The Shining City

by Kate Forsyth

  High above their heads a volley of flame blasted the night sky. Glancing up, Lewen saw the sinuous shape of the dragon soaring through the darkness, the red glare of its breath lighting up the massive heavy clouds, the wind-tossed trees, its great angular wings. For a moment all was white, black, red, like a drawing of ink on paper, then the dragon passed over.

  There was a rush of bitter-tasting air, then all was quiet and dark again.

  Rhiannon lay against the mare’s warm side, Blackthorn’s wing tucked over her, trying to stop shivering. The cold struck up from the snow-covered ground, penetrating the plaid she had wrapped around her, and seeming to strike right into the very marrow of her bones.

  Rhiannon had never seen a storm of such unnatural ferocity. It had seemed like a living creature with talons of ice, and fangs of lightning, that had harried her all the way from Sorrowgate Tower, across the river and to the foothills. Rhiannon had hoped to fly much further before resting, but their only hope of survival had been to land and seek shelter.

  They must want to hang her very badly, Rhiannon thought to herself, to send such a storm after her. Here it was, midsummer, and icicles hung from all the trees. Drifts of hailstones lay everywhere. The copse of trees in which they sheltered bent and blew in the wind, their branches creaking. Rhiannon did not know what time it was. Surely dawn could not be too far away, but there was no sound of birdsong, no lightening of the howling darkness. It had been an endless night.

  Rhiannon ached all over from their desperate ride through the hailstorm. Her head throbbed, and blood trickled down from a cut behind her ear. There was more blood on the arm she had raised to shield her face, and on Blackthorn’s sweat-scudded hide.

  Rhiannon would like to have lit a fire, and melted some snow to make a hot drink, but she did not dare. She could still hear the faint sound of bells. She had never heard such a melancholy sound.

  Blackthorn shivered and put back her ears.

  Do no’ fear, they willna catch us, Rhiannon thought. Nothing can fly as fast as a winged horse. He named us well, my beauty. Rhiannon, the rider who none can catch …

  Something pierced her heart, cut short her breath, brought a rush of tears to her eyes. The emotion she felt was far too strong, too fierce, to be called contentment, or even its brighter cousin, happiness. It was too dark, too sharp, to be called joy. She had no word in her vocabulary to describe it. I am alive, she thought, dumbfounded. I am free. All she could do was bend her head to the ground, and rest her forehead there, her eyes shut, feeling the blood throbbing in her throat and her temples. Alive …

  Suddenly Blackthorn scrambled to her feet, neighing in panic. Rhiannon was tumbled sideways. The bluebird trilled in terror, and took to the wing. Rhiannon drew her knife, searching desperately for any sign of danger. Blackthorn reared above her, eyes rolling white.

  Out of the darkness fell a darker shadow, immense and terrifying. A hot blast of wind whipped Rhiannon’s hair about her face, smelling of fire and ashes. The air roared with the sound of vast wings. Sudden dread weakened her legs, so that she fell to her knees in the snow.

  A blast of fire lit up the dark sky from horizon to horizon. The skin on her face was scorched. She threw up one hand to protect it, and felt fire lick her fingers.

  A dragon was hurtling down from the sky, trumpeting with rage. It was flame incarnate. Blazing eyes as big as suns, dreadful wings as wide as the world, a whipping tail that sliced the sky open. Rhiannon bent to the ground, her arms over her head.

  Blackthorn took flight, screaming with terror. No! Rhiannon shrieked silently. She saw the dragon lash out with one terrible claw and Blackthorn neighed in pain, and swerved.

  Looking up through the tangle of hair and fingers, Rhiannon saw her beloved winged horse fly free, eyes white-rimmed, wings straining. Then there was only terror, and despair, as the great golden beast plummeted down upon her.

  Expecting to be crushed, or incinerated, or torn apart, Rhiannon lay still, waiting, feeling again the dark rapture she had experienced earlier, in even greater intensity for knowing it would soon end in agony and death. Alive …

  But the dragon landed lightly beside her, in a gush of smoke and cinders, and clamped one immense talon over her prostrate body. Rhiannon’s breath rushed out of her. She rested her face on the ground, her mouth and nostrils full of snow. Tears choked her.

  Two boots landed with a thump near her head. They were long, black and shiny. They were also far too small to belong to a man. Rhiannon’s stomach clenched. She craned her head to see more, but it was no use. It was too dark.

  A woman’s voice said coolly, ‘Thank ye, Asrohc, ye can let her go now.’

