Witch Wraith

by Terry Brooks

  She darkened her heart against such feelings. These people had taken Arling and given her to the Federation. They had stolen the Ellcrys seed.

  They were not entitled to any consideration.

  They were perhaps a quarter mile outside the village when they came upon the cottage Aphen had been looking for. Leading the way, she entered the yard and walked up to the door. She was aware of how poorly constructed the house was, how shabby the few outbuildings. She looked for farm animals and saw several chickens and the donkey looking out the door of a small shed. She saw a tiny vegetable garden.

  These people had very little. They were just barely getting by on foraging and whatever they could grow.

  She felt her dislike softening.

  She knocked on the door, and heard a voice call out to her. “Coming!” When the door opened, the woman with the kind voice was standing there. She was wearing an old dress and apron, and her hair was done up in a farm wife’s bun.

  “Oh!” she gasped in genuine shock. She took a step back and then caught sight of Arling peering at her over Aphen’s shoulder. “Oh, my goodness, child—it’s you! Are you all right?”

  Arling nodded, smiling uncertainly.

  “Thank goodness! I’m so sorry for what we did. We didn’t know. Sora said you needed medical care and we didn’t have any to offer. Not even here, in our village. No Healer, not even a midwife. But look at you! You seem fine. And your sister and her friend have bought you safely back. I’m so relieved.” She glanced from face to face. “Come in, come in. I have hot tea on the stove.”

  They stepped inside, where the girls were ushered to seats at a tiny kitchen table. There were only three chairs, so Cymrian declined the offer of the third and said he would stand, moving off to warm himself in front of a small stone fireplace. The woman poured them each a mug of tea and then joined the girls at the table.

  “Sora had business at the tavern, but he should be back soon.” She seemed genuinely pleased that they were there. “He will be so surprised. How did you find us?”

  Then she saw something in Aphen’s face and hesitated. “What’s the matter? Something’s wrong, isn’t it? That’s why you’ve come. Something’s wrong.”

  Aphen nodded. “My sister was carrying a silver stone when you found her. It was taken while she slept but before she was given over to the men on that Federation warship. Do you have that stone?”

  The woman stared. “A stone? No. I never saw a stone. It was taken, you say …”

  She trailed off abruptly, and right away Aphen could tell what had happened. “Your husband has it, doesn’t he?” she said.

  The woman was trembling. “He’s a good man, really. But he thinks things should belong to him just because he’s found them. He’s been trying to sell something in the village for several days now. When he left today, he said he thought he had a buyer. I don’t pay much attention to that sort of thing. Mostly, it never comes to anything, even when he thinks it will.”

  She shook her head, flushed and angry. “But stealing! I’m so sorry. I would have made him give it back if I had known.”

  She was crying freely now, her face streaked with tears.

  Aphen and Arling exchanged a quick glance. Arling looked at if she might cry herself.

  Not so Cymrian. “Where can we find him?” he asked.

  The tavern was a single room with a bar, some stools, a few tables and chairs and not much more. It didn’t even have a fireplace. What heat there was emanated from a small wood-burning stove in one corner and from the bodies of the men clustered about the tables and pressed up against the bar. Tankards of ale were being passed around, and voices were loud and insistent.

  But the voices died into mutterings and the eyes of the patrons shifted to the doorway when the Elessedil sisters and Cymrian entered. They were Elves in a community populated mostly by Southlanders who had drifted west to find a better life and only found more of the same. There was a Dwarf in one corner, bent over his drink. There were a handful of Rovers at another table. But no Elves.

  A Borderman leaning against the bar a few feet away from her took one look at her black Druid robes, pushed away from the bar, and left without a word. Another, a hunter dressed in leather, followed him out.

  At a table near the back of the room, Sora was seated with a pair of men. Another four stood just behind the two in what appeared to Aphen to be a protective circle. As she watched, Sora counted coins from a stack that had been shoved in front of him, taking his time, not even bothering to look up from his task when they entered and the noise level dropped.

