The Hunter's Rede

by F. T. McKinstry

  “That explains some things,” Cael muttered.

  “How’d you know that?” Regin asked.

  “Several days ago, I got into Barenus’s mind. Had to threaten him to get anything. He’s the one who marked me to the siomothct.”

  “He never did like you,” Cael said.

  “He’ll like me a lot less before I’m done. Why would Eaglin be by the Om Tree?”

  “We heard the Faerins can’t get in there,” Regin said. “But we don’t know why he is. We had reports from all sides that the Faerins were positioning an army. We had plenty of men to hold the palace. By the time we learned Forloc had broken through Eaglin’s defenses, it was too late. We couldn’t find him before they overran us.

  “Bran, Randall and a large company were trapped in Thorns and slaughtered. The rest of us gained the upper level and were able to hold it. We have nearly five hundred people up there, those who managed to get upstairs before the Faerins cut us off. We had only a little food, and some water before the springs, channels and lifts were all clogged or destroyed. They blocked every means of our escape as if they knew this place from birth.”

  “You told me Eaglin was dead,” Lorth said.

  “We got a report. One of our scouts got through, and told us he saw Master Eaglin’s body broken on the rocks beneath the western drop. Freil called him a liar. The Mistress went to her pool.”

  “We didn’t see her for three days,” Cael said. “When she finally came out, she was starved and half-wild. She swore he was gone.”

  “Did she think I did it?”

  Regin said, “The scout said as much. Leda had him executed on the spot.” He cleared his throat. “You think Eaglin’s alive based on what, exactly?”

  “Aye, could’ve been his ghost you saw,” Cael suggested.

  Lorth splashed through the narrow way with a heavy stone in his gut. “I considered that, but my heart says otherwise. Earlier, Forloc’s lieutenant mentioned a wizard. He used the word ‘drained.’ Eaglin is the only wizard here they’d have had contact with.”

  The death smell grew stronger. Regin stopped and said, “Watch out for that.”

  Lorth stepped over a body and continued after the guardsman. “There’s another thing,” he resumed. “When I crossed the Northpass, I felt something odd. Shortly afterwards, something began whispering me, repeating ‘blackthorn, thistle.’ I thought the potion was affecting me. Something even got into my mind and led me to a storeroom beneath the refectory. I was so befuddled I nearly got caught.”

  Regin released an audible breath. “Bloody hell that could be anything. You’re just—”

  “I don’t think so,” Lorth cut in. “Before Eamon dragged me out of that broom closet you put me in, I dreamed. I saw Eaglin, he told me he was in the Omefalon. I don’t think it was just a dream.”

  “You think Master Eaglin is still watching the bridge?” Cael said.

  “He is not. I think he might have been drugged with something, like etherweed,” Lorth said. “He can’t do anything, but he’s still conscious.”

  “Mistress would have seen him in the pool,” Regin countered. “She’s in shambles. Her pool doesn’t lie—she truly believes he’s dead.”

  Lorth recalled his episode beneath the Waeltower, when Eaglin had taken him to Leda’s pool to bind his powers. For the first time since, he remembered something she had said to her son just before Lorth blacked out. Did you give him motherblack? “Maybe the pool can be fooled. When Eaglin tried to bind my powers, he didn’t realize I’m a Web. Leda saw it, and she angrily asked him if I’d drank something called ‘motherblack.’ Do you know of this?”

  Regin groaned with doubt. “You’re reaching, lad.”

  “Aye, motherblack is a fucking myth,” Cael agreed.

  Lorth said, “On my way here, I took shelter with a Maelgwn named Ithsion. As we parted, he told me Astarae had betrayed Eusiron. Sigmund’s men knew about it.”

  “You think Astarae poisoned Eaglin with motherblack?” Cael scoffed. “Now you’re really reaching.”

  They stepped over another body.

  “How loyal to him do you think she was?” Lorth returned. “He is son of the Aenmos, Raven of Eusiron, High Dark and whatever else he is. She used him like a towering shield. Few men are immune to women—and I know firsthand Eaglin’s weaknesses on that front.”