  Delicately the dragon lifted the ivory cage of its claws, and Rhiannon was able to lift her face from the snow and look.

  The Banrìgh stood beside her, dressed in leather gaiters and breastplate, a close-fitting helmet on her head.

  ‘Ye think ye can escape justice so easily?’ she hissed.

  Rhiannon could only stare at her. Never, in her wildest imaginings, could she have expected this. The last time she had seen the Banrìgh, it had been at the Court of Star Chamber, dressed in long ceremonial robes, with a crown on her head. She had looked grave and remote, her hands folded in her lap. Now she was livid with rage, her blue eyes blazing. She carried a naked dagger in her hand.

  ‘Get up,’ Iseult said.

  Rhiannon staggered to her feet.

  Iseult took a step closer, her dagger held close and steady to her waist. ‘Throw down your weapons.’

  Rhiannon dropped her knife. Iseult searched her, quickly and efficiently, then stepped away and went through her pack, which lay half-open on the ground. She straightened, holding in her hand the blowpipe and bag of barbs that Connor had long ago used to defend himself against the wild satyricorn herd.

  ‘Ye really thought ye’d get away with it?’ she said furiously.

  Rhiannon was puzzled. She did not know how to answer.

  ‘Asrohc, seize her!’ Iseult commanded. ‘Take us back to Lucescere!’

  Swift as a striking snake, the dragon’s immense claw flashed out and closed about Rhiannon. She had no time to even flinch. Then the dragon bent its great sinuous neck so that Iseult could mount up and sit astride it.

  With a jerk that snapped Rhiannon’s neck painfully and made her gasp, the dragon launched off into the dark sky. Her head whirled. Her vision swam with desperate tears.

  She had heard the stories from Nina, of course. How the Khan’cohban warrior, Khan’gharad, had saved the baby dragon princess from death and so had been given the dragon’s name as a reward, to call in time of desperate need. How both Iseult and Isabeau had inherited that privilege, and the right to cross their leg over the dragon’s back. How the seven sons of the queen dragon had come flaming out of the sky to help Lachlan MacCuinn win the final battle against the Fairgean at Bonnyblair. The tales of the dragons were among the favourites of the young apprentice-witches, and Rhiannon had heard them told many times on their long journey through Ravenshaw. She had just never, ever expected the dragons to be called upon to track her down. In all the tales the jongleurs told, it was emphasised what a rare privilege it was, the right to call the dragon’s name. All Rhiannon could think, all through the swift, vertiginous journey back to Lucescere, was that the Rìgh and Banrìgh must have valued Connor the Just very highly, to employ such awesome means to track her down.

  Now Blackthorn was gone, who knew where, and Rhiannon had no way of knowing how badly she was hurt by that spiteful swipe of the dragon’s claw. And her little bluebird gone, fled into the forest. All hope of escape gone too. No matter how quick or clever or strong Rhiannon was, she had no hope of ever escaping a dragon.

  Far below her, the orange smoky glare of Lucescere swung through the darkness, blurred by Rhiannon’s hopeless tears. Closer and closer it came, and then Rhiannon could smell it, the stench of two hundred thousand unwashed people and all their goats and pigs and chickens and childre
n rising up in a great reek that made her cough and choke. Then she heard it, the clatter and whine and bang and groan that filled the city even in the dead of night. She heard the rush of the waterfall, and felt its spray dampen her cheek, then the dragon was swinging low over the city, giving a little ironic spurt of flame so that Rhiannon could clearly see the few people in the streets running and cowering, and hear their shrieks of alarm.

  ‘Asrohc,’ the Banrìgh said reprovingly, and the dragon snorted with what could only be dragonish laughter.

  Then there was the palace below them, its windows all blazing with lights. The great square was lined with flaming torches, their smoke torn into rags by the wind raised by the dragon’s strongly beating wings. Lines of soldiers with raised spears waited as the dragon came down with impossible lightness and grace, and then they bowed as Iseult dismounted as gracefully. It was not until the dragon had stretched its magnificent huge wings and soared away that the Captain of the Yeomen came forward, and waited on bent knee for the Banrìgh’s orders.

  ‘Take her to the tower,’ Iseult commanded. ‘I found the evidence in her bag. I want her hanged at dawn, do ye understand me?’

  Dizzy from her wildly swinging flight, dazed with misery and despair, Rhiannon could barely grasp her meaning.

