"Nay, I spoke not of his garb, but of his face. I have seen him somewhere—or his portrait, at least. I could swear to it."
"Don't." Matt laid a hand on his shoulder. "Strange things happen when people swear things around here. Believe me, I know. Don't do it if you can possibly avoid it."
"But what of this fellow in gray?"
"He shouldn't, either." Matt stepped past the cyclops. "But I think I'll see what he wants."
The old man held up a hand, palm out, arm straight toward them.
Matt paused. "I don't think he wants me to come on."
"Mayhap we should heed him," Yverne said nervously.
"Maybe." Matt frowned. "I think I'll try to get a more complete picture from him. If you'll excuse me, folks?"
He stepped past Fadecourt's jaundiced gaze and went up toward the old man.
He had only taken five steps before the oldster quite calmly reached up and took off his head.
Matt froze, staring, waiting for the wash of horror to finish running through him.
While he was waiting, the old man tucked his head under his arm, turning into a ghost of his former self—not the old man, but the self they had seen chasing Yverne.
The damsel gave a little scream before she managed to clap a hand over her own mouth. Fadecourt was back and by her side in an instant, patting the other hand and murmuring reassurances.
Matt was wondering why the ghost could be seen in the daytime, until he realized the apparition was standing so far under the leaves that the gloom was almost nightlike. He set his jaw with determination and pressed onward.
The ghost began to make excited gestures. Matt stopped again, frowning, and called out, "Fadecourt—do your people have a system of sign language?"
"Nay," the cyclops snapped, and went back to comforting Yverne.
Matt frowned, remembering every bout of charades he'd ever played—not that it would have done any good to ask, "What category?" or "How many words?" But some of the ghost's gestures did seem to be on the verge of making sense, if you understood them as pantomime—the curled hand with two fingers extended downward scissoring could indicate somebody walking. But why was it walking in a U turn? And why that diagonal cut of hand across chest? Was he threatening to cut their heads off, too?
Then something almost clicked. Matt squinted, on the verge of understanding...
A brisk breeze stirred the leaves; a ray of sunlight lanced into the ghost's shelter. With a moan, he faded out, disappeared.
Matt stood, listening to the breeze and the summer insects, letting normality fill him again.
"What's it mean, Wizard?"
Matt looked up at Narlh. "I was just beginning to make sense of it."
"But you didn't quite get there?"
Matt shook his head.
"Shall we go, Lord Matthew?" Fadecourt came up with Yverne.
"Into the forest, or away from it?'' Matt asked.
"Was not the ghost indicating that we should go in?" the damsel asked, glance flicking nervously toward the leaves.
Matt shook his head. "I couldn't even make out that much. That upraised arm could have just meant that we should stop because he wanted to talk to us—or it could have meant that we should stop and not go into the forest."
"He did afright the damsel and make her run before him." Fadecourt's jaw hardened as he glowered at the forest. "Are we to let him bar us now? I say nay!" And he stepped off toward the trees. "Let us dare this forest to do its worst!"
Matt made a long arm and caught his shoulder. "Hold it, friend. Its worst could be very bad indeed. Notice all the little yellow eyes in the shadows, giving us the evil look? And I don't like the way that tree is staring at me."
"Nonsense, Lord Matthew! A tree cannot..." Then Fadecourt caught sight of the oak Matt was pointing at. He gazed at it for a moment, then said, "I catch your meaning. It does look at us, does it not?"
"Indubitably," Matt assured him. "And it does not have beneficent intentions."
"Yet how can a tree do harm?" Yverne asked.
Matt skipped the visions of trees falling on houses and twiggy fingers grabbing somebody by the throat. "This is a magic forest, remember—raised by sorcery, activated by malice. What couldn't a tree do, in there?"
Yverne apparently had a more graphic imagination than he did, to judge by the way she shuddered.
"That's what I thought." Matt turned away to his right. "Let's just see if we can go around it, shall we?"
They saw. They saw all that morning, hiking on and on, the forest to their left, the hills to their right. After the first half hour, Matt stopped and said, "You're very noble and all that, milady, but it looks as if this could go on for a while. You ride Narlh, okay?"
