by Rick Shelley
"You'll stay the night?" Dieth asked somewhat later. The pace of eating had slowed down a little. I still had an appetite, but I wasn't cramming it in quite so roughly.
I shook my head and took a quick gulp of beer to wash down food. "I have to get to Basil and tell the king and Baron Kardeen what we've managed. But even before that, I need a quick peek at Arrowroot." While I was still free of pain. "You'll show me the doors?"
"Of course, lord."
I stopped shoveling food in for a moment and looked at Dieth. "You were my father's squire?"
"Many years ago, when I was just a lad."
"When this crisis is over, I hope we have time for many long talks. I never knew of my father's life here. A few weeks ago, I didn't even know that Varay existed." Something about the drug Dieth had given me must have mellowed my mood as well.
Dieth nodded. He did seem pained by Dad's death, even in the middle of his own nasty little war.
After taking in a little more food and beer, I collected my people. We got back into our war gear and went for the doors. The passage to Arrowroot was in the cellar of Coriander's keep. The door to Castle Basil was on the floor above the great hall.
"Have your swords ready when I open the way to Arrowroot," I said. "I don't know how close the danger will be." The rest of our weapons were back in the great hall, except for my pistol, and I had pretty much discarded that from my thoughts. I stood in front of the door and stared at the silver tracing.
"You know where in Arrowroot this opens?" I asked Dieth.
"I've never been down here when it was open," he said. "It doesn't get much use. The old doorway opened into a gate tower on the Mist side of the castle, but your father set up a new passage after I left his service."
"We going straight through?" Lesh asked.
"Depends on what happens when I open the way." My palms were sweating. I couldn't have been more nervous if I were about to stick my hand into a snake charmer's basket. "Ready?" I looked around at my companions.
"Aye, lord," Lesh said. Annick and Harkane nodded.
I stretched my hands toward the silver. I remembered the sense of danger from that first day, and I had seen enough evidence of the danger sense since. I closed my eyes while I took a deep breath, then opened them again.
"Here goes." I touched my rings to the silver. The passage opened to a door on a blank corridor. I didn't see anyone, any clue to what might be happening there, but a wave of such deadly peril engulfed me that I stepped back in a hurry and broke the connection.
"What is it?" Everyone asked that, more or less in unison.
"The worst I've felt." Everyone understood what I meant, even Dieth, since he had once been Dad's squire.
"You think the elflord's taken Arrowroot?" Dieth asked.
"Or worse." I wasn't sure what I meant, but I didn't have any doubt that the elflord could find something worse.
"What will you do now?" Dieth asked.
"Go to Basil and see if they know anything about it there. Then I think I'll probably still have to go into Arrowroot." I was the Hero, after all. Any solution was going to have to come from me, no matter what the problem was.
"If you'll open the way here again, I'll go through and start whatever needs doing," Annick said.
"I don't think so," I told her.
"If you know what the danger is, you can prepare for it better," she said.
I shook my head. Maybe Annick could do the spying, but if the elflord's army had taken the castle, there was a good chance that she would just start killing and keep at it until somebody killed her. I didn't want to give Xayber any more warning than absolutely necessary.
Dieth showed us to the doorway to Basil after we collected the rest of our gear and the new pouches with the sea-silver.
"Thanks for your help, Baron," I told him. "We may be back this way or go straight on to Arrowroot from Basil." I opened the passage-not a hint of danger at Basil. Annick, Lesh, and Harkane stepped through while I held the way open.
"Until we meet again, lord," Dieth said as I got ready to follow my companions. He touched his hand to his head in salute. I nodded and went through the door.
We came through in one of Basil's gate towers and headed across the courtyard for the keep and great hall. It was late evening. Supper was over, but a few men were still at the long table drinking.
"Lesh, check Parthet's room and workshop. See if he's around." If he wasn't at Basil, I'd have to pop through to his cottage, but I wanted to check the castle first. "I'm going to look for Kardeen. Harkane, find Timon. Maybe he knows what's going on here."