  Regin halted, and then led them down another passage. Light glowed in the distance, and the sound of roaring water made it difficult to hear. “Even if Astarae had the nerve—let alone the motive—to try that, I doubt she had the ability.”

  “Maern can operate through a woman in her ignorance as well as her wisdom,” Lorth said. “A man can only know the Old One’s hand through the same.”

  “Och!” Cael moaned. “You sound like the Mistress.”

  “Listen,” Lorth pressed. “Ithsion knew Astarae belonged to Eaglin. He said something strange to me, he said, ‘Mother not see.’ One of our men out there holding Icaros’s realm told the Maelgwn about this.”

  “How would they know?” Cael said. “Those men have no access to the palace, now.”

  “Maybe they caught a Faerin captain and tortured it out of him.”

  Cael grunted. “That’s possible. Sigmund’s good at that sort of thing.”

  Regin motioned them to silence as an opening shivering with torchlight came into view. “There’ll be trouble here,” he whispered. He motioned to Cael, who pulled his Faerin cloak around him and strode towards the arch.

  Lorth said, “I thought these passages would be full of Faerins—or ours, in hiding.”

  Regin cast a glance behind them. “Forloc would’ve known about these passages, given his knowledge of everything else here. He’ll have cleaned out every rat hole. As to why it’s not more heavily guarded, that I couldn’t say.”

  “I’ll take a guess and say his men are worth more above, at the moment.”

  Cael appeared in the archway at the end of the passage and waved. Lorth and Regin joined him, and stepped into a cavern. The Starfilon roared from the darkness and flowed in wild threads over a stone structure that directed the water into a reservoir, glistening with light. On the far side, the river continued its course into the darkness beneath the rock.

  Several Faerin guards lay dead around the edge of the pool. Regin pointed. “This way.” He grabbed a torch from a sconce as they hurried over the slippery rocks.

  As they entered the dampness of another passage, Regin muttered something under his breath. “Freil told us he saw Astarae when he was being held at Icaros’s house. She was out there on a mission from Eaglin. But Freil is convinced she was working for the Faerins.”

  “I wouldn’t disregard that,” Lorth said. “I think that’s when she set up the exchange between me and Freil. Removing Eaglin’s spell on the place was probably part of the deal. She could have told Eaglin anything to explain it away, in the event he found out.”

  “Aye,” Regin said with a derisive breath. “She told him the Faerins made Freil do it. When we questioned the boy, he denied it. Astarae told us he would, because of his guilt over what the Faerins had done to Ivy. So we left it alone.”

  Lorth slowed his step as a white streak of wrath rippled through his heart. “When this started, I thought Setriana was the one working against me, through whatever information she had gained in Os. I believed she had allied to Forloc, because she had murdered Roarin and Icaros—”

  “We know only that Princess Setriana killed Roarin,” Regin interrupted. “Barenus swore to Eaglin on his Keepers’ mantle she didn’t murder Icaros. We don’t know why she is involved with any of it, but I can assure you, Tarth is not allied to Faerin.”

  Lorth steeled himself as the image of the rastric bite on Icaros’s heart fled over his thoughts. “I reconsidered my beliefs about the extent of Setriana’s involvement when Ithsion told me about Astarae. Originally, I thought she had set me up because I threatened her. I thought she was playing politics and got foolishly involve
d with the Faerins thinking she could get away with it and remain unscathed.”

  “Astarae did have a right unsettling hatred for you,” Cael said. “Even Eaglin commented on it. But he didn’t trust you, so he never parried it.”

  “I gave him little to trust, I concede that. I didn’t care, and Astarae took hard advantage of that. As I said, it all looked like politics to me. But to involve Freil? To stand by while the people of Eusiron were put to the blade? There’s something else going on.”

  They stopped as voices rang out above them. Regin held his finger to his lips, and pointed up. They moved forward until they reached another grate. Light shone down in dirty beams. The room above shook with stomping feet, shouts and the tumult of warriors rallying to alarm.

  “What’s happening?” Cael whispered.

  “We must hurry,” Regin said. Once they had crept by, he turned to Lorth. “You were accusing Astarae of high treason.”

