The Ryel Saga: A Tale of Love and Magic

by Carolyn Kephart

  "And how would you bring them back, brother?"

  "With the joining-spell of Lord Garnos written in that book you hold."

  Riana laughed even more shimmeringly and longer than ever. "Nothing more than that? Ah, Ryel." Her smile vanished, her eyes chilled; and the wysard with a shiver remembered the way the voluptuous sun had drowned in blowing white cold. "There is much more to that spell than mere saying. The Coalescence is the most difficult of all the Masteries, not to be undertaken lightly. Great study and discipline are required for its success." She tossed the book onto the table. "You're not ready for it. You'd be like a little child toddling into a blazing fire."

  Ryel winced at that image. "And yet Dagar learned it easily enough."

  She shook her head, apparently in pity. "Ah, my poor Ryel. For your better instruction, Lord Dagar Rall was Elecambron's Garnos. Preternaturally intelligent, although in every wrong way possible. I saw him in my Glass once, long ago when he was still very much alive and in his own form. He was of purest Hralwi blood, all white gold—but not in the least bulky with brawn, as most Barbarians are. When I saw him, he was wearing a robe of figured green velvet that trailed yards behind him, and his hair hung to his knees. I thought he was a woman at first, because he was so slight and delicate, with the most wonderful blue-green eyes. He was holding a newborn child, and I thought it was his from the tender way he sang to it and kissed it. But then he..." She gave a disgusted little shudder. "I'd much rather not say what he did to that luckless infant. Dagar was a monster. A dainty, simpering monster with the greatest talent for the Art I've seen since my little band of brothers and sisters built Markul. It's no wonder he succeeded with Garnos' spell."

  Ryel lifted his chin. "What Dagar could accomplish, I can. And better."

  Riana rolled a highly skeptical eye. "Ah. Really. Well, brother, I'll teach you all that is needful. But what will you give me in return?"

  "Whatever you desire, my lady."

  He never should have said that. Her tongue darted across her lips, and her eyes all over him. "Whatever I desire. Oh, but that is much, brother." Reaching out, she took his hand, again surprising him with her heat, but this time he did not evade the contact.

  "Only try me, my lady." He bent his brow to her hand's back. "For me you will take the place of destiny."

  Her smooth fingers evaded his, and she stretched with feline grace, supple and slow. "Well, I am destiny, am I not? What difference between me and a goddess, save that I am not worshipped...yet?"

  At that moment Desrenaud entered the room. "For this change of weather I thank you, my lady," he said, bowing with a courtliness that seemed second nature, unexpected though Ryel found it. Throwing off his trailing furred coat, he came forward as the door-guard Hekrit silently descended his pedestal to take up the cast garment, shake it free of snow and neatly drape it over a chair. Glancing at the table, Desrenaud winced. "Not that fly-wine again."

  Riana smiled tolerantly, waving an indolent hand as she spoke a word. A crystal flagon of mulled claret materialized at her bidding. Desrenaud filled a cup and tasted, then lifted the drink to the One Immortal, giving a grateful nod.

  "Your health and long life, my lady."

  "Yes, yes. Always." With a languid sweep of silk she rose. "You two have matters to discuss." I'll retire awhile, for there are some things I must study." She gazed up at Desrenaud, who had stood when she did. "You think me beautiful. You have said so, often."

  "More lovely than any woman I have ever seen," he replied, lightly caressing her dark gold hair, looking down into her eyes with bemused tenderness. "But I half think I knew you before, in another life."

  "You might have. But if you did, you knew this one as well."

  As she spoke she became taller, whiter, harder, her honey-gold tresses silvering and straightening, her face's girlish charms transmuting to a severe beauty almost masculine save for the crimson fullness of the mouth; but though her warm blue-violet eyes turned ice-pale, they lost nothing of their Art's power. Desrenaud took a step backward.

  "Bradamaine," he whispered.

  "Ah, you remember," the Northern queen said, her voice low and sweet and a little rough, even as Ryel remembered it. "Remember, then, what passed between us, and return to me. My realm's in danger; my life as well, and Roskerrek's, and many another's you hold dear."

