This was a city at war.
But with what, or whom ? And why had word not come to Redhelwar, or Andoreniel?
Questions it would have been the height of rudeness to ask—even if Maga-rabeleniel had not far outranked him—crowded Jermayan’s thoughts, but the Elven Knight held his tongue. There was yet time.
Magarabeleniel led him down from the walls and into the streets of the Winter City. Here the air was comparatively still, the winds blocked by the walls of the city.
Together they walked among the tents to The House of Sky and Grass. Jermayan saw no one else as he passed between the tents, not even the street-sweepers who would normally be about in this weather, for even though the ice-walls blocked most of the falling snow, it did not block all of it. But word of his arrival had obviously gone ahead, and the inhabitants of the Winter City were doing him the courtesy of ignoring his presence entirely.
The House of Sky and Grass was no larger than the largest of the other tents they passed—perhaps the size of Redhelwar’s pavilion—and there was nothing to mark it as the Vicereign’s House save an elaborate braided knot of dried summer grass that hung beside the door. Magarabeleniel stopped beneath the canopy.
“Be welcome in my home and at my hearth, Jermayan son of Malkirinath, Elven Knight, Ancaladar’s Bondmate. Stay as long as you will, and when you go, go with joy.”
“To be welcomed at the hearth of a friend is to be made doubly welcome,” Jermayan answered formally. “I accept with thanks.” He followed her into the tent.
The floor of the tent was covered with rugs that matched the weaving of the tent’s walls, and here the air was so warm that the ice on Jermayan’s heavy stormcloak actually began to melt. There was a rack near the doorway to hang outdoor garments, and after Magarabeleniel had pulled the door curtains snug against the outside air, they both removed their outer layers—and Jermayan his armor—and spread them to dry, Jermayan accepting a houserobe and boots from his hostess.
Though there seemed to be no one else present, someone had obviously been here recently, for the braziers and the lanterns were lit, and someone had prepared the tea things. The kettle was boiling, and a low table was prepared with what looked to be a rather more substantial meal than Jermayan was used to taking with his tea.
“You will discover that you do not hunger, here in the Great Cold,” Magara-beleniel said. “But one must eat, all the same.”
She seated herself upon a cushion upon the floor, and motioned for him to do the same. She filled the teapot, and as the tea steeped, they began with a thick soup, and talk of the weather.
They did not speak of the sentries upon the walls, or why those walls were so stark and plain.
Over several small courses—all very rich—and several pots of tea—they discussed many things, though never, of course, the reason Jermayan had come. The weavers had produced some truly splendid work recently. The autumn flowers had been less extravagant than usual, but some beautiful specimens had still been seen. The herds were as well as could be expected, and in ten years or so would have been restored to their former size. The burn which Gaiscawenorel had remarked upon the Plain, of course, would be gone long before that; in a growing season, or perhaps two, no trace of it would remain. Grass fires were a fact of life, and easily dealt with; it was only the Great Drought that had made this one so very difficult.
At last Magarabeleniel allowed the conversation to turn to the progress of the war—though still, of course, not to the reason that Jermayan had come.
“I regret that my brother is not here to greet you as well, but he is riding with the herds and will not return for at least a fortnight. Were he here, he would wonder how it goes with our folk who answered Andoreniel’s call, if there were anything you cared to tell of that.”
“Were Chalaseniel here, I would have much to tell him,” Jermayan answered, and spoke at length of the army’s recent battles. Of the Shadowed Elves, and their fight against them. Of their victory in determining the Demons’ ultimate strategy: to gain the human Mage-City for their own. And of Redhelwar’s recent discovery that the Demons were now massing their forces to send what creatures they could into the Elven Lands, as well as along their borders, using the ways the Shadowed Elves had prepared.
There was a long silence after Jermayan finished telling this news, and in it he came to realize that whatever message Andoreniel might have sent, it had not reached Lerkalpoldara. Well, that was only to be expected. And so Magarabele-niel’s next words did not surprise him.