  “How do you think Forloc knew enough to lay siege to Eusiron?” Lorth said. “He knows things about this palace that half the people who live here aren’t even aware of. And—reports aside—how easy do you think it would be to kill Eaglin? Someone could have staged that. I think he’s alive, but poisoned with something powerful enough to hide him from his mother.”

  “Why would Astarae do that?” Regin said.

  “You’re the ones who told me how dangerous she is,” Lorth reminded them.

  “Not that dangerous!” the guardsmen said in unison.

  Silence fell between them as they moved through the dampness. Cael said, “Forloc told you that Astarae killed herself for fear of you. Did you believe that?”

  Lorth shook his head. “I assumed he mocked me. But it does bring something to mind Leda told me. Apparently, Astarae laid eyes on Eusiron himself and decided she wanted him. He refused her, and she threatened him—with the Old One, no less.”

  Cael whistled; Regin spat. “Ballocks. Not even Astarae had that kind of nerve.”

  Lorth glanced at them in the near dark. “This isn’t a fireside tale, lads. Leda told me this, and she didn’t learn it from Astarae, if you take my meaning. Eusiron went dark. He told Astarae she would die by the ‘hands of a wolf.’”

  “Let me guess,” Cael said dryly. “A sneaky wolf.”

  “I thought so at the time, given her hatred for me. She saw through that Dark Tongue shield Leda laid over me at the feast, you know. And she did a great deal to bring about my capture or condemnation, one way or another.”

  “You did threaten to hunt her,” Regin pointed out.

  “I didn’t know about this at the time.”

  “But you weren’t kidding her about it,” Cael said.

  Lorth breathed a black laugh. “No, I wasn’t. But I didn’t kill her. Do you think Eusiron would have cursed her like that and been wrong about it? He’s a god. Above the time-space matrix. They see every version of the choices we make.”

  After a heavy pause, Regin said, “So let’s say Astarae saw you as the ‘wolf ’ Eusiron threatened her with. Clearly, she had it in for you. But high treason?”

  “Forloc spoke of her ‘higher aspirations.’ I doubt he was talking about Eaglin, assuming she had put him down. I think he knew Astarae had her sights on a god.”

  Regin swore. “You think she did all this for vengeance? On Eusiron?”

  A chill crept over Lorth’s heart. “Think about it. A woman bold enough to threaten a war god for refusing her love would be capable of anything. She got it into her mind that I was the curse Eusiron had laid on her—she tried calling the Old One down on me in the greenhouse. And because this palace and the people of Ostarin are also his, she wouldn’t have stopped there.

  “She saw me with Leda in the garden. Leda told me about the curse, and that I was most likely the god’s hunter. She also told me she planned to strip Astarae’s name. I don’t know how long Astarae stood there, but if she heard all that and then saw us making love...”

  “She wouldn’t have stayed loyal to the Mistress, either,” Regin finished.

  Cael said, “Astarae did make Forloc swear on the Old One not to harm the Mistress.”

  “Assuming he spoke the truth,” Lorth said. “But it makes sense. Astarae may have been willing to bring down Eusiron, but that doesn’t mean she would bring harm to Leda.”

  “After killing Eaglin?” Cael said with disbelief. “I’d call that some harm.”

  “No, that’s just it,” Regin said, as if understanding had finally dawned on him. “She wouldn’t have killed Eaglin. She just made it appear so, to implicate Lorth.”

  “Perhaps,” Lorth surmised, “Forloc spoke the truth about her death. After accomplishing her vengeance on the god, she might have heard of my arrival and assumed the end was near. She might have killed herself just to spite me.”

  “Or him,” Regin added.

  They continued until the passage opened up into an earthen chamber filled with thick roots creeping over the ceiling and walls. The roots disappeared into the floor around a center pool as black as a starless sky.

  Regin waved them towards another grate on the far side. “I think this is it.”

  Cael held up his torch. “Is that the Omefalon? It’s awfully dark.”

  “It’s close by.” He frowned. “I think.” He interlaced his hands, held them down and jerked his head at Cael to take a lift.

  A short time later, the three of them stood in a storeroom. Regin looked Lorth up and down. “We need to find you something better to wear.”