  But as Aphen and her companions started across the room, one of the men seated said something to Sora, who looked up, saw who was approaching, quickly produced the leather pouch in which the Ellcrys seed had been placed, and shoved it across the table to the man who had spoken. The man snatched up the pouch and tucked it into his jacket.

  “There, now,” Sora said, rather too loudly, “our business is concluded! I must be on my way. A pleasure seeing you.”

  He scooped the coins off the table and into his pockets and rose hurriedly, nearly tripping over his own feet as he tried to move away.

  Cymrian was on top of him before he’d taken his second step, seizing him by his shoulders and shoving him back down into his chair. “Your business isn’t quite finished,” the Elven Hunter said, reaching down and extracting the hunting knife from Sora’s wide leather belt and flinging it across the room.

  “Don’t move,” Aphen said to the men seated at the table, her hand stretched out in warning. Her eyes lifted to take in the bunch clustered at the back of the table. “Don’t any of you move.”

  She tried to keep Arling behind her, out of harm’s way, but Arling had other ideas and pushed forward. “Where is the seed you stole from me?” she snapped at Sora. “While I was injured and unconscious, you took it. Where is it?”

  The big man squirmed. “I was owed something for saving your life,” he snapped. “You would have died without Aquinel and me!”

  “You were owed much for saving me, but you had no right to steal what wasn’t yours,” Arling persisted. “Give me the seed!”

  Sora’s mouth tightened. “I can’t. I sold it to this gentleman right here. He’s the lawful owner now. You’ll have to take it up with him.”

  He tried once again to get to his feet, and again Cymrian shoved him back down. “He is not the lawful owner if he bought stolen property,” the Elven Hunter pointed out, eyes fixing on the man in question.

  Arling’s gaze, white-hot with anger, shifted to the man with the pouch. “Give it back to me.”

  The man was not intimidated. He was long and lean and had the look of someone who had not willingly given up much in his life. “What about my money? I paid for that silver orb. I’m owed.”

  Cymrian reached down and pulled the coins from Sora’s pocket, casting them across the table. “There. We are even. Give back the seed.”

  The man looked down at the coins and shook his head. “I don’t want the money. I want the seed. I bought it. It’s mine.”

  “You have no right to it!” Arling shouted, her voice shrill enough to make Aphen flinch. “It was sold to you by someone who didn’t own it! You have to give it back. You don’t understand what’s at stake!”

  “Arling,” Aphen said quietly, making a calming motion. “They don’t need to know everything.”

  One of the men standing behind the pair seated at the table started to reach beneath his cloak. Aphen gestured, snapping her fingers as she did, and the man dropped to the floor, writhing in excruciating pain. The knife he had been reaching for clattered on the wooden floorboards.

  The men at the table backed up, muttering and looking left and right at their fellows. They clearly anticipated doing something, but were undecided as to what that should be. Their leader kept watching Aphen, making no move to interfere. She didn’t like the look on his face. He was enjoying this.

  “Let’s be fair about this,”
he said, not sounding as if he intended to be fair at all. “You.” He pointed to Sora. “You sold me the orb for a fixed amount and I paid that amount. Isn’t that so?”

  Sora nodded reluctantly. “That’s so.”

  “Did you steal it from them?”

  “I … It sort of just dropped out of the girl’s pocket while we was helping her. I actually saved it from being lost.”

  “So it’s yours, after all. You see?” He smiled at Aphen. “Your claim is suspect. But if you want it back—orb, stone, seed, whatever—I’m willing to negotiate. Pay me four times what I gave up. Wait, five times. Then you can have it.”

  Aphen stepped forward, eyes fixed on the man. “Take out the pouch and set it on the table. Do it right now.”