“Andoreniel knows we will fight the Shadow to our last breath, as we did in the days of old, no matter how unlikely the chance of victory,” Magarabeleniel said at last. “Should the City of a Thousand Bells fall—and forgive me for speaking bluntly, cousin, but what you tell me does not make me think it will long stand, with this canker in its heart—then I cannot think where in all the forests or beneath all the stars the Children of Leaf and Star may find shelter from the Shadow’s hunger. We will stand against it, and fall—and unlike the Seven, no victory will rise up from our slain bodies. But no one can truly know how the game will play before the stones are laid upon the board, as Master Belesharon has told us all, so we will not think of that yet. What is in my mind now is of a more practical nature. It is in my mind to wonder at your purpose in traveling to tell me of these things now, with so much of winter yet to run, for you have seen the Gatekeeper, and know he is not to be traversed for many moonturns yet—later this year, we think, than in other years. We would have sent word of this, but the ice has claimed our signaling mirrors, and those who would care for them are with the army. All who remain must look to the herds, and to other difficulties of which you do not yet know.”
Though the tone of her voice had not changed, there was a faint note of warning there.
“I would hear of these difficulties, if there were anything you cared to tell,” Jermayan said mildly.
“You have said that the Ancient Enemy wishes to send its forces into the Elven Lands, to strike and harry. I say to you that they are here now. Some we have faced of old, and know. Others we have never seen before, but know now to our cost: the great white bats that fly by day and night.
“These monsters drove the wolf and tiger down upon the herds, for anything that lives will run from a Coldwarg pack. The Coldwarg followed them to slay, first the predators and then the herds. Yet were it Coldwarg alone, well, we have slain Coldwarg before. They make a fine cloak-lining—yes, and a saddle-cloth, too!” She smiled, faintly and without mirth. “Yet there are others, and worse. After the high passes froze, but before the Great Cold set in, we saw signs of shade-walkers and even the hint of an ice-drake lair, though that we are not sure of, for it is not cold enough yet to bring the creature out to hunt. But to know that the war against the Shadow goes badly makes ill hearing, for I think our own war for the Eastern Plains is that one in small, and I tell you plainly, cousin, the walls of the Winter City shall not rise with next year’s snow.”
Because there will be no one left alive to build them again, Jermayan thought to himself. The Lerkalpoldarans could fight—indeed, they were fighting—but without magic and without Elvensteel. And against the monsters of Shadow Mountain’s brewing, it was a battle they could not win.
In such a position, a prudent general called for retreat, and Jermayan was certain that Magarabeleniel had thought of that a thousand times over, but from the high plains of Lerkalpoldara, in winter, they could not retreat. The Gatekeeper was the only pass of any size out of the mountains, and Jermayan and Ancaladar had flown through it on the way in. Even if the Lerkalpoldarans were willing to abandon all of their livestock and everything they owned, they could not make it through that ice-choked pass on foot. They were trapped here in the northernmost east, with their numbers slowly dwindling day by day against the assaults of the Shadow.
“And now I would hear what message you bear from Andoreniel,” Magara-beleniel said, when Jermayan had sat silent for a very long t
ime.
“In autumn, you sent your children to the Fortress of the Crowned Horns, where, by the grace of Leaf and Star, all arrived safely. Now, as the Enemy grows bolder, Andoreniel has sent me to bring all women with child to the same safety upon Ancaladar’s back. It is his decree.”
“So badly as that…” Magarabeleniel whispered, bowing her head. “It goes so badly as that… .”
After a moment she straightened, composed again. “Indeed, I am desolated to be forced to bear words of rebuke and refusal to Andoreniel in this time of his difficulty, and were matters otherwise, I would have found it a restful thing to have visited the Fortress of the Crowned Horns, for I have never seen it, and it would have been a pleasant thing to see my nephew Rierochan again. Yet I cannot leave my people, no matter what Andoreniel’s decree, nor is any woman to be so ordered, as if she were herself a child, but given a choice to go or to stay. There are four here who must choose. I have chosen. Three have yet to choose.”
