Wine of the Gods 08: Dark Lady

by Pam Uphoff

  "You are easily the most powerful magic user in our World. You were seriously overstrained about four months ago, saving a great many lives. You could not save everyone, and in your overstrained condition could not shut out the mental screams of the injured and dying, and fled through a gate as the most likely means of saving yourself."

  She scooted back in alarm. "I am not more powerful than you." Quail's father. But not my husband?

  "When you are fully recovered, in everything but warfare, you are."

  She looked warily at him. "I am fairly recovered."

  "Some parts of your mind are shut so tightly I didn't even recognize you when I laid eyes upon you. If you were a goddess, you'd curl up and sleep for a year. I recommend you do something close to that."

  She nodded cautiously.

  He reached out and touched her face lightly. "Who's been throwing fireballs?"

  "They called him a god, but he was a mad, enslaved thing. I killed him." She turned her head enough that the god could see the claw scratch that showed beneath her helmet.

  The god stood still for a long moment. "Just as well." There was some odd reverberation under the comment that had Phantom easing a bit away from him. Quail started fussing and she took her back.

  "Is that Phantom's sire?" December—Rustle—changed the subject.

  "Yes. Do you recall Sir Romeau's Sun Gold? Another very special horse, and the sire of Phantom's dam."

  She frowned. "I remember bad poetry."

  "Yes, that's Romeau's specialty."

  "I'm surprised you could find me. There are . . . I remember there being a lot of gates. Or are you looking for something else?"

  "I was searching for you. You had opened eleven gates, so far. I was horribly afraid you might have opened another one that I didn't know about, and then I'd have to search the World to find it. I checked the Ash and Rip Crossing gates first."

  "Ash. I think I remember Ash. It's a village . . . isn't it?"

  The big man looked her over calmly, but December—Rustle—found herself wanting to edge away again.

  "How badly are you injured?"

  "Mentally? I . . . cannot remember much of anything. The horse's name. A few odds and ends. Magically, I can't raise a mental shield. I can do almost anything else I've thought of so far . . . until I get tired. Physically . . . I was deeply clawed, from scalp to calf. The god . . . ripped off my ear and ate it."

  She flinched away from the god, away from the radiating heat, the eye-searing light that was leaking in from somewhere. Then the light faded, the heat cooled, mostly, and the god was merely glowing. Her head pounded, faint and distant, not hurting. Yet.

  Power. He is just leaking power, not projecting it . . . God help me if I ever need to try and shield against this man!

  The glow vanished abruptly.

  She continued cautiously. "First I killed the priest that had summoned it, and then I killed the god."

  The god sighed. "And how many of your friends had to sit on you to keep you in bed?"

  She snickered, and slapped a surprised hand across her lips. "I was . . . nearly sensible about resting, because we knew what was going to happen. I mean, we knew they were going to start their all-out assault soon.

  "Tell me what happened."

  She gave the god a complete accounting of the siege. She repeated what the priest had said to her before she killed him.

  The god looked troubled. "I should take a look at these priests and their little gods. Their collecting power like that is . . . alarming."

  "If you do, mind their Chain spell, the pitchblende made it very strong, and I think there was some sort of radiation and phosphorescence in the other colors as well."

  The god nodded, and as the sun set, he paced in thought. He stopped down slope of her. Down almost two feet, Wolf was eye-to-eye with her.

  The big man looked worried. "You really don't remember me, do you."

  "Not until you showed up outside of Jeramtown. Were you looking through all the gates? Exploring?"

  "All of them. Several times each. I was afraid to spend so much time in one that I missed you somewhere else. Then that person called me."

  "Coincidentally when you were on his World?"

  The big man's brow creased. "I told someone—I was hunting through gates and calling for you and then listening—I told someone they had all they needed to win, he need only stand fast and true."

  "He was the same one who called you to the siege."

  "Yes. Apparently he failed to stand fast and true. I was at the Crossroads and he was able to pull me in. Infuriating, in some ways. I wasn't sure which gate I'd been dragged through. I was glad to help, of course. And delighted to know you were alive, and fairly well."