  Desrenaud looked down, clearly remembering much and shamed by those recollections. "We parted angrily, m'Domina."

  "I have forgiven you. Fear not you'll be compelled to stay; I know where your strongest loyalties lie. Only help me, for only you can."

  He raised his head again, and met her ice-eyes evenly. "I will not fail you, m'Domina," he said; and he took her hands and bowed over them, with soldierly respect.

  Riana gave Ryel a sideways glance, and smiled as she slipped free of Desrenaud's gentle hold, and with a word make him sink down onto the couch again, unconscious.

  "There, I'm done," Riana said with an ironic head-shake. "My brief demonstration should stick in his mind, and serve to lead him in the right direction. I'm a good mimic, wouldn't you say?"

  "Too good."

  Her Dranthene regard dwelt awhile on Desrenaud, coolly musing. "Love. A most unsettling emotion. Agonizing. I've not missed much."

  "You know you have."

  She made no reply, but turned away, swaying in deliberate exit from the room.

  His emotions turbulent, Ryel watched her. The One Immortal possessed consummate Art clearly intended for the good of the World, but she had no more heart than a succubus. You anger me, the wysard thought. But I pity you even more. And I will do everything I can to change your mind.

  He turned to Desrenaud, who slumped senseless against the cushions of the divan; laid a hand on his shoulder. At once the Northerner roused and shook his head.

  "That was stronger ale than I thought," he said. "Witch's brew, doubtless. Speaking of such, what's become of the lady?"

  "She thought that you and I might wish to talk alone awhile."

  "We probably should." He reached for a tidbit from one of the golden platters. A scant taste made him wince, and he let it drop. "Foul stuff, this Zinaphian cookery. Almost Ormalan." He whistled, and the she-lynx Dashrali instantly appeared. "Take this trash away and give me something I can stomach, catkin," he said to her, lightly ruffling the soft fur of her haunch as he did so. Purringly the creature obeyed, transforming the strange meats into Northern fare preciously dished, vanishing again when Desrenaud required no further service.

  "Much better," the earl said as he liberally helped himself. "Join me, enchanter—unless you really do prefer pickled reptile."

  For some time they said nothing of moment, concentrating on the excellent food. But after the main dishes vanished once empty, replaced with fruit and wine, Ryel turned the talk where it had to go.

  "Where will your road lead, after here?"

  Desrenaud shrugged. "I don't seem to have much of a choice, sorcerer." He commanded a couple of glasses of Dryven whisky, handing Ryel one, motioning the wysard to follow him out to the broad veranda. Seating himself at the top of the stairs, he gazed out at the white-draped woods. "I never feel cold in this kind of weather. It laps me like a blanket. I love the look of it, the pure sweet white, so quiet and so clean. When I was a boy up in the Craigs, it made me forget the dirt in the world."

  Ryel sat next to him. "Your grandmother the Markessa told me a little about that time."

  Those words evoked a grin. "Never will I forget that first sight of her when she rode up to Dryven Keep astride on her gray mule and swathed in her sea-cloak, and how all the dogs ran howling from her. She changed my life whether I would or no. Taught me letters and manners, and kindness. And thanks to her I became acquainted with Prince Hylas De Warvrek, whom I worshipped; and thanks to him at length I escaped that malignant whore my mother, and that drunken swine my sire. Escaped to a kind haven, where I was welcomed. But I had a grudge against the world that demanded satisfaction, and…" He
halted, darting Ryel a suspicious glance. "You're making me tell you all this, warlock, with those arts of yours. I wouldn't mind knowing why."

  "The better to understand you, Guy."

  "For what reason?"

  "So as to work your cure."

  "I'm not sick, sorcerer. The witch Riana set me right. What you began in Ormala, she completed."

  "She healed your body only. Of the mind's pain she has no comprehension."

  "One as fair as she needs no such knowledge. But I wish my road wasn't leading Northward again. All my mind was set on Almancar."

  "It is your decision to make."

  "As I said, I've no choice, sorcerer. The troubles there have to be put down. And besides, I'd not mind seeing some of my old friends once more, Roskerrek among them."

  The wysard half laughed. "He's the last person I'd expect you to call a friend."

