“The swine!” Cordelia jammed her fists on her hips and glared at the raft on the far side of the river. “To leave their craft where we could not reach it!”
“Patience, good lady,” Allouette advised. “Surely they do not know that you follow them . . .”
“Well, they should know!”
“. . . and Gregory thinks he is following me,” Allouette finished smoothly.
“There’s some truth in that,” Quicksilver allowed. “Not enough to excuse them, mind you, but some.”
Never in her wildest imaginings had Allouette dreamed she would be the voice of reason.
“Still, it is no great feat to bring it back.” Cordelia stared at the raft. After a moment, it lurched free of the bank and began to move toward them.
“How does it compare to a broomstick?” Quicksilver asked.
“Most unwieldy,” Cordelia answered. “Still, you have given me a thought—perhaps we should fly.”
“What, poor three of us, and three horses into the bargain? You would be worn out in minutes!”
Cordelia didn’t argue; indeed, her brows drew down in a scowl of concentration, and she muttered, “Water’s resistance is most maddening.”
“And wearying.” Quicksilver hiked up her skirts and waded into the river to catch the raft one-handed. “Aid me, Allouette!”
“I am here.” Allouette caught the other corner-post and turned, plowing her way back to the bank, skirts held up in her other hand.
The raft touched the bank and Cordelia staggered as she loosed her mental hold. “I thank you, damsels! That took greater effort than I had thought it would.”
“Board,” Quicksilver said. “There is no reason for you to get wet with us.”
“My enthusiasm for this quest is already dampened.” Cordelia stepped aboard the raft, then turned to glare fiercely at the bank. “Board,” she said between her teeth.
Allouette and Quicksilver stepped up to the bank again, then led the horses across to the boat. Both immediately sat, stretching out their legs to the sun.
“There is some advantage to their absence,” Quicksilver said.
“Pooh, damsel! Surely Geoffrey has seen your legs before this!” Cordelia scolded.
“That he has,” Quicksilver admitted, “but if he saw them now, we would cease to journey onward for some hours.”
Cordelia gave Allouette a wink. “She does not mind boasting a bit, does she?”
Allouette smiled but lowered her gaze. “I was thinking much as she was myself.”
“I too,” Cordelia said, “but there is no reason to speak it aloud.”
So trading verbal jabs, they drifted across the river and downstream until they bumped into the bank.
“I am dry now.” Quicksilver stood in a single lithe movement, catching her horse’s bridle. “Come, my lovely! You may have solid ground under your feet again.”
The horse whinnied as though to say that was a very good idea and came with her onto the bank. Allouette and Cordelia followed with their mounts. Then Allouette dropped the reins and told her mare sternly, “Bide!” and went to tie the mooring-rope firmly around a tree trunk.
“What good is that?” Quicksilver asked. “Our men are on this side of the river now!”
“At least the raft will not go drifting downstream to be lost,” Allouette said equably. “Besides, we may wish to return.”
“There is that,” Cordelia said. “Well! We have drifted downstream quite a way. Shall we not have to search for the men’s trail?”
They mounted and rode along the bank, Quicksilver’s gaze on the ground, Allouette watching the woods in case of danger, and Cordelia abstracted, mind searching for Alain’s—a more difficult task than finding Gregory’s or Geoffrey’s, since the prince was only a latent telepath. “Odd that we cannot find their thoughts.”
Quicksilver frowned. “If we cannot, they must be shielding themselves. What enemy do they fear who can read minds?”
Two experienced psis and one novice were silent a moment, contemplating the possible answers to that question and not liking them a bit. Quicksilver broke the silence by crying, “What happened here?”
Cordelia and Allouette looked down and gasped at the churned mud on the bank. “That raft certainly came to land with a great deal of force,” Cordelia said.
The ground was plowed up sharply where the logs had jammed into the bank. The mud was riddled with hoof marks, but the boot prints were fewer and more centered.
Quicksilver dropped to one knee, studying the signs closely. “The horses were quite upset, prancing about—trying to break free, I would guess—but the men seem to have calmed them.”