  "I see." She hesitated. "How long have I known you?"

  "All your life. We . . . our romantic relationship started badly, and has gone in fits and starts. I love you, and with your permission, I will woo you properly as soon as I may. I will never presume."

  Quail interrupted with a loud demand for dinner. A bit embarrassed and uncertain, she got a small blanket from the saddle bag and threw it over her shoulder to feed the baby under its cover.

  "What are my parents like. Not married, I take it?"

  "Technically. They are a bit of a scandal. A witch actually living with her pet." He turned to the bigger horse and unsaddled him, and then Phantom.

  "Pet?" She eyed him dubiously.

  "Never gets a bit huffy about it, but Dydit just looks smug. No one has dared call Never a wife since a certain witch spent a week barking like a dog, years ago. Your father is a very unusual man . . . I think you'll have to meet him to understand."

  "I see." She stared, baffled, at the man for a long moment. "I thought my only problem was remembering me, and maybe the father of that baby."

  The god smiled a bit. "You have a large, vocal and concerned family. Maybe you should enjoy your vacation in isolation instead. How many witches have you met here?"

  "None." She touched her hat, over the partially regrown ear. "Outside power sourcing. Of course. Why couldn't I remember that? The genes for outside power sourcing seem to have been mostly lost. I . . . don't know where that god sourced from . . . I didn't analyze it while I was fighting, all he really had was a good shield, and these power claws that could pierce my shield."

  "Quite enough, in your depleted state."

  The Lady drew herself up. "I am not . . . I feel quite strong."

  "When you are well, you are overwhelming. You are something beyond strong."

  While she'd fed Quail, he'd laid out a camp in a little flat spot below the crest of the hill, their bedrolls still rolled, but on opposite sides of the firepit his horse excavated with a swipe of a huge hoof. His saddlebags turned out a small amount of firewood, a kettle of water and . . . water. Focusing on the saddlebags, she could see that they were full of bubbles.

  "That looks like what I did in town. I caught hundreds, possibly thousands of bubbles for people to live in. And store grain, livestock, mothers-in-law . . . "

  Wolf laughed. "I noticed all the bubbles and wondered what was going on. I suspect I came along just in time to save the Arbolians from your ingenuity." He pulled a brush from the bag and worked over both horses before they wandered off to graze.

  December . . . Rustle . . . fixed tea, and produced dinner from her saddlebags.

  Wolf grinned. "Sometimes I wonder why I bother with fires."

  "You'll stop wondering shortly, the night wind off the icecap is chilly, even now."

  "This World must be fairly close to ours, well, a recent split, I suppose I mean."

  "Oh yes. They are also Exiles. Kurt—Prince Kurt Alpha—says they arrived here fourteen hundred years ago."

  "Alpha. Good heavens. I suspect I knew your prince's ancestor." He looked thoughtful for a long moment. "The local collective subconscious hasn't adjusted to me yet. I can feel that Roger. Apparently he thinks of Gods the way our people do. I fit too well and was
vulnerable to him. I may still be. I think I'll avoid the Crossroads for awhile."

  "The Crossroads?"

  "An area with a lot of gates to other worlds. It is located on your home world." He eyed her uncertainly. "May I escort you home?"

  "Do gods need to ask?"

  "Oh yes, gods above all need to be sure they are not presuming."

  The man not-presumed to the point of laying out his bedroll across the fire from hers. He didn't try to touch her, but had no qualms about helping with Quail, eating her dinner and washing her dishes.

  In the morning he led her off slightly more north than northwest. They stopped for frequent breaks, and camped early every night, but the last.

  She spotted the glowing white circle from the base of the hill, and turned Phantom toward it.

  "We could wait until morning." Wolf suggested.

  He had worked his ass off trying to be nice to her. Helping with the baby, setting up camp, taking care of the horses. And taking the trip slow and easy.