  "We had our differences, no question. But never have I known anyone more learned in so many ways, or more patient under the lash of unceasing sickness. Roskerrek saved my life, you've doubtless heard."

  "Saved it, only to nearly take it again."

  "He tried hard, I admit. He's a ravening demon with a blade."

  "I don't mean the initiation of the Fraternity." And Ryel revealed what had nearly occurred when Desrenaud lay unconscious in Grotherek Palace, poisoned by an assassin's blade. The Northerner listened expressionless, but his cold-ruddied features lost their color awhile.

  "So my looks both endangered and saved my life that night," he said at last. "How often I remember his eyes on me afterward, that he would avert as soon as my own met them. A notable spirit, Yvain Essern's; seldom does one see pure good and black evil wedded so tightly in a single soul. I well know how deeply he hated me; but that hatred embarrassed him, I think, when he saw I couldn't share it. The only time I came close was during the Brotherhood initiation, when he cut me unfairly—and fatally, almost. Hallagh's best doctors looked after me at once, and I healed fast, with barely a scar. But my resentment rankled all during the wars, and Redbane and I had many a hot dispute whenever I called his judgment into question regarding strategy, which was often. I understand his ill-will toward the Snow-folk—or Hralwi, to give them their true name—to whom he lost his father and eldest brother, both dear to him; but thousands more lives than theirs were squandered just as futilely on either side."

  "You ended that war."

  Desrenaud shrugged off the wysard's implied praise. "I only began the end. All it took was a parley with the Hralwi chieftain—which was made easier by my knowledge of his language, since he knew but scant Hryelesh."

  "That was all?"

  The earl smiled ruefully. "Not quite. First came our single combat witnessed by the clan's aristocracy—a wrestling-bout that lasted an hour or two and bruised me crown to heel, which is a fair distance; but since Clathegar and I were exactly matched in height and years, and nearly so in size, he got as good as he gave. Worse than that was the all-night drinking-bout that came after the treaty, followed by a boiling hot steam-bath and a naked roll in the dawn-lit snow to purify ourselves for peace, and a crushing wet lot of kisses and bear-hugs at farewell—Hralwi warriors are an effusive lot regardless of gender. Still, those were easy proceedings compared to what came afterward in Hallagh when the Domina—and Roskerrek—learned of my diplomacy."

  "Was it your diplomacy that forced you to leave the Barrier?" the wysard asked.

  "Rather my lack of it," Desrenaud muttered. "Damn your Art, that makes me say whatever you want."

  "Tell me what drove you from Hryeland."

  The earl sighed. "Heartily glad was I to leave that cruel land. And I'd no desire whatever to become the he-concubine of the insufferable virago that ruled it."

  "What do you mean?"

  Desrenaud gathered up another snowball, slinging it at a pine-cone wavering on a limb a considerable distance away; did not miss. "Bradamaine asked me—commanded me, more accurately—to become her morganatic consort. But I didn't consider a few nights of drug-drenched lust sufficient persuasion for a union in which I'd have no rights whatever of succession or inheritance, and I told her in the bluntest terms that I'd no inclination whatever for the wrong side of her blanket. That's when she drew the knife she keeps at her side and started in on me, upon which I knocked her down after she'd carved me up a bit."

  Ryel stared. "By every god."

  "It was considerably more sordid than it sounds," the earl replied. "Knowing that my life in Hryeland wasn't worth much after assaulting its sovereign, I sought out Roskerrek and told him of my plans for flight, which he was more than happy to assist and keep secret. I've often wondered how he's fared since."

  "I'm willing to let you know, if you're interested."

  Desrenaud was, and asked many questions regarding the healing of the Count Palatine's blood-bane and the wysard's meeting with the Domina, but most of all Ryel's initiation into the Sword Brotherhood, among whom the Northerner numbered his dearest friends--even to the Countess of Fayal.

  "I'll be glad to see them all again," he said. "Thanks to them, I was safe from Bradamaine's vengeance; the Brotherhood keeps secrets to the grave." He stood up, and Ryel joined him. "Since fate leads us both northward, let's go together. I'd be glad of your company."