“What would so upset their steeds?” Allouette asked.
“Whatever it was, I hope it was not telepathic.” Cordelia gave a nervous glance toward the river.
The other two women followed her gaze. “It seems tranquil enough now,” Allouette said.
“What was it an hour ago?” Quicksilver returned. “Or was it longer than that?”
“Let us follow and see,” Allouette proposed.
“And keep your thoughts to yourself,” Quicksilver added.
Allouette’s gaze snapped to her, affronted.
“I mean no insult,” Quicksilver said, “only that if the men shield their minds, we should too. I’d rather not discover what stalks them by having it find us!”
“Oh.” Allouette looked sheepish. “Your pardon, damsel. I had thought—”
“I was careless in my wording,” Quicksilver said gruffly, “and it is I who should be asking pardon. Let us ride!”
They turned their horses and followed the trail into the woods.
Half an hour later, Cordelia reined in and looked at the trees about them. “Night comes on quickly and soon we shall not be able to see what obstacles lie in our path.”
“I know a spell for light,” Allouette offered.
“Do you not fear night-walkers?” Quicksilver asked with a frown.
Allouette barely managed to keep from saying that she herself had been a greater danger than anything else that walked by night. Instead, “Not with two such doughty companions,” she said.
Quicksilver eyed her askance. “Flattery, methinks.”
“But nonetheless pleasant for all that,” Cordelia said. “She has a point—one of us might be at risk, but together we can cope with any monster or hobgoblin I can think of.”
“Provided they do not come in packs,” Allouette qualified.
“Or that the packs are not too large.” Quicksilver nodded. “Still, it is well thought, ladies. The men shall no doubt be wearied from whatever happened at that riverbank and will pitch camp for the night. If we keep riding, we should catch up with them before they sleep.”
They were all silent a moment, each thinking about catching her lad before bedtime. Then Cordelia shook off the mood and said, “Press on!”
They turned back to business and set off after the men.
Before the twilight had quite ended, they came out of the forest into a wide lane, lined with low fieldstone walls on either side. Allouette stared at them and asked, “Who built these?”
“They certainly seem most strange in the midst of a wood,” Cordelia agreed.
Quicksilver shook off the mood and said, “We forget betimes that there are farms all ’round every wood. Simply because ogres have come out of a mist over a field does not undo all the building folk have done over the years.”
“But so high here in the mountains . . .”
“The mountaineers are not wild beasts, no matter their conduct to me,” Allouette said. “Like as not they have fields planted wherever the ground is level enough—and where there are fields, they must build lanes for wagons. Let us follow this path and see where it goes.”
They rode onward as the twilight failed. Finally Allouette scowled, concentrating, and a globe of light glimmered into life before them, casting just enough light to show them the next ten feet of road, albeit dimly.<
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Quicksilver gave her a sharp look. “Is that fox-fire yours, or a spirit’s?”
“Only mine,” Allouette assured her. “ ’Tis only necessary to excite the molecules of air until they heat enough to give light.”
“It will take some effort to keep it glowing, will it not?” Cordelia asked.
“Only a little.” Allouette turned to her. “I can brighten it, if you wish.”
“That would take more effort,” Cordelia said, “and we may have hours yet to ride. We can see well enough.”
They rode onward. Cordelia didn’t tell the others that she had learned the same spell from her mother years before. She was quite content to let Allouette do her part.
Suddenly Quicksilver pulled up. “Hark!”
Allouette and Cordelia stopped their horses, listening. “Only nightbirds and crickets,” Cordelia said. “What should I hear?”
“It has stopped now,” Quicksilver said, frowning. “I heard a sort of brushing noise behind us.”
“I heard nothing,” Cordelia said, but doubtfully.
“Nor I.” Allouette felt the first pricklings of fright, and her old response came instantly—simmering anger that anyone should beset her. “Let us ride on and listen as we go.”
They rode ahead for several minutes until finally Allouette said, voice low, “I hear it! A brushing sound indeed, as though something scrapes against the stone wall behind us!”