  The man shook his head. “I don’t take orders from anyone. Especially Elves. I don’t care who you are or what sort of tricks you can do. A word from me, and you and your friends will be cut to—”

  He never finished. Aphen’s fingers made a curious twisting motion, and the man’s words choked in his throat as he was lifted out of his chair by invisible hands and hauled across the tabletop. He thrashed momentarily, but could gain no purchase, and his efforts at calling for help failed. The men with him backed against the wall, then broke and fled toward the doors. Cymrian moved quickly to the second man seated across from Sora and put him down with a single blow to the temple. Sora tried to run yet again, but he was hemmed in on all sides by the Elves.

  Shouts rose from the other patrons, but Arling wheeled on them and screamed at them to be silent. The force of her words was enough. The room went absolutely still.

  Aphen flipped the man she had ensnared with her magic onto his back without touching him, her wrist twisting slightly to complete the task. Then she reached inside his robes as he flopped and thrashed like a fish out of water and took back the pouch with the Ellcrys seed.

  She leaned close. “I ought to kill you and be done with it. You deserve no better. But men like you should to live out their lives until the misery they cause to others comes back to find them—as it surely will in your case.”

  She cast him away as if he weighed nothing. He flew off the table and onto the floor, collapsing in a motionless heap.

  Aphen and Arling were already moving toward the tavern door. Cymrian was a step behind, hauling Sora along by his collar, shoving him forward. A few angry mutterings rose from the tavern patrons, but no one tried to stop them.

  Moments later they were outside, trudging down the road toward the end of the village. Rain sheeted down, soaking them through. No one spoke. Cymrian released his grip on Sora, but the latter made no attempt at running away again. He simply kept pace as if this were the only choice open to him.

  “I’m finished here, you know that?” he said to Aphen without looking at her. “Finished and done. I can’t go back. Not to those men. They’ll blame me for this.”

  “You should have thought of that before you stole the seed,” she snapped at him.

  He went silent for a moment. “Aquinel didn’t have anything to do with this, you know. It was all me. I took it when she wasn’t looking. I just wanted to sell it and give her something nice, something more than what I’ve been able to for all these years she’s stuck with me.” He trailed off. “You just need to know. It wasn’t her fault. She’s a good woman.”

  Aphen wheeled on him and shoved him up against the side of a building. “Then take her and leave. Now. Pack a few things and go before they come for you. It will take them a day or so to muster the courage. Go somewhere far away, but get out of here!”

  She reached in her cloak, brought out a handful of coins, and shoved them into his pocket. “Take these. Consider the matter of the seed settled. But don’t forget what happened here. Don’t try stealing from anyone again.”

  She pulled him away from the wall and pointed him down the road toward his cottage. “She’s waiting. Look after her.”

  She stood watching as he stumbled down the road and disappeared into the rain. She wondered if he would do what she had told him. She wondered if he would heed her advice about stealing.

  She wondered if there was any hope for these people.

  Then she grabbed Arling’s arm and, with Cymrian trailing, started back down the road toward the waiting Sprint.

  Twenty-two

  Seersha and Crace Coram flew their two-man north through the remainder of the day, making sure they kept well east of the Straken Lord’s army. Neither Dwarf had ever seen an army of this size, so massive and sprawling that it seemed to have no beginning or end, blanketing the countryside for as far as the eye could see. It let them better understand why the Federation army in Arishaig had been unable to defend the city. The Elves would be no more successful in trying to defend Arborlon.

  “An evacuation is the only answer against a force of this size,” the Dwarf Chieftain insisted within minutes of surveying the onslaught below them.

  “The Elves won’t give up Arborlon,” Seersha replied at once. “They won’t leave their home city. They won’t abandon the Ellcrys. They will stand and fight.”

  “Which is madness,” her companion hissed in dismay.

  “Maybe. But that’s the way of it. And it’s why I am setting you down outside Tyrsis as soon as we sight her. I need you to get word to the Border Legion. Let them know what’s happened, if they don’t know already. Tell them the Elves will need their support. Then fly on to the Dwarves and bring them, as well. Use the flatbeds for transport—as many as you can manage. No arguments from the other Chieftains. There’s no time for it.” She paused. “Can you do it, old dog?”