  ‘It will be my pleasure,’ Captain Dillon said grimly, and jerked his head so the soldiers stepped forward to seize her.

  ‘But, Iseult …’

  Rhiannon turned her numb face towards the Keybearer, who came hurrying across the square, Dide close behind her. Isabeau looked white and exhausted.

  ‘I found all the evidence I need,’ Iseult said defensively and brandished the blowpipe. ‘There’s a bag o’ barbs here, missing quite a few thorns, and a bottle o’ poison too.’

  ‘But to hang her, out o’ hand, without even an attempt at a trial. Iseult, it’s wrong!’

  ‘She’s had her trial and she was found guilty. That’s good enough for me.’

  ‘But that was for Connor’s death and Lachlan was to pardon her …’

  ‘Lachlan is dead now and his soft heart with him.’

  ‘But, Iseult, ye canna be sure.’

  ‘Aye, I can.’

  ‘But …’

  ‘Do no’ argue with me!’ Iseult cried.

  There was a long silence. Iseult drew a ragged breath. When she exhaled, a white frosty plume filled the air before her mouth. She raised a hand and dashed it across her eyes. ‘Do as I say,’ she commanded the Captain, who bowed his head. He gestured to two of the soldiers, who seized Rhiannon’s elbows. Two more stood on either side with their spears at the ready. All were shivering in the cold.

  ‘I will see justice done,’ Iseult said in an unsteady voice. ‘She is lucky I do no’ have her strangled with her own intestines.’

  Then she turned and hurried away towards the palace, a gust of snowflakes blowing behind her.

  Rhiannon could only stare.

  Isabeau grasped Captain Dillon’s arm. ‘She is half-mad with grief,’ the Keybearer said in a low, urgent voice.

  ‘As are we all,’ the captain replied in heavy tones.

  ‘Dillon, I beg ye, do no’ be hasty.’

  ‘I must obey Her Highness.’

  ‘There is more to this than meets the eye. I must have time to find out the truth o’ it.’

  ‘I have my orders, Keybearer.’

  ‘Give me until the morning. I will talk with her.’

  ‘The prisoner will hang at the ringing o’ the dawn bell, unless I hear otherwise,’ Captain Dillon said, his mouth hard.

  Isabeau let his arm go, and turned to Rhiannon. ‘I am very sorry. I will do what I can.’

  Rhiannon reached out a hand to her, then gasped as the soldiers jerked her back painfully. ‘What am I meant to have done?’ she asked. ‘This is something new, isn’t it? This is no’ just because I escaped?’

  Isabeau stared at her. ‘Ye think my sister would call the dragon’s name simply to chase after an escaped prisoner? Eà, no! Child, do ye no’ ken? Did ye no’ hear the bells toll? Rhiannon, the Rìgh was murdered last night. With a poisoned barb spat through a blowpipe.’

  The night whirled around her. ‘They think I killed the Rìgh?’

  Isabeau nodded.

  ‘Dark walkers, spare me,’ Rhiannon whispered.

  Iseult found it difficult to keep her feet. She walked slowly, keeping her back straight and her gait steady only with a great effort of will. For the last few hours she had been sustained by anger and the fierce hunger for revenge. Now that the satyricorn girl was captured and thrown back into prison, her death only a few hours away, Iseult found her savage strength gone. It was all she could do not to weep as she made her weary way back to the palace.

  Lachlan dead; her youngest children stolen away; her eldest son, her beautiful winged Donncan, possibly in danger. Iseult could not bear it. In only a few hours, her whole world had been dismantled and laid in ruins. Iseult had been raised by the Khan’cohbans, though, raised to be strong and ruthless, to never submit to weak emotion. No matter how much Iseult wanted to crawl into a dark hole somewhere and howl her heart out, she could not. Someone had to take the reins, and look after things till Donncan came back.

  She heard hurrying footsteps behind her, and turned, recognising Isabeau’s quick step. Her twin came stumbling through the snow, her cheeks as white as the ground, her red hair falling out of its pins to straggle wildly around her face. She looked fierce and wild and angry and haggard with grief all at the same time, and Iseult had a sudden insight into how she too must look. She put up a hand to her own hair and tried to smooth it back.

  ‘Iseult, this is wrong, ye ken this is wrong,’ Isabeau said, gripping her arm. ‘Even if Rhiannon is involved with all this mess, ye shouldna be hanging her out o’ hand. We need information! We need …’

  ‘She killed the Rìgh,’ Iseult said icily. ‘Ye think I can hesitate over this? If I show the slightest weakness, anyone who hates the MacCuinns and plots against the crown will gather round us like vultures round a corpse. She dies at dawn, and so too shall any other o’ these vile plotters that we can lay by the heels.’