“I hear with it the rattle of chains,” Cordelia said, “but very faintly.”
“Whoa.” Quicksilver reined her horse to a stop as she spun to look behind her. Cordelia turned to look, too, but Allouette kept watch ahead, well aware that the sound could be a diversion. “What do you see, ladies?”
“Naught.” Quicksilver turned back to the front. “Only shadowed trees and stone walls stretching behind us into deeper darkness. Let us ride on but hearken well.”
They shook the reins and touched their horses’ flanks with their heels, moving ahead—and behind them, the sound began again: the whisk, whisk, whisk of something huge brushing against stone and, beneath it, the padding of great unseen bare feet.
CHAPTER
6
Quicksilver spun in her saddle as though to catch whatever followed them by surprise. This time Allouette darted a quick glance backward too, but saw only blackness with the faint glimmering of stone walls at either side.
“It stops when we stop,” Quicksilver reported.
“Ride on,” Cordelia said, face hard.
They started forward again, and behind them, the brushing sound began once more—and the clanking of chains was clearly audible now. Faint it was indeed, but all three could hear it.
“Stalking is all well and good—as long as I am the stalker,” Quicksilver said between her teeth. She pulled up, spinning in her saddle—and the sound, of course, also halted. “Whoever you are, avaunt and begone! Know that I am redoubtable in my own right and will as soon run you through as look upon you!”
“Therefore will it not be seen,” Allouette said, her voice trembling. “What monster is this that comes upon us?” She turned to Cordelia. “You, who were reared by a wizard and a witch and have hobnobbed with elves and brownies all your life—can you not say what follows us?”
“I have heard of a presence like this, that makes sounds but is seen not,” Cordelia said, her voice shaking. “ ’Tis called a barguest.”
Allouette’s breath hissed in, and Quicksilver drew her sword. “What harm is in it?”
Cordelia said, “None in itself—but it is a forecaster of death.”
“Then let it forecast someone else’s!” Quicksilver scowled into the darkness behind her and cried, “Avaunt thee, barguest! Get thee gone!”
“Hold, I pray!” Allouette said in alarm. “It gives us no hurt.”
“No hurt!” Quicksilver rounded on her. “How can it forecast death and do no harm? Nay, I can forecast death, too—with this omen here.” She hefted her sword. “If the spirit predicts our dying, it can only be because it causes death!”
“Not so,” Allouette protested. “It has something of the precognitive gift, that is all. We need only pay it no heed.”
“No heed!” Quicksilver cried. “Perhaps you can walk a nighttime road and truly ignore those sounds of chains, of padding feet and furry sides brushing against stone—but I cannot!”
“It will be unnerving,” Cordelia agreed and turned to call to the darkness behind them, “Show yourself, whatever you are! Shame upon you for so frightening three weak young women—and know that we are not so weak as we might seem, for two of us can turn you completely to jelly! Appear or be gone!”
Her concentration was so intense that it rocked Allouette and even made Quicksilver’s head snap back as though she’d been slapped—so they should not have been surprised when the darkness seemed to coalesce into a huge wooly black dog the size of a calf with eyes like saucers, with triple irises—a pupil inside a white ring, inside a blue ring which was inside a red ring. Those eyes glowed balefully at the three women as its lips writhed up in a snarl, revealing sharply pointed teeth that glowed in the night.
“Do not dare to challenge me!” Quicksilver snapped, brandishing her sword. “We’ll have none of your dealing here! All three of us shall live many a year yet, and if you dare to contradict me, barguest, I shall prove it upon your body! Go on, get away, get you gone—or I shall loose my friends to tear you apart, nay, to make war between the cells of your body, so that your whole substance falls apart and oozes down into a puddle in the roadway, a heap of gelatinous quivering fungus that shall never again stalk poor travelers at night, let alone foretell the death of any being!”
Cordelia and Allouette stared at her, appalled. Her face was distorted with anger, bright red, her bosom heaving and her whole body trembling with the intensity of her rage as she stared furiously into the darkness.