"What about me?" Annick asked peevishly.
"You'd better stay with me. You may have answers I don't."
Kardeen's chambers were a floor above the king's, close enough whenever His Majesty might want him. I banged on Kardeen's door and waited until he called out-not too happily, I thought. The room was dark, so I took a torch from the hall with me. When Kardeen saw me, he got up fast and pulled on a fur robe.
"We were afraid you were lost," he said as he hurried across the room, knotting the belt on his robe.
"Why?" I cocked my head a little to the side. "It's only been nine days. Parthet said he didn't think we could get back in less than ten, that it would probably take even longer than that."
"Nine days?" Kardeen shook his head. "It's been twice that."
It was my turn to shake my head. "Impossible. Four and a half days going north, four days coming back." I looked at Annick, who had stopped right in the doorway. "Nobody said I lost that much time during my struggle with the elflord."
"It couldn't have been an hour," Annick said. "But time does strange things in Fairy. I've never heard of it running that much faster, but time is different there."
I started to protest instinctively. Time is time. All parts of a solid world have to rotate in the same period. It was an outrage to the laws of physics to think otherwise… but then, there was a lot about the buffer kingdoms that seemed to have little relation to the laws of physics-magic doorways, ethereal duels, dragons. Those dragons had no more business flying than Wrigley Field would. But the protest never got out of my mouth.
"Where's Parthet?" I asked instead.
"At Arrowroot, waiting for you. He wouldn't stay here."
"Have you heard anything from him?"
"Not for a week. Why?" I told him about the intense danger I felt from Arrowroot and about the siege of Coriander. He knew about Coriander.
"Your mother has been handling their resupply, opening the way," Kardeen said.
"How much time do we have to meet the Etevar?"
"Little enough to intercept him at Castle Thyme, at the border. If you opened a passage at Arrowroot this minute, then rode your horse to death, you might barely have time to reach Thyme ahead of the Dorthini army. And you say there's trouble at Arrowroot and Coriander."
"There is. When I ride east, I'll start from here. I've been over that route before. Does that buy me enough time?"
He nodded hesitantly. "It should, a day or two. But we can't abandon the northern castles if they're under siege."
"Did you send any other men on toward Thyme?"
"We have six hundred men near there now. That's not nearly enough to hold the Dorthini army."
I closed my eyes to think. There could be no help from either of the northern castles unless the elflord backed off, and if he already controlled Arrowroot, I didn't see any way to make him back off. "I guess I have to go into Arrowroot first," I said. "Find out just what's going on there. Can you find me a half-dozen soldiers?"
"We'll find them. When will you go?"
"Before dawn, when most of the people there should still be asleep, whether they're ours or Xayber's. Maybe we can raise a little hell."
"We can do that!" Annick said. Kardeen looked at her.
"You're Resler's niece?" he asked. She nodded.
"We picked her up on our way into Xayber," I said. "She's been a help." Somehow, I manage
d to get that out without choking-probably because Dieth's drug picked that moment to start wearing off. I guess I grunted at the return of pain.
"Are you all right?" Kardeen asked, concern immediately appearing on his face.
"Not completely," I admitted, "but I don't have time to worry about that. Baron Dieth had a foul brew for pain. It worked. Would there be any of it here?"
"Number," Annick said, and I heard the same num-mer pronunciation as before.
"I'm sure your mother has some around here somewhere," Kardeen said. "You'd best have her check you out right away. What happened?"
"A spear took him in the back," Annick said. "He has a broken rib, maybe two, and the wound may be infected. Hadn't been for the armor, he'd have been skewered for proper."
"Let's get you attended to," Kardeen said. He took my arm and led me out of the room.
I learned something new about my mother that night. Another something new. She was something of a doctor-and I don't mean witch doctor. I was guided back to my room. A page went for Mother. There were twenty minutes of her fussing over the injury. I got my pain medicine, and it tasted just as vile the second time. Mother smeared some kind of jelly over the wound. This preparation didn't sting the way Dieth's poultice had. It felt warm but not hot, soothing.