She regarded him steadily, her black eyes unyielding.
“I thank you for your courtesy,” Jermayan said, bowing his head. It had not occurred to him that the Lady of Lerkalpoldara might be among those affected by Andoreniel’s decree; in the face of what she had just told him about Enemy forces drawing closer around the city, it made sense that she did not want to leave her people, whatever the cost.
“But come. I believe our cloaks are dry now. Let me show you the walls of Lerkalpoldara, though they are far from what they should be. And I can make you known to the rest of the folk, before they burst with curiosity,” Magarabeleniel said.
THOUGH Lerkalpoldara’s normal population was greatly diminished, those that remained were filled with lively curiosity about Jermayan and his errand—and about Ancaladar as well.
Jermayan’s mind was in turmoil. It had never before occurred to him to disobey a decree of Andoreniel’s, yet how could he rescue a handful—at most—of the people here and leave the rest to die?
What if none of the other three women wanted to come? How could he order them if Magarabeleniel refused to order them?
The city that had been so empty when he and Magarabeleniel had walked through it a few hours earlier was now bustling with life—paths being swept; snow being carried away, and the walls being repaired or added to. Magarabeleniel took Jermayan on a leisurely tour of the city, stopping to speak with everyone, and by the time they reached the Flower Forest—which Jermayan had slowly come to realize was their eventual destination—the inhabitants of Lerkalpoldara knew a great deal about dragons.
“Your dragon can come in here to spend the night. He will be warmer—and safer as well,” Magarabeleniel said. “They mean to show us our fate by slaughtering everything that lives here upon the plains, everything wild and tame. It is how we have escaped death so far, for They will happily slaughter cows and talldeer instead of us—the bodies just lie there and freeze, now, for there is nothing left to eat them. The wolves are gone, and the foxes, and the weasels … the ice-tiger is gone, though we saw too many of them while they were being starved out. The owls are gone … everything that flies in the air but one.”
She took a deep breath. “We have made a promise to one another, my people and I. In the spring the wind sets east and blows over the pass until summer. The grasslands bloom and flower—I think that even this year they will flower. The rivers roar with melt and all the springs are full. But in summer the wind shifts away from the passes. The grass turns from green to gold. The rivers wane to streams and no rain comes in any year. And when that time comes, whoever is still alive will take a torch and a string of fast horses and ride into the wind, and set the Plains alight so that the fires kindle like a chain of pearls. If he cannot ride he will run; if he cannot run, he will walk; if he cannot walk he will set the Plains alight where he stands. But we will burn it all this time—every leaf, every seed, every blade of grass, the Flower Forest itself, so that They gain no foothold here, nor anything They can use.”
It was as if Jermayan had opened a door and stepped back a thousand years, to the time of the Great War. Such desperate bargains, such terrible battles, had been commonplace then, and the land still bore their scars.
There must, there must be another way!
“I hear your words, Lady, and will bear them to Andoreniel with all you have said. I thank you for your courtesy to Ancaladar; he tells me he does not feel the cold, but there are times when it makes my heart ache with cold to look upon him.”
“The forest is warm,” Magarabeleniel said, and indeed, it was warm enough that Jermayan had removed his heavy fur-lined mittens and thrown back the hood of his heavy fur cloak. “And he need not fear to fly over our walls in the storm, for the winds will drop soon, the better for him to see his way. Nor will we fire upon him, for we have had time to learn our Enemy by now.”
Though Jermayan doubted that even the heavy shafts of the Elven hunting bow could penetrate Ancaladar’s scales, the barbed quarrels could certainly tear the membrane of his great wings, and Jermayan was not yet certain of his power to repair such damage. Though he had Ancaladar’s inexhaustible power to draw upon, he was the one who must do the drawing, and that part of him which was an Elven Mage had been taxed to the uttermost by the spell of Kindolhinadetil’s Mirror. Like Kellen and the other Wildmages—and the High Mage Cilarnen—who had played their parts in that spell, the longer he could go without doing magic, the better it would be for him.