  She closed her eyes and tried to think of how to put it diplomatically. Gave up. "Another night of your frenzied attempts to demonstrate what a fine husband you are will probably drive me to violence. Stop slowing me down. I need to find out if I can live on the other side of that Gate. I need to meet all these strangers I'm related to."

  Poor man. She was not returning the favor of demonstrating what a fine wife she was. Because rather to her relief, she wasn't anyone's wife.

  He shut his mouth and followed after her. Halfway up the hill he spoke again. "You think I've been impeding you?"

  "I think you have taken the opportunity to demonstrate your finer qualities. In your attempts to be solicitous, you have overlooked the stress I feel about returning to something I don't remember, apart from a great deal of pain and panicked flight. And I am not going to drag it out any further."

  "Oh."

  Up close, the Gate looked more like a violent whirlpool of lightening laid down sideways, the better to eat any willing sacrifices who rode their horses straight in. She wrapped her arms protectively around the baby in the sling in front of her. Phantom trotted the last two steps and leaped into the maelstrom.

  The lights exploded around her and pulled her and spun her and teased her with things just out of her sight, and Phantom landed lightly on the other side, trotting forward. Quail screamed, and Rustle ran her hand up and down the baby's back. "Welcome home, sweetie." Quail gave one more displeased cry and hiccupped.

  Phantom walked down to a wide, well built road and turned south. Rustle looked around, and could see several other hills crowned with glowing circles. Jet leaped out of the gate behind them, with a snort of dislike, and trotted down to join them.

  "Did you say something about eleven gates?" she asked, listening carefully, mentally. Nothing was screaming in her head, and she started relaxing.

  "Yes. Four are located elsewhere. These seven haven't been much explored. A lot of them appear to have no people there at all. The King is going to station a part of the Army here, in case there are people on the far side who are more interested in conquest than trade."

  "Like those Arbolians. So . . . these gates were recently found?"

  "Recently made." The man eyed her, worry line across his forehead. "When I said you were the most powerful magic user in the World, that was mostly based on you creating these."

  She froze, appalled. "Do you have any idea how I made them?"

  "Yes. I helped with the first one you made. If, once you've healed, you still don't remember how you did it, I'll show you." He frowned down the road. "Good God! Did Harry move the tavern? Not that he hasn't moved it before, but it has been in Ash for over eight hundred years. It's hard to think of Ash without it."

  As they came closer, Rustle eyed it. It was smaller than the tavern in Jeramtown. High pitched roof; they must get a lot of snow here. Or perhaps wherever it was first located. Hmm. Moving entire buildings. "So . . . who is Harry?" Phantom stopped at the steps to the porch.

  "The God of the Roads, the God of Travelers." He swung off Jet and held his hands up for the baby.

  Do I want to meet another god? Do I want to offend him, by avoiding him? She pulled the sling over her head and handed Quail down to him. The baby blinked sleepily, but didn't cry. Rustle slipped off Phantom and followed Wolf.

  "Ah." He stopped right inside he door. "I don't know if this is good or bad timing." He walked forward again. "Never, Dydit. I've found Rustle, and she is having some shielding and memory problems so please don't . . . "

  Whatever the Wolf was going to say, was lost. The gorgeous blonde woman, and the tall muscular man leapt past him and flung their arms around her. She stood rigidly trying to control . . . something. Some violent response. Thoughts pressed on her, pinpricks of worried probes. Their overlapping babble ground to an awkward halt.

  "Rustle? What's wrong?" the blonde woman held her off at arms length.

  Rustle stared. She didn't know this woman. Wished she would stop looking at her. Her attention grated over Rustle's brain, and tender bits were fast approaching painful.

  "She has amnesia. Very close to total. Give her room, she needs peace and quiet to heal. She can't hold a shield, please try to not project."

  The man that was supposed to be her father snapped around and glared at the Wolf. "What did you do?"

  "Nothing. You know damn good and well what happened to her. She needs peace and more time to heal."

  Wolf, whatever he was to her, was at least quiet mentally. Her purported father was boiling over with angry mental power. Odd little ziggzaggy bright spots were wiggling at the edges of her vision, or maybe her brain.