"The one rib is broken, but the other may not be. I can't be sure without X rays," Mother said. "You shouldn't have any real problem with it now, but you need to stay flat for at least forty-eight hours."
"No chance," I said, and Mother didn't argue.
"I have to tell the king that you're back," Kardeen said then. "He left standing orders that he was to be told instantly of your return, and I'm already late. You'd best get a few hours rest before you leave."
"As long as someone wakes me three hours before dawn," I said.
"I'll see to it," Kardeen promised.
Timon managed to promote a few gallons of hot water, and I took the time to get cleaned up. With a fresh dose of painkiller in me, I managed to get it done without help. Then I dropped across the bed like a dead man. Annick ended up in my mother's room. I slept without dreams. I had no sensations at all until Lesh shook me awake. Waking was difficult, almost impossible. The last thing I wanted to do was abandon sleep. At least there was no pain yet.
"The cooks sent up breakfast and coffee," Lesh said. A table had been set up in the room and loaded with food. I hadn't heard any of the preparations. Timon and Harkane helped me dress. They did most of the work. My mind was still somewhere closer to sleep than waking.
Mother came in with Annick while I was chugging my first cup of scalding, bitter coffee. From the glance Mother gave me, I could tell that she didn't approve of Annick-which meant that she had completely misread our relationship. I had seen that look before when I dated girls Mother didn't like.
"I'm worried about Parthet," Mother said while she took another look at my back. "If the elflord captures him, it won't go well. The lords of Fairy take harsh measures against the wizards of the seven kingdoms when they can."
"You mean they'd kill him?"
"Eventually. Parthet is old. It might not take him long to die under the treatment he could expect." Then she handed me a silver flask with the family crest and some extra designs worked into it. "This is the painkiller. Only take a single capful at a time, and don't take it at all until you feel the pain. It should be longer each time."
"Nobody warned me how screwy time is in Fairy," I said. I was getting used to things like that, people forgetting to mention things that were too "obvious" to need mentioning-if you knew enough about the land to start with. "Not that it would have made much difference. I still had to go," I added. But I wouldn't have taken the extra time to go farther north and raise hell after I got the sea-silver. And then I wouldn't have taken the business end of that spear in the back.
"How did you get the elf sword?" Mother stared at it. I told her, very briefly. I was too busy eating to weave the full tale.
"Be careful. Such weapons can cut the hand that holds them."
"So can everything else around here."
"Grandfather wants to see you before you leave," Mother said.
"Getting waked up twice in one night has got to be hard on him," I said, hoping to get out of a pointless formality. There wasn't much time, and I didn't see what good it could do.
"No matter, he sleeps lightly," Mother said. "He's been worried. You were gone so long."
I nodded-simple punctuation. "We'd better go see him, then."
The meeting was short and not as gloomy as I had feared. I introduced Annick and said what a help she had been. It was easier to say this time. Pregel thanked her and asked about her mother. Annick's bitter reply was the most painful part of the ten-minute meeting. It embarrassed everyone but her. The king had been informed about my injury. He asked me how I felt and then asked Mother for her medical opinion. She told him that I really should be flat in bed for two days but that I would likely be okay anyway as long as the injury wasn't aggravated, that I appeared to be healing lickety-split the way my father always had. I was starting to feel pain again, but I wanted to wait until I got away from Pregel to take my next swig of that awful elixir.