“And so I shall tell him,” Jermayan said. “In truth, he is quite timid, and will welcome the reassurance.”
Magarabeleniel made a faint noise that might, months ago, have been something as undignified as a laugh. “Perhaps you think I will believe any nursery-tale you care to sing, Jermayan, but I have been to Sentarshadeen, and am no child at her first Spring Foaling. If you can fight as well as you can dance, your dragon cannot be timid. But refresh yourself here in our forest, if you will, and perhaps you will rejoin me and my advisors for the evening meal.”
“It will be my pleasure,” Jermayan assured her, bowing as Magarabeleniel turned and walked away.
The shadows lengthened as he walked deeper into the forest, and over the sound of the wind he heard a wild deep-chested howling.
Coldwarg.
Tainted, creatures of the Shadow, created specifically to hunt and kill unicorns, but willing, even eager, to kill anything; they lusted for the pain and fear of their victims even more than for their deaths.
And they were only one of the monsters that plagued the High Plains, if what Magarabeleniel said was true.
Coldwarg could be slain. Deathwings could be slain. Even shadewalkers could be slain. But it had taken Ancaladar to kill the last ice-drake they had seen, and the ice-drake had very nearly killed him. If there were indeed an ice-drake here, lairing until the winter had deepened further, when it finally emerged and began to hunt, the Lerkalpoldarans would have no defense against it.
What was he to do? Jermayan knew he must not stay longer than needed to complete his mission—or acknowledge failure. He must press on to the other Eight Cities. And then he must return to the army, for the power he could lend to the battles it had yet to fight could be vital.
And what then, Son of Malkirinath? Were you to level the Golden City, slay everyone within it, guilty and innocent alike, you would not win this war. You would only deny Them a tool to Their using. The war would go on, as your friends die about you, until there is nothing left… .
Perhaps the destruction of Armethalieh by the Light would buy time, but at a price no one of the Light would be willing to pay. There was always the danger, in fighting the creatures of the Shadow, in being tempted to use Their methods in order to win, but all that was, was a sort of surrender to Them. No one thought it was better to lose cleanly than to win with the Shadow’s tools: It was simply that it was impossible to win with the Shadow’s tools. No victory for the Light could be gained by using the tools and the methods of the Shadow—once they were taken up, they b
egan to twist the wielder, changing him or her bit by bit, moment by moment, until he or she no longer recognized the original purpose for which their side had once fought. They began to make changes, compromises, disastrous alliances—until soon they were the Shadow’s pawn in all but name.
Was that what had happened to Anigrel, in Armethalieh?
Or was he one of the rare ones who stared the Darkness unblinkingly in Its eyes, and flung himself into Its embrace, knowing full well what it was that he chose to serve?
How could any creature, mad or sane, do such a thing?
Jermayan shook his head, a human gesture he had picked up from Idalia. He did not know, but as Master Belesharon was fond of saying, all answers are to be found in the Circle, or else you have asked the wrong question.
It did not matter how Anigrel had come to do such a thing.
What mattered was how what he had set in motion could be stopped.
THOUGH it had seemed unlikely that afternoon, when Jermayan had landed in the full strength of the snowstorm, as the shadows of evening fell, the temperature dropped sharply, and the snow stopped falling.
Earlier, Jermayan had passed Magarabeleniel’s message on to Ancaladar through the Bond they shared, and now Ancaladar descended into a clearing at the forest’s heart—though leaving the forest again might be a more difficult matter.
Snow, leaves, and loose branches cascaded to the forest floor as Ancaladar settled to the ground, folding his wings warily, for his flanks pressed against the trunks of the trees at the edges of the clearing. Jermayan wasn’t at all sure of how the dragon could possibly move without knocking trees over.
“So this is a Flower Forest?” the dragon observed. “It is very nice.”
“Yes,” Jermayan agreed. “I think … I think we will be leaving here soon. And without what we came for.”
The Obsidian Mountain Trilogy Page 170