The Last Rune 5: The Gates of Winter

by Mark Anthony

  “So it does, mistress,” said one of the younger women. “That is why we've come.”

  Grace blinked. “Excuse me?”

  One of the eldest witches hobbled forward, leaning on a crooked stick. “You travel a long road, one that leads into the very heart of shadow.”

  Durge took a step forward, scowling. “What business is it of yours where we are traveling, woman?”

  The crone laughed. She was quite toothless. “It is the business of all of us, Sir Knight. Do not think we do not see, for our vision is clear. Even now you march to the Final Battle, and soon all the Warriors of Vathris will follow you.”

  Durge crossed his arms. “And do you mean to try to stop us? For know that you have little chance of doing so.”

  The young witch who had spoken approached. She was dressed in the drab browns of a peasant, and her long face was plain, yet there was an elegance to her bearing. “We do not wish to stop you, Sir Knight.”

  “But don't you have to?” Grace licked her lips. “Aren't you part of the Pattern?”

  Murmurs rose from the witches, and the crone cast a sly glance at the maiden. “We have made our own Pattern, weaving it in secret these last years.”

  Excitement coursed through Grace, and dread. “You're a shadow coven.”

  Durge frowned at Grace—he couldn't possibly know what that meant—but both crone and maiden nodded.

  The words tumbled out of Grace. “The shadow covens were forbidden. If you're discovered, your threads will be cut off from the Weirding.”

  The crone's weathered face was sorrowful but resolute. “So they shall. All the same, we have come together. You see, we have not ignored the eldest prophecies as the other witches have. We know Runebreaker will destroy the world, and also that he will save it. We know also that the Warriors of Vathris have a part to play in this before all is done, and that you, sister, are linked to both the Warriors and the Runebreaker himself.”

  Durge's eyes narrowed. “I do not care for these witches, my lady. If they have betrayed their own sisters, how can we trust anything they say? We should run them out of the camp before they spin a spell upon us.”

  “Hush, Durge,” Grace said, laying a hand on his arm, and he fell silent, though he still glared at the witches. Grace approached the two women, young and old. “Why have you come here?”

  “Our coven is not complete,” the younger witch said. “We need one more if we are to be thirteen and our secret Pattern complete.”

  Grace shook her head. “I'm sorry, but I have to go north. I can't go with you.”

  The crone laughed, a sound like the call of a crow. “Of course not, sister. That is why we shall go with you.”

  23.

  Two days later, the makeshift army reached the bridge over the River Darkwine and the borders of Toloria. “That bridge can't possibly be there.”

  Grace sat up straight in the saddle. “Actually, it looks fairly solid to me.”

  Tarus ran a hand through his red hair. “That's not what I meant, Your Majesty. I know this landscape well. I spent much time patrolling here when I was in the Order of Malachor. It's a week's journey from Calavere to Ar-tolor, which lies just a few leagues beyond that bridge. But it's only been three days since we set out from King Boreas's castle.”

  “Then we've made exceptionally good time, haven't we?” Grace said with a smile.

  “But, Your Majesty—”

  Grace gave him a sharp look. “Sometimes it's best not to question good fortune, Sir Tarus.”

  The knight bit his lip, then nodded. “Very well, Your Majesty. I'll instruct the army to cross the bridge. We'll make camp on the other side.” He rode away.

  “Thank you for speeding up our journey,” Grace murmured, enfolding Tira in her arms as they approached the bridge. The girl wriggled in her arms, making a low sound like a moan. What was the matter? Then, as Shandis's hooves clattered against the bridge, Grace understood.

  Glancing down, she saw the footprints melted into the stones of the bridge. It was here at this very bridge that the krondrim, the Burnt Ones, had trapped them on their journey east last year. Only the spell Grace wove with the help of Aryn and Lirith—along with the fatal bravery of Sir Meridar—had saved them. Even then, Tira and the blind boy Daynen had been trapped on the bridge, its stones half-molten from the touch of the fiery beings. Both children would have perished. But then, as Grace and the others watched in helpless horror, Daynen had carried Tira across the glowing stones of the bridge, saving her—and sacrificing himself.