When the audience was over, Baron Kardeen had my extra soldiers and everyone was armed and armored. I left my shield behind-I hadn't found a use for that yet, despite my initial enthusiasm for it-but I did wear a helmet. Harkane had scared up a new one for me. The fact that I wore a tin pot willingly should give some idea how nervous I felt about the expedition. My Cubs cap was in my pocket, the blue bill sticking out. One bag of sea-silver was brought to the doorway that led to Arrowroot. We wouldn't take it through until Arrowroot was secure, though. If. The other bag was taken to the door leading to Coriander and put under guard. If I succeeded in Arrowroot, I would pop over to Coriander, set up the door there, then return to Basil to start my mad ride to Thyme. I didn't expect to need the second bag, at least not until I reached the other end, if then, but I wanted it handy, just in case.
Annick had an arrow nocked when I opened the way to Arrowroot. My bow was over my shoulder. I moved to the side and held the passage open with one hand while Lesh and the other soldiers hurried through to take up positions on the other side. Annick, Harkane, and I went through last. We left Timon behind again. He still wasn't happy about being excluded.
Once more, the sense of danger was overpowering as soon as I opened the passage to Arrowroot. Danger flowed through the doorway like heat out of an oven. But I was ready for it this time. I gritted my teeth and moved on into Arrowroot, Dragon's Death out and ready.
There were no torches burning in the corridor we entered. There were no watchfires on the battlements. Castle Arrowroot was silent but for the lapping of the Mist against the outer wall.
"Which way?" Lesh asked softly once we had a couple of torches burning.
"To the great hall, but carefully. We don't know what's waiting for us," I said.
We had trouble skulking-ten of us in chain mail and toting metal weapons-but it didn't matter. There was no one in the corridors, and everyone in the great hall was sound asleep. Underscore the sound. The volume of the combined snoring was incredible. A twenty-one gun salute might not have wakened men who could sleep through that din.
"These are Resler's people," Lesh said after we got a few more torches lit along the walls. Annick confirmed it.
"Hey, Kobe!" She prodded one of the sleeping men with her foot, roughly. His snoring changed tone for a moment, but he didn't wake. Annick pushed his shoulder again. He still didn't wake. Neither did anyone else. I whistled, as loud and shrilly as I could. A few men rolled over or interrupted their snoring for an instant, but that was all.
"Let's find your uncle," I told Annick. She led the way to his room. There was no answer to my first knock, so I bashed on the door with the hilt of Dragon's Death and shouted for Resler. There was still no reply, so I went in anyway. Resler was in bed, snoring as lustily as any of the men downstai
rs. We got lights going and went to work at waking the baron. It took ten minutes and two pitchers of water over his head before he even started to stir, another five minutes to get him sitting up with his eyes open.
"Morning already?" Resler asked, staring blankly. He didn't notice that he was sopping wet, or who was in his room, or anything. He yawned wide.
"What the hell's going on?" I demanded, almost shouting in my effort to shock his brain awake. It didn't work.
"What's going on?" he asked back, dreamy. His eyes started to droop shut again.
"Lesh, see if you can find coffee. Or whiskey if there's no coffee brewing." He nodded and left.
"Wake up, Baron." This time I did shout. Annick shook her uncle. Resler looked from me to Annick, then back at me. Something finally seemed to be getting through to him.
"What's going on?" he asked, a little more coherently.
"That's what I want to know," I said, still speaking loudly. "Why won't anyone wake up?"
"I don't know. I was sleeping so peacefully." Resler seemed to be speaking at about half speed, and running down. He raised his hands and started to rub at his cheeks and eyes. He looked as if he hadn't shaved since I left to get sea-silver. Finally, he looked up at me, more closely.
"You're back already? We thought it would take another week."
"Another week? I've been gone almost three weeks now!"
Resler shook his head slowly, then stopped. His eyes opened a little wider. "It can't be more than three or four days."
I was getting confused. First I was told that I had been gone twice as long as I thought, then that I had just left. I watched Resler as he continued to come awake. It was incredibly, impossibly slow going.
"Where's my uncle, the wizard?" I asked when Resler looked as if he was finally getting his act together.
Resler's eyebrows moved toward each other. "We have a problem,' he said slowly. "Something came over us." Very slowly now. "It hit the town first. The elflord…"