  Rustle shifted uneasily away from them. "Stop. Stop. Fuss over Quail, she likes it." Her head was starting to throb.

  "I'll fuss over whomever . . . "

  His frustrated anger and worry crashed through her brain in a blaze of pain.

  "Come back here."

  But she was in full flight and not about to stop.

  Five miles away the spike through her temples eased, and she slowed Phantom. "Well, was that fun? I seem to be getting worse instead of better. Where can I go to get a year's worth of peace and quiet, without neglecting Quail, you, starving, freezing or whatever?"

  "I was very powerful, in Arrival, simply because only a few Arbolians had power, too. Here I'm ordinary, and apparently very vulnerable." She rubbed her temples. "Am I going to have to run away again?"

  She looked around at the sound of hooves.

  "Rustle?"

  It was the man again, her father, his mind so closed up she couldn't tell he was there.

  "I apologize for hurting you. Will you please come back? I care about you, and didn't realize that I was worsening an injury."

  "Where I've been for the last couple of months, there are so few magic users, I didn't hear a single mental voice. I didn't realize how sensitive I'd gotten, or how weak my shields still are. I am not at all sure that I can live here. At least not until I've completely recuperated. If I ever do. I . . . don't expect you to change because of me. I think I have to leave." She put her hands to her temples. "Don't do that."

  He backed his horse away, or rather the god's horse.

  "I hope you didn't hurt Wolf when you took his horse. I may not remember him, but at least he's been polite and mentally quiet."

  "He threw me up here and told me to shut my bloody mental mouth before I killed you, and apologize if I didn't want to lose a daughter. Please, will you try to come home? You need to at least see Xen. I, umm, I'll go ahead and warn your sisters to keep their shields up."

  She closed her eyes. "All right. I'll try."

  "Thank you. Umm, can you come back to the tavern?"

  "I'll start by trying that." She turned Phantom. "Sorry guy. Didn't mean to add ten miles to your day." He answered with a shift to a gentle rocking canter, and kept it up until the tavern was in sight. Then he dropped to a walk and cooled himself down over the last half mile.
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br />   "I'll do the horses, go on." Her father smiled wryly. "It sounds like Quicksilver is hungry."

  The Wolf was on the front porch with the angry baby. The woman who was supposed to be her mother gave her a searching look, and Rustle flinched as it raked across her brain. The woman jerked back and closed her shields completely.

  Rustle just took the baby and walked away. She carried her up the hill and stepped through the gate. Silence.

  Mental silence.

  The wind rustled the grass gently and a mockingbird was singing down by the stream.

  She sat in the grass and practiced some deep breathing for a few minutes, then adjusted her clothes and fed the baby.

  "It has been three weeks, little bird. Maybe I ought to have stayed longer. Added another month or two of healing before I tried to go home." She burped the baby, switched sides. "I wonder if the king's army has made it to Jeramtown. Do you suppose the king came himself?"

  Chapter Twenty-eight

  Spring, 1376 PE

  Ash, Comet Fall

  Soft foot steps behind December—Rustle!—and the man who claimed to be nearly her husband sat down a few feet away. He had the baby changing bag with him.

  "Please tell me that I'm not expected to live within five miles of either of them."

  "I didn't realize how loud they were. Nor how raw you still are. I think that god must have reinjured your shields."

  "The priest, actually. I couldn't keep him out. Are you always this quiet, then?"

  "Yes. I learned to hide a long time ago, and to appreciate quiet." He rested his chin on his hands. "My house is in a naturally quiet place. You've never lived there. Why don't I fix up a room for you? You can have as much or as little company as you wish, I can help take care of Quail or take her to your parent's house and they can babysit. Xen is staying with them at the moment, I'll work with him on being quiet, so you two can see each other, but you can mostly just rest."

  She nodded. "I think I was happier with just a blank in my mind, and no idea of how many people would try and crowd into it."

  He nodded, barely visible in the dark. "Will you come back to the tavern? It's the abode of a god, and as such it's easy to recognize and use for traveling large distances."