The night was very quiet. Even the crickets seemed stunned to silence by Quicksilver’s anger.
Then, almost furtively, the sounds began again—the brushing, the jingling of chains, the padding of huge feet—but moving away.
Cordelia and Allouette turned to stare into the darkness in shock.
The sounds faded and were gone. Quicksilver relaxed, sheathing her sword with a single nod of her head. “It knows better than to strive against Cold Iron in the hands of one determined.”
Cordelia let out a long, shuddering breath. “I would not have believed it if I had not seen it—but I think, bold chieftain, that it was the sheer intensity of your anger that affrighted the beast. Certainly I felt you battering at my mind like a ram, and I was not even your target!”
“It knew I spoke no more than I was willing to do—or that you were,” Quicksilver said evenly. “Oh, it was a fine game when it could pace behind us unseen and fill us with terror, but there is no pleasure in it when the prey becomes the hunter!”
“So it was only necessary to show resolution after all,” Cordelia said, smiling.
“True resolution,” Quicksilver insisted. “I was quite ready to set upon it with my sword, no matter the sharpness of those glowing teeth—and I trust you were just as willing to turn it back into the lump of fungus from which it was made!”
“Be sure of it.” Cordelia shook her head as she turned to ride on. “I wish that all threats could be banished so easily.”
“Most need a bit more persuading.” Quicksilver kicked her mount into a walk beside Cordelia’s. “Life has taught me that I must always be ready to fight. I can only rejoice that, with your brother, it is rarely necessary.”
So they rode off into the night, discussing the young men they pursued—but Allouette rode behind them in silence, unable to rid herself of a nagging dread. If the barguest only predicted death, after all, banishing it would not prevent that death. She felt a chill that reminded her of her own mortality and hoped that the deadly forecast was not for herself or her companions, but only for their enemies.
Several hour
s later, they rode bleary-eyed and nodding into a clearing. Cordelia looked up at the stars and sighed. “The constellations have turned toward midnight, ladies. The men must be considerably farther ahead than we thought.”
“They could be only a hundred yards from us,” Quicksilver grumbled, “and we would never know it in the gloom under these trees.”
“What other night-walkers might lurk among the leaves not even fifty feet away?” Allouette asked with a shudder.
“Well said.” Cordelia dismounted and began to untie her tent and bedroll. “One haunting is enough for the night. By your leave, damsels, I’d rather sleep till dawn than wander.” She paused to look up at her companions. “That’s not to say, of course, that I shall not take first watch.”
“No, I claim that privilege,” Allouette said instantly. “I have learned Gregory’s way of meditating in a trance that keeps him aware of the world about him, but gives as much rest as sleep. I shall take the first three hours.”
Cordelia and Quicksilver exchanged a glance that quite clearly asked if they dared trust their former enemy to guard their slumber. Then, reluctantly, Quicksilver nodded, though her hand rested on her dagger-hilt as she turned toward her future kinswoman. “Thank you for the kind offer. I will accept it, for truthfully, I know not if I could keep my eyes open for even one more hour. Nay, do you take the watch with my thanks, lady.”
“And mine,” Cordelia seconded. Then she hauled the tent off her horse’s rump. Before she started to set it up, though, she unsaddled and unbridled her horse and tied it to a tree on a long rein. She stroked the mare’s neck, saying, “Do you graze now, my lovely, and sleep when you are filled.” She knew she really should curry the poor thing but was too weary. With leaden limbs, she turned to help Allouette pitch the tent while Quicksilver laid the fire. “How far ahead are the men, think you?”
“An inch is as good a guess as a mile,” Quicksilver said, exasperated. “Since they shield their thoughts, there is no way of telling.”
Allouette pondered their reason for shielding and trembled with a shiver that was not due to the night’s chill.
As sunset gave way to twilight and the men pitched camp, Alain asked, “Can you not cease shielding my thoughts now, Gregory? It must be wearying for you, and neither you nor Geoffrey has had any hint of a mind-reading monster near to us.”
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