  Grace let out a breath when they reached the other side of the bridge, and Tira grew still in her arms.

  Silver twilight was falling by the time they reached the other side. Grace was barely able to pick Durge out of the gloom as he veered his charger Blackalock close to Shandis. Both Embarran and warhorse looked like shadows.

  “I do not like this,” Durge rumbled.

  She followed his gaze and saw that the witches who had joined them two days ago were just coming across the bridge—the younger ones walking, the eldest sitting astride shaggy ponies.

  “We ride now into the lands of the Witch Queen of Toloria,” Durge said, his eyes glinting. “Will not they betray us to her? You yourself, Your Majesty, have said the Witches seek to prevent the Final Battle from coming about.”

  Grace watched the witches approach. “No, Durge. They won't betray us to Ivalaine. Besides, I think you may have misjudged the queen. Some of her own knights ride with us. Besides, no matter what side she stands on, all laws require that I request her permission to ride through her lands.”

  Durge couldn't argue with that; the Embarran was a staunch supporter of laws. All the same, he glowered at the witches. “I still don't like it. We know nothing about these women. It would be better if we had sent them on their way.”

  “Nonsense,” Grace said crisply. “There are far too many men about. A few women will do this army good.”

  Over the last two days, Grace had learned that, while she didn't know these witches, they knew her. The coven's Crone was named Senrael, while the Maiden was called Lursa; they were the two women Grace had first spoken to. It turned out both Senrael and Lursa had taken part in the High Coven in Ar-tolor last year. Both had met Aryn and Lirith there, and it was through Lirith and Aryn that they had come to know of Grace.

  So that explained how they knew who Grace was. But that didn't explain how the witches had known to find Grace on the road outside Calavere, or where she was going. Only they had known. Which meant one among them had the Sight.

  Senrael had confirmed it last night, when she and Lursa paid a visit to Grace's tent. The two explained how, after the High Coven allied with the witch Liendra and those who sought to destroy Runebreaker, they had formed a shadow coven and had searched for a role they might play in the Final Battle, something they could do to aid Runebreaker in fulfilling his destiny. Then, a fortnight ago, it had come to Lursa as she gazed at a candle.

  “I didn't even know I had the Sight,” the young Embarran woman said. She was soft-spoken and unassuming, but there was intelligence and humor in her brown eyes.

  “Sometimes power only reveals itself in times of great need,” Senrael said. “And I'd say these times certainly qualify.” The toothless old woman was at once feisty and grandmotherly. Grace liked her instantly.

  Lursa nodded. “It wasn't at all like a dream—it was clear, as if I was living it. I knew we would join you, and that we would travel with you to Shadowsdeep.”

  Grace gave the young woman a wan smile. “You didn't happen to see how things would go once we got there, did you?”

  Lursa shook her head and smiled back. “Magic never seems to be that convenient, does it?”

  “No,” Grace said, “it doesn't.”

  Before the two women left the tent, they had asked if Grace would accept the role of Matron in their coven.

  “I'm the oldest and crabbiest,” Senrael said, “so I get to be Crone. And Lursa has made for a fin
e Maiden.”

  Lursa frowned. “I'm too old for the role, you know. I'm four-and-twenty winters.”

  “Yet you were the best choice, and you know it,” Senrael said. “And fear not for your status as Maiden. I'll make certain none of the men in this army dare lay a hand on you. If one does, he'll discover his private bits have shriveled up like raisins.”

  Grace doubted untoward advances would be a problem. She had seen the dark glances the men cast at the witches, as well as the signs they made with their hands behind their backs. Durge was not the only one who was suspicious.

  “I'll do it, if you need me to,” Grace said, then grimaced. “But I don't really know what being Matron involves. I'm afraid I'm not much of a mother figure.”

  “And aren't you?” Senrael said, casting a glance at the cot where Tira lay curled up, one of her half-burnt dolls tucked under her arm.