  "And I of yours," Ryel replied. "But I must stay here awhile, to learn the Art I require. In the meanwhile you'll have your hands full overseeing Theofanu's downfall in Hallagh."

  Desrenaud nodded, but winced too. "To think I was once that crone's most ardent follower, slave to her vicious philtres and potions. It shames me sore."

  "You never really worshipped the Master, Guy. The Art within you was too strong for that."

  "Still, it didn't keep me from becoming an abject slave to Theofanu's drugs, and finding my way to Ormala. Mine is no hero's history, magus."

  "But it could be."

  At those words Desrenaud seemed to muse awhile. "While a boy in my grandame's house I learned tales of gods and heroes, and now it feels as if I'm part of one." Reaching out with a gloved hand, he gathered up some snow in his palm, letting it fall like sand through his fingers. " My life's never been overly fortunate in its devolutions, sorcerer, but maybe now my luck will turn."

  "It has already begun to."

  "I'd be glad of the change, believe me." Again Desrenaud took up a handful of snow; but this time he ungloved, as if to feel the hurt of the cold. "My grandame found the good in me; Sandrine de Tresk found the best. I'd been a worthless rakehell, a stain on King Niall's learned and noble court, until Sandrine changed me the way the princess changes a beast to a man in those tales of wonder. She was wed to a worthless lord who treated her ill because she was barren, or so he thought; but she died in childbed because of me, and our daughter with her. I mourned in true Starkland fashion, howling and squalid and solitary, as drunk as I could make myself. I doubt I'd have lived long had I not been commanded to serve as interpreter for Prince Hylas when he journeyed to Almancar. I went there unwilling and surly, and upon my arrival I shunned the city, choosing to hunt all day in the wasteland outside the walls chasing foxes or whatever else I could find to kill, wearing desert gear against the sun and wind. This same gear I wore over my black mourning-weeds the night of the Sovran's feast, not caring what was thought of me; and the court observed my garb with outrage, for in Destimar it is an enormity for a guest to wear mourning at a royal celebration. But I was forgotten when Belphira Deva was brought in.

  "It angered me to see a mere brothel singing-wench greeted with such acclaim and respect; perhaps I was jealous. So irate was my mood that when old Agenor made some slighting remark about my rough appearance, calling me a low fellow and a turncoat mercenary, I flung off my desert guisings and gave him back scorn for scorn, to the stark appallment of the lookers-on. Needless to say, I was drunk, having made free with Sindrite brandy and other strong waters; drunk and wretched, wishing myself a thousand miles from that place of flowers and moonlight and laughter." He caug
ht his breath, and winced. "She told you what I did next, did she not?"

  "She did."

  "There was a sight for you, sorcerer. I must have gone maudlin from the drink, to have flung myself down at her feet so desperate, blubbering amid the folds of her gown--but I was long past caring. All I felt was her cool hand upon my head and her soft voice close at my ear, soothing as the sea. I loved her from that moment; could have died there with my head on her lap, the angel sweetness of her singing my last memory."

  Laughter floated in on the wintry air, low and mischief-laden. Then Lady Riana was in their midst, still in Belphira's guise. "It will be much better for us all if you live, green eyes," she said. "I understand you're on the point of leave-taking. When would you depart?"

  "As soon as may be, my lady," Desrenaud replied; and now he seemed well aware that he spoke only to his lady's semblance. "That is, if you've no objection…or obstruction."

  She smiled serenely. "None whatever of either. You seem ready for your journey—well-rested and strong. Is there anything you would take with you?"

  "With nothing I came to you," Desrenaud said. "I'll go the same."

  "Oh, I think not," the lady said. "You'll find a few things in your pockets when you arrive in Hallagh, little gifts of mine that may prove useful. I'm a firm believer in reciprocation, and you gave me much to remember. Bend down to me, you great tall wonder."

  Desrenaud bent, and Riana wreathed her bare smooth arms around his neck, kissing his mouth lightly but lingeringly. "Now hold yourself very still. Still as death, lest death find you indeed."

  Her easy tone held a terrible warning. Desrenaud stood upright and unmoving, and the last look he gave was to the wysard, his eyes now clear and steady.