  He scowled at her. “The ‘old dog’ will need three days to get reinforcements to Arborlon. Can you give me that?”

  She grinned and nodded, and suddenly they were laughing. It was insanity, all of it hopeless, and there was nothing for it but to stare it down and laugh in its face. You did what you had to in a situation like this one. You did what your heart and your sense of right and wrong told you was needed.

  They flew past the ocean of creatures serving the Straken Lord and continued north. It was close to midnight when she dropped him just west of the city of Tyrsis, the fortress settled high on the massive plateau overlooking the grasslands of the Streleheim. He would make the gates well before sunrise and do what he must to try to help her. She, in the meantime, would snatch a few precious hours of sleep, then go to the Elves and see if she could manage to open their eyes. Or, more particularly, the eyes of Phaedon Elessedil, who would most probably want her clapped in irons and locked away the moment he saw her.

  But she was a Druid first and always, and a warrior to boot—a planner and a tactician. She would not give him the chance to do what he would like. She would find a way to turn his rage and obstinacy against him.

  The hours were long and the tension high as she steered a course safely beyond the demonkind while keeping a sharp eye out for Elven craft, as well. But she reached the Valley of Rhenn by midafternoon and sailed through the shadow of its cliff-walled gap, giving a wave to the sentries—a sign of friendship that she hoped would be enough to keep them from trying to stop or engage her. Her hopes were realized when no aircraft moved to intercept her and no challenge was issued to stop her passing.

  She moved on quickly from there to the outskirts of Arborlon, choosing to land at the Elven airfield where she believed she might be lucky enough to find a friendly face. In fact, she found several. A handful of the Elven Home Guards she had been training with were working on a skiff nearby when she landed and wandered over to see what had brought her back.

  “I thought you might be missing me,” she answered with a laugh. “Any warrants or postings out on me?”

  She said it jokingly, tossing it off, watching them carefully for signs of uneasiness, but the Elves just shrugged.

  “Who would bother with something like that?” one asked.

  “Well, your new King wasn’t exactly friendly toward me when we parted,” she
said.

  “I wouldn’t spend my time worrying about that,” said another, pulling a face. “Our new King is too busy trying to find his backside with both hands to be bothered with the likes of Dwarves or Druids!”

  “Unless he thought Dwarves might do a better job of finding it than he could, them being smaller in stature and all,” said another.

  They all howled with glee, and she let them do so. No point in making this into something it clearly wasn’t. She laughed as if sharing the joke, and then casually asked, “Do you know where I can find Sian Aresh?”

  They did better than that. One of them offered to find the Captain of the Home Guard and bring him to her. She almost agreed, but then decided it would be better if she found him herself. Sending word risked having Phaedon learn she was back in Arborlon, and she wasn’t ready for that to happen just yet. So she excused herself amid a final barrage of insults and jokes and set off for the Home Guard barracks where she was told Aresh could be found.

  She took the trouble to procure and don one of the green cloaks of the Home Guard, leaving her own distinctive black one behind. The less attention she drew to herself, the better. She was putting herself in enough danger as it was, even though it seemed no one was looking for her at this point. Perhaps it was enough that she had fled with Crace Coram, removing herself from the city and the Elven population. Even Phaedon couldn’t seriously believe she had anything to do with the old King’s death. Mostly, she imagined, he simply wanted the Druids out of the way while he went about the business of establishing himself as King.

  She knew her way around the Home Guard barracks well enough by now to come into the building through the rear entry and make her way to Sian Aresh’s office without being stopped. She stood just outside his door and listened to him speaking with another Elven Hunter, waited until the latter departed, and then stepped inside and closed the door behind her.

  “Seersha,” he said, looking up, clearly startled. “Have you lost your mind?”

  “Probably,” she answered. “Is the King still hunting for me?”