"Nay, I have enjoyed the walk!" she protested.
"Maybe so far—but I don't want to wait till you're looking droopy. It's tiring enough just riding."
"But the poor beast..."
"Aw, you scarcely weigh anything," Narlh scoffed. "Wouldn't make me any more tired than a feather—and I'm carrying plenty of those."
"But 'tis not right that I should ride whilst you walk!"
"It is your privilege, as a lady," Fadecourt assured her, "and ours, as gentlemen. Be of good cheer, Lady Yverne—we have paced long miles already, and a few more will trouble us not at all. You, however, are unused to the exercise—nor are your shoes fitted to it."
"No point in waiting until your slippers are in rags," Matt agreed.
"Well—I am not booted," Yverne admitted, and it only took a little more cajoling to persuade her to ride again.
It was a good thing she did, because the hike went on, and on, and on. Finally, when they called a halt around midday, Yverne's shoulders were slumping as she slid off Narlh's back. The dracogriff wasn't looking too chipper himself; his scales had dulled, and his eyes had turned sullen. Fadecourt was still holding his head high, but you could tell he was working at it.
As for Matt, he was fuming. "Confound it! Will this blasted forest never come to an end?"
"All things end at last, Lord Matthew." Fadecourt sighed. "This, too, shall pass."
"I'm concerned with whether or not we're going to pass it." Matt glared at the gloomy wood. "I could swear I'm looking at the same evil tree for the fourth time! You know, the one that was staring at me?"
"Aye," Fadecourt said weariness dragging at each syllable, "Yet that cannot be. It must be some oak that resembles it."
But Matt was suddenly taut again, with a realization that brought him something like horror. "It could be possible though, you know. Once you allow magic, the range of possibilities increases dramatically." He waved a hand at them. "You folks go ahead and start lunch. Let me see what I can cook up here."
Yverne looked up from opening the saddlebags. "But you, too, must rest!"
"I won't be long."
He wasn't. It didn't take that long to scuff around the long grass until he found an inch-thick stick, about a foot and a half long. He drew his dagger and cut a notch below the two little knots at its top, then jabbed it into the ground and came back to his companions with a vindictive smile.
Yverne held out bread and cheese with a frown. "What virtue is there in setting out a stake?"
"Yeah," Narlh concurred. "Tryin' to set a booby trap for anybody comin' after us?"
"No—I didn't even sharpen the top." Matt folded up tailor-fashion and accepted the slab of bread and cheese.
"Then what purpose will it serve?" Fadecourt asked.
"Let's just say that I hope like fury I don't see it again."
It took a long time. It took four hours, and Matt was beginning to think he was wrong, and it had all been his imagination, and the forest really was that large. It took so long that the sun was declining toward the horizon with a thought of reclining, and Fadecourt was sighing. "I can only admire your tenacity, Lord Matthew, and your zeal—but if we do not make camp soon, the darkness will catch us unaware."
"As long as it's only the darkne
ss that catches us," Matt said grimly. "No, Fadecourt. We have to know what we're up against, before..."
Then he saw it.
He stopped dead, and Yverne lifted her tired gaze, frowning, wondering why he had halted; but just as she was about to ask, Matt sprinted ahead to something in the grass. He yanked it up, bellowing, "Damn it!"
Yverne turned ghastly pale, and Fadecourt stood ramrod stiff. Even Narlh scowled and muttered to himself.
Matt stumped back to them, holding out the stick and shaking it. "Do you see this? Do you see it?"
"Aye," Fadecourt said his face frozen. " 'Tis the stick you notched and planted."
"Planted, yeah! And it's grown into a regular nightmare! You know what this proves, don't you?"
"Yeah," Narlh said. "Some sorcerer moved it ahead of us."
"Sorcerer, yes—ahead, no! It stayed put—we did the moving! We came in a full circle! We've been tramping around in the same path all day!"
"But how can that be?" Yverne protested. "We have kept the sun behind us in the morning, and before us after noon!"
"And the wood on our left hand," Fadecourt added. "Can it be a circular wood?"