  Now Grace watched as the last of her army marched across the bridge. Sir Tarus shouted orders, as did Commander Paladus, and camp was quickly set up near the banks of the river. Night fell, clear and cold, and Master Graedin and the other runespeakers moved through the camp, touching stones and speaking the rune of fire. Dawn seemed to come mere moments after Grace lay down on her cot, and it was time to rise and continue the journey.

  It was midmorning when the seven towers of Ar-tolor hove into view, green banners snapping. Grace imagined she would have to enter the castle in order to meet with Ivalaine, but as they approached she saw a pavilion had been set up outside the castle walls. The canvas of the pavilion was striped green and gold, and atop the center post flew the royal banner of Toloria. So the queen had come to meet her. But why?

  Perhaps to avoid prying eyes and ears, Grace. Isn't Sister Liendra still in Ar-tolor?

  A pony trotted toward Grace, a drab bundle on its back which, a moment later, Grace realized was Senrael.

  “The queen must not see my sisters and me,” the old witch said. She pointed to a distant knot of trees. “We will wait for you in that grove.”

  Grace gazed at the pavilion and sighed. “You know, I believe that in her heart she supports us.”

  “That may well be,” Senrael said. “All the same, she was Matron of the High Coven, and until she renounces that role she is bound by the Pattern woven there. If she were to see us riding with you, she would know we have betrayed the Witches.”

  “What about me?” Grace said. “Won't she know I've betrayed the Witches as well?”

  Senrael let out a cackle. “You cannot betray them, deary, for you were not part of the Pattern.”

  Grace lifted a hand to her chest, trying to quell the sudden ache there. “What pattern am I part of, then?”

  “That's for you yourself to weave,” the old woman said, then she turned the pony around and rode off to join the other witches. Together, the twelve women headed for the leafless grove of trees. However, before they had gone a furlong, the air shimmered around them, and their forms faded away, vanishing into the dun-colored landscape.

  “Your Majesty,” Durge called, riding toward her. “The queen awaits.”

  Despite their many previous interactions, Queen Ivalaine greeted Grace coolly, formally—not as one woman or one witch to another, but rather as ruler to ruler. They did not touch and remained always a distance apart. The queen sat in a folding chair of gilded, intricately carved wood, and she indicated that Grace should sit in a chair that was only slightly less ornate. Grace made her request to ride with her army through the queen's lands. After that, servants brought them steaming goblets of spiced wine and stoked the braziers that warmed the pavilion, then retreated, leaving the two women alone. Even Tressa, the queen's closest advisor, was nowhere to be seen.

  Maybe she's back in the castle, Grace, keeping an eye on Sister Liendra.

  “You must guard your thoughts,” Ivalaine said, her ice-colored eyes fixed on Grace. “It is not only words spoken aloud that may be overheard.”

  Grace clutched her goblet. “And who might hear us?”

  “I would give much to know the answer to that question, sister. I simply know I am being watched. The feeling comes and goes, like clouds on a summer day. But the clouds come more often than light now. The storm approaches, and I fear it will wash us all away.”

  Grace didn't know how to reply to that, though she noted Ivalaine had called her sister. Were they no longer speaking as queens, then, but as witches? There was one way to find out.

  “You have not asked me why I ride through your lands with an army, sister.”

  Ivalaine made a dismissive gesture. “Your business is your own.”

  Grace set down her goblet. “No, this business is all of ours. Everyone I talk to tells me the Final Battle is coming, and I really have no reason to think they're wrong. So I'm riding to Gravenfist Keep, which lies in Shadowsdeep, right at the gates of Imbrifale. Once I'm there, I'll wait for the coming of the Warriors of Vathris, led by King Boreas.”

  The queen made no exclamation of shock or surprise. She sat motionless in her chair. However, there was a light in her eyes—a glow that in the ED Grace would have taken as a sign of fever—and blotches of color blossomed on her pale cheeks.

  “What of my . . . what of Prince Teravian?” Ivalaine said softly. “Will he ride with his father?”

  “I believe so.”

  “But of course he will.” Ivalaine muttered the words under her breath, as if speaking to herself rather than Grace. “He has to go, does he not? For it is not the father who will fight this battle, but the son.”