  ‘But if I can show ye, if I can prove to ye that she is innocent?’

  ‘How?’

  Isabeau hesitated.

  ‘There is no way ye can prove so to me,’ Iseult said, and walked on.

  As she climbed the steps into the banquet-hall, the light of the torches her lackeys carried went with her. Isabeau was left in the icy darkness. Snow drove steadily into her face. Dide stood beside the Keybearer, holding her close, as she shivered violently, her teeth chattering.

  ‘What will ye do?’ he asked.

  For a long moment she did not answer, then Isabeau said slowly, ‘There may be a way. Ye remember the silver goblet Connor carried with him everywhere?’

  ‘The one ye were so curious about?’

  ‘Aye. If ye remember, I think it could be some kind o’ cup o’ truth. What if we gave it to Rhiannon to drink from?’

  ‘Ye would have to convince Iseult first,’ Dide said dryly. ‘If she does no’ believe it truly is a magical cup that forces truth-telling, she will just say Rhiannon lies and naught is changed.’

  ‘Aye, I ken.’

  ‘So how …?’

  ‘If it is in The Book o’ Shadows, Iseult will have to believe,’ Isabeau said.

  ‘Did ye no’ mean to look it up afore?’

  Isabeau nodded.

  ‘Then why …?’

  ‘I’m afraid,’ Isabeau replied, and she shuddered so violently, Dide was startled and moved to grasp her closer.

  ‘Afraid? Afraid o’ what?’

  ‘Afraid o’ what The Book o’ Shadows will show me,’ Isabeau said, and looked past him into the black storm-ridden night.

  Inside the banquet-hall, the dead Rìgh lay on his bier, candles surrounding him.

  The room was virtually empty now. The last of the wedding guests had found their beds, and only a few so
ldiers still stood guard on the doors. Gathered around the fire at the far end of the room were the privy councillors, drinking from steaming goblets, heavy velvet mantles thrown over their midsummer finery. Nina and Iven sat together, holding each other’s hands. Brun the cluricaun sat beside them, his tail twisting anxiously behind him. Gwilym the Ugly sat with his wooden leg elevated, his face creased with pain. The other witches were gathered about the bier, their heads bent in silent prayer. There was Stormy Briant and his brother Cailean, his huge shadow-hound lying at his feet, Ghislaine Dream-Walker, looking very frail, and Jock Crofter, scowling as usual.

  On the far side of the bier, Iain of Arran rested his head in his hands. Elfrida sat beside him, fiddling with the heavy knobs of her antique fan. Ther son, Neil, was sitting some way away from them, his eyes fixed anxiously on Bronwen’s face. She had withdrawn from the others, sitting with her mother on one of the trestles drawn up against the wall, the Lodestar cradled in her lap.

  A scullery-maid was on her hands and knees, sweeping up the last of the mess on the floor. She stopped every now and again to wipe her red eyes on her apron. Otherwise the only servants left were the Lord Steward and Lord Chamberlain, both sitting in vigil by the Rìgh.

  As Iseult came in, everyone rose to their feet and bowed. Iseult felt a heavy despondency fall on her shoulders. She had not been gone long, no more than half an hour, but that time had been spent in swift, decisive action. She had flown high above the storm on dragon-back, felt the wind screaming in her face, and had the fierce satisfaction of seizing the satyricorn and wresting her back to justice. Here all was the same.

  ‘Any news?’ Iseult demanded, even though she knew there had scarcely been time. Neither Finn nor Lewen would send a message until they had something to report, and any messenger would have to bring the news on foot, since Finn was somewhere under the city in the labyrinthine sewers, while Lewen was at the Tower of Two Moons. It took at least half an hour to walk from palace to tower on a sunny afternoon; there was no doubt it would take longer on such an inclement night. Horses were not kept at the tower, for there were no stables or grazing land for them. Any sorcerer who desired to ride out into the city would use a mount from the palace stables, and the students were all expected to use their legs. She and Isabeau often communicated by scrying when they had not the time or the inclination to walk the distance, but no-one could scry when the heavens were in such turbulence, except perhaps through Scrying Pools or crystal balls of great power. So they would have to wait for any messenger from the tower to run the gamut of the storm. Until then, all they could do was wait in patience.