"Why not? It's a product of sorcery!"
"But the sun!" Fadecourt protested.
Matt nodded. "That proves it—that's the clincher. Gordogrosso twisted space on us, isolating us and those trees from the rest of the universe in a closed loop."
"Twist space?" Yverne gasped, eyes wide, and Fadecourt frowned. "Space is all about us—it is naught but air! How can one twist it?"
Matt started to answer, then scanned their faces and decided it wasn't the time for a lecture on math and physics. "Magic," he explained. "We've known we're up against sorcery—only Gordogrosso's a bit more of a heavyweight than I thought. Believe me, it's possible—here. And he did it." His face suddenly contorted with rage, and he whirled, hurling the stick from him. "Damn that stick!"
Yverne blanched. Fadecourt's face hardened to granite. "Well, then, we have wasted a day, and I doubt not the king has used the time well, to bring his army that much closer to us. Yet it is done, and there's naught we can do to counter it—or is there?"
"No," Matt agreed. "Nothing, until morning—or at least, there's no point in trying. If I come up with a spell that gets us out of here before night, I'll just give King Gordogrosso all the time he needs to come up with something worse. We'd better just find dinner and bed down."
"And make a defense line," the cyclops said grimly. "We shall need a strong one, surely."
Matt stared at him in surprise. Then he said "Why yes, of course. Any special reason?"
But Fadecourt had already turned away, casting about the meadowland in search of a campsite—not that there seemed to be much to choose from. It was perilously close to rudeness, saved only by the fact that Fadecourt had managed to turn away before Matt got his mouth in gear—but it jolted the wizard nonetheless. He turned to Yverne, but she had already slid down off Narlh's shoulders and was walking away, too, dipping down now and then to pick up kindling wood. In desperation, he turned to Narlh. "How come I'm persona non grata all of a sudden?"
"Whadda ya expect, Wizard?" the dracogriff growled. "You just put us all in danger and set yourself up on the side of evil."
Matt stared.
Narlh nodded.
"I must have done it while I wasn't looking, then," Matt said "What did I do?"
"You cursed the stick," Narlh explained.
"Cursed it?"
"Yeah—when you sent it to Hell."
"But I didn't...Oh." Matt's eyes widened. "You mean...when I said, `Damn that stick'?"
Narlh winced at the repetition. "Yeah, yeah! Did ya have to say it again? Look—if you damn something, you send it to Hell—right? You set the worst of curses upon that helpless piece of wood."
"But I didn't mean it that way! It was just a figure of speech!"
Narlh winced. "What you say, can really happen here. And if you heap so much torture on such a poor little innocent object, you've done a lotta wrong."
"But it isn't even alive!"
"Doesn't matter. What the words said is evil—and that means you gave the sorcerer a hole in our defenses, by siding with Hell, no matter how small the issue was."
Matt stared at him, shocked.
Narlh cocked his head to the side, frowning. "So how come you didn't know all about this? You're a wizard, ain't you?"
"Yes," Matt said, "but I still haven't managed to shift my Weltanschauung, my worldview, along with my shift in worlds. You're right—I really should have thought of that."
Narlh started to ask, but Matt suddenly whirled and ran toward the forest, plowing to a halt and casting about frantically. He found the stick and yanked it up out of the grass, cast around again until he'd found three rocks, slapped them together into a rough hearth, then yanked up grass from all around it and pulled out flint and steel. He struck a spark and breathed on it as the grasses crisped around it, breathed the spark into flame, blew gently on it until the stick caught fire, and blew harder and harder until the flames surrounded it Then he sat back on his heels with a sigh and looked up to see Yverne gazing down at him—and she was looking rather bitter.
Matt spread his hands: "Look—no more stick, no more curse."
She stared at him as though he'd lost his wits. "Can you truly think so—and you, a lord of wizardry?"
Matt just stared at her as the flames died down and guttered out, leaving only a small heap of ash. Then he said, "Okay—what basic, elementary fact have I overlooked this time?"
"The stuff of life," she said, "or rather, that life has no stuff. These sticks and rocks about us are but illusions, as are we ourselves; the real world is the spirit's."