  Grace frowned. “Sister?”

  Ivalaine stood, and her goblet fell to the rushes that strewed the ground. Wine spilled, staining the rushes the color of blood. The queen stared at the crimson pool.

  “An omen,” Ivalaine said, her words hoarse. “Blood will spill. Royal blood. But I will go to him before the end. I will see him before that bull can break him like a sword. I will be queen no longer. Nor will I be Matron. I care not what happens—all is beyond me now. There is but one last role for me to play.”

  Grace could do nothing to hide the horror on her face. In all the time she had known Ivalaine, the Witch Queen of Toloria had been a figure of authority and cool control. Always Ivalaine had seemed to float above the events that weighed down other mortals, proud and beautiful, untouched by fear or worry. However, the woman who stood before Grace now seemed diminished. She hunched over, her flaxen hair tangled, her beauty shattered by fear, like cracks crazing once-flawless crystal.

  “Sister?” Grace said, rising, but still the queen stared at the spilled wine. “Your Majesty?”

  Ivalaine's head snapped up. “Go!” she said, her voice a hiss, her eyes wide and shot with red. “This one last thing I will do as queen—you have my permission to ride through my lands. But go quickly, before you and your shadow coven are seen. Their spells of illusion will not hide them for long, not from those who keep watch. And if you are discovered, I can and will do nothing to protect you.”

  With that, Ivalaine turned her back and vanished through a slit in the canvas wall. Grace stared after her, trying to comprehend what had just happened. There is but one last role for me to play, Ivalaine had said. But what role did she mean? And where was it she intended to go?

  “Your Majesty?” said a deep voice behind her.

  She turned around and let out a breath. “Durge.”

  The Embarran stood in the entrance of the pavilion. “We spied the queen riding back to the castle with her servants, and we assumed your audience was over. Do we have her permission to ride through Toloria?”

  Grace managed a stiff nod. She staggered a bit and caught the back of the chair for support.

  Durge hurried to her side, steadying her with a strong hand. “Are you well, my lady?”

  A shard of pain lodged in her chest. He wasn't the one who should be asking her that, not with what worked its way toward his own heart. However, Grace forced herself to stand straight. Like Queen Ivalaine, she had just one role to
play.

  “Come on, Durge. Let's get out of here.”

  24.

  They continued to make impossibly good time as they marched eastward over the rolling hills of Toloria. By late afternoon of their second day after crossing the river, the spire of the Gray Tower soared into view. Much as Oragien and the other runespeakers might have liked to see how their brethren fared, the army did not stop. By the evening of the next day, they had reached the edge of the wilderness that lay between Toloria and Perridon.

  “Tomorrow we turn north,” Tarus said as Grace and her commanders took supper by the fire.

  Paladus looked up at the frosty stars. “I have never seen an army march so quickly as this. Surely the gods must favor us.”

  Grace gave Tira a hug. “I'm pretty sure there's at least one who does, Commander.”

  The next morning they left Toloria behind and marched into the wilderness. Last summer, when they had journeyed through this region on the way to Castle Spardis, Falken had called it Dun-Dordurun, which meant In-Between-Land in the language of the Maugrim. Only the Maugrim had vanished an eon ago, and no one lived here now.

  The landscape was achingly lonely: a series of misty valleys and scrub-covered ridges that stretched as far as the eye could see. The only sound that broke the silence was the occasional call of a hawk, and the army passed no human habitations, though a few times Grace glimpsed a ragged circle of stones crowning a distant hill.

  The sun was sinking low in the west when they reached the gigantic drawing of Mohg on the side of a hill.

  “So it's still there,” Grace murmured as Shandis came to a halt on a ridge opposite the drawing. But then, it had been there for centuries. She shivered despite the warmth that radiated from Tira's body.

  “What is it?” Master Graedin said. The voluble young runespeaker had been bouncing on his mule alongside Grace for the last few leagues, chatting eagerly in response to her questions concerning what the Runespeakers had learned in their effort to repair the runestone.