  Cael headed for the door. “Stay here. I’ll be back.”

  Once the guardsman had closed the low portal behind him, Lorth said, “Who’d you leave in command?”

  “Eamon.” In response to Lorth’s bleak stare he added, “He’s properly motivated.”

  “He’s a madman,” Lorth muttered.

  “So are we all, in such times.”

  “Regin,” Lorth said in a low voice, “Morfaen and Barenus will be bearing on Forloc’s forces from the south even now. Can your people above hold out?”

  “Forloc is prepared for an assault from the south. That won’t go easily for Morfaen no matter how many men he marches up here. And if Eaglin is still alive, even unconscious, Barenus will have limited powers here because the Raven’s mind still rules.”

  Lorth clenched his jaw in frustration. “That would prevent anyone here from summoning a Raven, too. Bloody wizards! You’d think if the Keepers sent an army to take back Os, they would send a Raven up here to help us.”

  “They have their ways,” Regin said offhandedly. “In any case, we’ll have to hold out. Cael used the potion to get some provisions for those most in need, but we didn’t have enough left to continue that course. We had only enough to find you.”

  “One of you could have done that.”

  “The two of us barely got you out.” For some moments, he said nothing. He stared at the floor, flexing his jaw. Finally: “Leda didn’t send us down here to rescue you, Lorth. We could have done that without the potion. She sent us to find out if you killed Eaglin.”

  Lorth blinked as the words slammed into him. “You said she didn’t believe that.”

  “She is of two minds on it.” He shifted on his feet. “She loves you, but she also knows what you’re capable of.” His expression turned sad. “It really hurt her when you left the first time without telling her. She hid it well, but we knew.”

  As the revelation rained cold on his heart, Lorth recalled holding Leda in his arms in the water, before she had sent him from the palace to hunt Asmat. It’s precisely your wildness that fills my heart, she had said, her eyes sparkling.

  He had ducked his head to hide from the sadness there.

  “I apologized to her,” he said, raking his fingers through his hair. “It was the first time in my life I questioned the Hunter’s Rede.”

  “Even so.” Regin took a deep breath. “She also knows her son, and he hadn’t exactly played by her rules through all this. She confided t
o me that he might have turned on you and incurred your wrath.”

  “She did warn him of that. But she wouldn’t have accepted my killing him, regardless.” He met the steel-blue gaze of his friend. “What were your orders?”

  “What do you think? So little of that potion remained, Leda knew you’d lost your powers, and that the two of us could take you.”

  “So that’s why you wouldn’t give me any.”

  Regin made a face. “At first.”

  “But you gave me my sword,” Lorth said with a laugh. “I didn’t need—”

  “I don’t believe you killed Eaglin.”

  Lorth dropped his gaze to the guardsman’s trust. “If we don’t find him, thirst will kill him anyway.”

  “It’s been a full quarter moon since his spells dropped. He could already be gone.”

  “That would explain Leda’s vision in the pool.”

  Regin started to speak, and then fell silent as a noise echoed in the corridor outside. Sharing a glance, they moved against the wall on either side of the door.

  “It’s me,” Cael said. He entered dragging a brown- and red-clad corpse behind him, which he dropped without flourish at Lorth’s feet. To Regin he said, “Change of plan. Forloc has the Mistress.”

  Regin’s face revealed nothing. “Did they break through our defense?”

  Cael shook his head. “No. She gave herself up. Eamon must have defied her orders and refused to surrender. They’re still up there.”

  Lorth gazed at the body at his feet without seeing it.

  “There’s something else,” Cael said. “I passed by the hall to the Omefalon. It looks like they got in. Something’s going on in there.”

  Regin glanced at Lorth. “Maybe you’re right.”

  Lorth drew a deep breath, stepped around the corpse and headed across the floor.

  “Where are you going?” Regin hissed.

  “I’m turning myself in.” He opened the door.

  Cael grasped his shoulder and spun him around. “Are you mad? Forloc will expect that!”

  Lorth removed his sword and slammed the sheath into the guardsman’s hand. “Keep that safe for me.” He looked at Regin. “Try to find some blackthorn and thistle. I think that’s what Eaglin needs to get back.”