Matt stared, horrified. Slowly, he said, "And in that real spirit world, I've condemned this stick to hellfire eternal?"
"You have," she confirmed. "What use is making the stick itself to vanish?"
He had the odd, irrational feeling that she was hoping he would explain some secret of wizardry to her, whereby his cursing the stick would be erased; but he had none to give, and after a moment, the light in her eyes died, her mouth twisted with bitterness again, and she turned away. Matt stared down at the pitiful heap of ashes before him, feeling foolish and, strangely, very, very guilty.
But it was just a stick!
Finally, he hauled himself to his feet and turned to look around and see what his companions had done while he was chasing the wild goose.
The first thing he saw was the dozen sharpened stakes on top of the hillock, leaning outward in an impromptu chevauxde-frise. They made a neat circle around the top of a little hillock—a hillock that Matt hadn't even known was there. He wouldn't ever have, either, if Fadecourt hadn't been busy finding sticks and sharpening them, setting them up in a stockade. The cyclops was still at the task, setting up another sharp point to close the ring. Matt stared at him in silent tribute, shaking his head with a shamed smile.
If there was anything resembling a defense to be found or built, Fadecourt would do both. Matt pushed himself into motion, heading toward his companion. As he came up, he asked, "Anything I can do to help?"
"Aye," Fadecourt said, his attention still on the stake he was setting. "Seek out boulders and roll them back."
Matt accepted the unstated rebuke and turned away to go rock hunting.
Narlh was already on the job, bringing foot-thick rocks back to the hillock—except that he wasn't rolling them, of course, he was just picking them up in his jaws and carrying them back. He spat out the current one and called out, "This is stupid—I can haul 'em a lot faster'n you, Wizard. But it slows me down having to look for 'em. You just hunt 'em out, okay? And wave to me when y' find 'em."
So Matt did—and the dracogriff was right, it did go faster that way. As the sun was setting, they all settled down inside a ring of stone two boulders high, with a stack of eight-foot tree limbs beside them to sharpen and add to the stockade.
The at
mosphere had thawed enough for conversation—sinner and klutz though he might be, Matt was on their side. He groused at Fadecourt, "Where'd you learn so much about the military, anyway?"
Since he intended it as a rhetorical question, he didn't really notice that the cyclops didn't answer.
Alisande neared the western border with an army at her back, and the peasant mothers ran home and hid their daughters, out of long habit. They had heard that the queen had already executed two men for rape, but soldiers will be soldiers.
The queen came to the border with an army at her back, yes,. but the only unit she really trusted was D'Art's. And Sauvignon's, of course—at least, she trusted his intentions and his fighting ability; the marquis had been jailed with his father, after racking up quite a score on the tournament circuit.
But how he would fare in battle—ah, that was another matter. Due to the consequences of his loyalty, he had been forced to sit out the last war, unable to rally to Alisande's banner.
He had rallied now, well enough, with the gleam of fervor in his eye, and a look of awed worship whenever he glanced at his queen. Alisande glanced back to her right; he was there, like a shield on her shoulder, eyes only for his sovereign.
But not for the woman Alisande.
Regrettable, in its way, for he was a handsome youth, only a few years older than Alisande—clean-favored, with a strong jaw and flashing blue eyes. She reflected, not for the first time, that a pedestal can be an uncomfortable location. Not to mention its being an exposed position.
With a shock, she realized the course of her thoughts and deflected them, thrusting them from her angrily. The man was another woman's husband, after all!
Besides, she herself was betrothed.
Yet he was the son of a duke...
If only her Matthew were as well born as Sauvignon! Her Matthew, who regarded her not with awe, but only admiration—admiration, and a healthy lust.
Again, she thrust the thought from her; it was apt to weaken her with the womanly emotions it raised. She lifted her eyes unto the hills and beheld the borderland, with its lofty spires and rocky crags. A dragon drifted between the peaks, no doubt eyeing them with suspicion. She smiled and raised a hand in greeting, remembering Matthew's dragon friend Stegoman, who had aided them so strongly in battle, and en route to it. Was there nothing that did not remind her of Matthew?
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