’d be rid of an unwieldy burden. Without him they’d be able to take paths and chances they weren’t taking now. Without him they could devote energy to saving themselves.
He swallowed the bitter herb pellets quickly, before they could catch him at it, and washed away the bitterness with a splash of icy water from his canteen. Then he pressed himself up against the sheltered side of Kethry’s mount, trying to leech the heat from her body into his own.
Kethry took the sword from her partner, and turned it over. The sheath looked as if it had once had metal fittings; there were gaping sockets in the pommel and at the ends of the quillions of the sword that had undoubtedly once held gemstones. There was no evidence of either, now.
“Poor bastard. Might have been a merc, down on his luck,” Tarma said. “That’s when you know you’re hitting the downward slide—when you’re selling the decorations off your blade.”
Kethry slid the sword a little out of the sheath; it resisted, with a grating sound, although there was no sign of rust on the dull gray blade. Tarma leaned over her shoulder, and scratched the exposed metal with the point of her dagger, then snorted at the shiny marks the steel left on the metal of the sword.
“Well, I feel a little less sorry for him,” Kethry retorted. “My guess is that he was a thief. This was some kind of dress blade, but the precious metal and the stones have been stripped from it.”
“Have to be a dress sword,” the Shin‘a’in said in disgust. “Nobody in their right mind would depend on that thing. It isn’t steel or even crude-forged iron. You’re right, he must have been a thief—and probably the pretties were stripped by somebody that came across the body.”
Tarma turned back to her inspection of her mare’s condition, and Kethry nodded, shoving the blade back into its sheath. “You’re right about this thing,” she agreed. “Metal that soft wouldn’t hold an edge for five minutes. Damn thing is nearly useless. That pretty much confirms it. The departed wasn’t dressed particularly well, I doubt he’d have much use for a dress-sword.” She started to stick the thing point-down into the cairn they’d built—then, moved by some impulse she didn’t quite understand, put it into her pack, instead.
There was something about that sword—something buried below the seeming of its surface, something that tasted of magic. And if there was magic involved, Kethry thought vaguely, it might be worth saving to look into later.
Neither Tarma nor Jadrek noticed; Tarma was checking Ironheart’s feet, and Jadrek was pressed up against Hellsbane’s side with his eyes closed, trying to absorb some of the mare’s warmth into his own body.
Tarma straightened up with a groan. “Well, people, I hate to say this, but—”
Kethry and Jadrek sighed simultaneously.
“I know,” Kethry replied. “Time to go.”
Darkness was falling swiftly, and the snow was coming down thicker than ever. They’d given up trying to find a campsite themselves; Tarma had sent Warrl out instead. That meant they had one less set of eyes to guard them, but Warrl was the only one who stood a chance of finding shelter for them.
Tarma was leading both horses; on a trail this uncertain, she wanted it to be her that stumbled or fell, not the mares. She was cold to the point of numbness, and every time Hellsbane tripped on the uneven ground, she could hear Jadrek catching his breath in pain, and Kethry murmuring encouragement to him.
Tarma was no longer thinking much beyond the next step, and all her hopes were centered on the kyree. If they didn’t find shelter by dawn, they’d be so weary that no amount of will could keep them from resting—and once resting, no amount of foreknowledge would keep them from falling asleep—
And they would die.
Tarma wondered how many ghosts haunted the Comb, fools or the desperate, lured into trying to thread the rocky hills and falling victim to no enemy but the murderous weather.
She half-listened to the wind wailing among the rocks above them. It sounded like voices. The voices of hungry ghosts, vengeful ghosts, jealous of the living. The kinds of ghosts that showed up in the songs
of her people, now and again, who sought only to lure others to their deaths, so that they might have company.
How many fools—how many ghosts—
A white shape loomed up out of the dusk before them, blocking the path. A vague, ivory rider on an ethereal silver horse, appearing suddenly and soundlessly out of the snow, like a pallid harbinger of cold death.
“Li‘sa’eer!” Tarma croaked, and dropped the reins of both horses, pulling the sword slung at her back in the next instant, and wondering wildly if Goddess-blessed steel could harm a hungry ghost.
:Mindmate, no!:
Warrl jumped down from the hillside to her right to interpose his bulk between her and the spirit. : Mindmate—this is help!:
“Peace upon you, lady.” The voice of the one astride the strange white beast was not that of a spirit; nor, when Tarma allowed a corner of herself to test the feel of him, was there any of the tingle she associated with magic. The man’s voice was not hollow, as a spirit’s normally sounded; it was warm, deep, and held a tinge of amusement. “Your four-footed friend came looking for aid, and we heard his calling. I did not mean to startle you.”
Tarma’s arms shook as she resheathed the blade. “Goddess bless—warn a body next time! You just about ate six thumbs of steel!”
“Again, your pardon, but we could not tell exactly where you were. Your presences seem rather ... blurred.”
“Never mind that,” Kethry interrupted from behind Tarma, her voice sharp. “Who are you? What are you? Why should we trust you?”
The man did not seem to be taken aback by her words. “You’re wise not to take anything on appearance, lady. You don’t know me—but I do know you; I’ve talked to your friend mind-to-mind, and I know who you are and what you wish. You can trust me on three counts.” He and his horse moved in to stand nose to nose with Ironheart. Tarma saw with no little surprise that even in the fading light the beast’s eyes were plainly a bright and startling blue. “Firstly—that you are no longer in Rethwellan; you crossed the Border some time back, and you are in Valdemar. The enemy on your backtrail will not be able to pass the Border, nor would I give you to him. Secondly, that the man you seek, Prince Stefansen, is Valdemar’s most welcome guest, and I will be taking you to him as quickly as your tired beasts can manage. And thirdly, you can trust me because of my office.”
Valdemar 05 - [Vows & Honor 02] - Oathbreakers Page 15