“I’m sorry,” he said softly, lamely, and then he ran.
The brownies led him around so many corners at such a breakneck, nonstop pace, that he hadn’t a clue where he was being led until he burst through a doorway and into an open-air garden, a copse of trees topping a shallow slope, down which a brook babbled its cheery way to a large pool easily deep enough for both swimming and diving. He saw a rich field of grass, broken at intervals by plots of flowers, artfully arranged in terms of color and composition to delight all the primary senses. Yet there was no sense of formality to the setting, no hint of a master plan; it was more along the line of design by improvisation.
He took a step into the open, and as quickly ducked back beneath the shelter of the doorway arch as a great winged shadow swept across the scene. The Night Heron pivoted on one wing, extending its legs as it straightened to catch the topmost branches. Thorn had withdrawn as deeply into the shadows as could be managed yet was equally as sure that the heron could see him perfectly. It tossed him the barest glance, head cocked to the side at a slight angle in a manner that was disconcertingly reminiscent of a praying mantis sizing up her prey. There was intelligence in its gaze but one that was alien to human comprehension.
He sensed Elora before he saw her—from the moment of their first meeting, the old awareness, dormant for more than a decade, had reasserted itself—and knew the same held true in return. She may not understand the feeling, but it would be there just the same, growing in strength with every sight of him, as would his in return. He almost broke cover when she strode toward the tree and actually clutched his heart when the heron dropped down to her. She smiled a greeting of delight and it butted its head against her like a favored companion. It made a noise that, to him, was worse than claws scratching down a windowpane but that left her laughing. Then, both looked toward his hiding place. One hand raised to point, two mouths opened, two throats uttered an unearthly wail.
He hammered open the door behind him with his shoulder and stagger-stumbled down a flight of spiral stairs.
“Rool!” he called. “Franjean! Show me the proper way!”
They cannot help you, smalling.
The wall ahead was gone, replaced by a darkness that was beyond absolute.
“Drumheller!” Rool, beckoning from the far end of the corridor, eyes wide and white as he stared at the absolute blackness that had consumed the wall opposite. Thorn almost started a reflexive retreat to place his back against a wall all his own, until he realized that could just as easily turn phantom.
You have little time.
“What are you?”
Salvation? There was amusement in the reply and the sense that both word and concept were foreign to the speaker.
He blinked, vision distorting, splintering, presenting him with bodies in purposeful motion, winding their way down stairs that never seemed to end, path lit by torches that gave the scene an air of menace. With an effort, he broke the link the Other had forged between them.
“The dungeon!” he said, tremble to his body but strangely none to his voice; in all the years since his InSight manifested itself, he’d always been the one to initiate contact. Losing that control was bad enough, but the ease with which it had been taken terrified him.
They come for you, and you they must find, as you were left, else you are lost.
“Franjean,” he snapped, looking around for his companions, “Rool, we have to go!”
Neither would budge. They kept their distance.
“Drumheller,” Rool called, “the SoulEater! That’s a Demon!”
You think I don’t know that? he shrieked in the sanctity of his own thoughts. Its presence overwhelmed his every sense, physical and beyond, as though he stood between charnel pits, viewing both the newly dead and those aswim in their own rot, with souls all turned to sharks, their teeth eagerly rending him to the bare bones.
He sensed laughter and to his horror found that image reflected back at him.
Not so awful as once I was.
“Get away, foulness, leave me be!” His inner wards were all in place, his defenses as formidable as they ever were, yet this monstrosity made a mockery of them all.
That I cannot do. Hide you may from those who search above, but only I can deliver you from those below.
“I’ll take my chances.”
Are you so great a fool, then?
“Far greater, to trust the likes of you.”
The corridor changed around him, and he physically flinched to behold a horde of Daikini thundering toward him. There was time to make out the captain who’d imprisoned him, and a woman all in white, who had to be the Princess Anakerie, and a much older man so tall he had to stoop his head at every doorway. At his heel, unchained and obedient as any household puppy, trotted a Death Dog. An eyeblink later they were on him, two sets of ghosts passing in the night, with only the hound aware something was amiss. It paused and looked about, uttering a whining growl that signaled its alarm. The man took no notice and brought the beast back to him with a snap of the fingers.
Decide, the Demon said, there is not time to ask again.
He felt a sharp sting against his thigh, looked down to find Rool beside him, his blade dark with Thorn’s own blood. The brownie was visibly shaking; not even up on the Scar, when they’d faced the hunting pack of Death Dogs—not in all the years they’d traveled together—had Thorn seen his friend so afraid. Nor seen such evidence of how close the bonds of that friendship had tied them.
“It is a SoulEater, Drumheller,” Rool keened, as if by words alone he could ensorcel the Nelwyn to safety. “Its every pledge is false, every word a trap! For all our sakes, come away!”
“For all our sakes, Rool, I don’t dare.”
The words came unbidden, the thought from nowhere, as though his own soul had taken momentary charge of his brain and dictated what was to come next. There wasn’t a single reason to trust the Demon, a lifetime of stories telling him to do precisely the opposite.
He heard the brownie cry out as he plunged forward into the darkness…
…and then he found himself back in the cell.
His glowing stones lay before him on the floor, where he’d scattered them, with the wall and manacles just beyond.
He turned, looking back the way he came, not sure what he’d see but expecting the very worst.
Only darkness, though, as absolute and unknowable as it had been before.
Be quick, mage, he heard, and he was.
He blew on his stones to cool them and stuffed them back into his pouch. In the far distance he could hear the sound of boots on stone, the chink of mail and harness, that heralded the approach of his jailers; moreover, he could sense the sharp, conflicting emotions of the Death Dog. It had caught his scent and was eager for his blood. At the same time, though, it was aware of another presence in these ancient halls, that raised the hackles on its muscular neck and made it bare its teeth in fear.
Leg shackles closed easily. Only after that was done and he was truly locked in place did the thought manifest itself that this might be some deception, to deliver himself willingly and completely into the hands of enemies.
“Somehow,” he said aloud, in part to hear a friendly voice, “I don’t believe so.” And snapped shut a manacle over his wrist.
Another inspiration, as unexpected and mysterious as the impulse to trust the Demon, prompted his free hand to his waist. With swift, sure movements—no mistakes, no hesitation, because neither could be afforded—he yanked belt free from buckle and swung it, complete with his precious pouches, as far from him into the darkness as he could manage.
The Death Dog had slipped past its master, ignoring shouts of alarm and a peremptory snap of the fingers as it uttered its gobbling hunting cry and scrambled for the cell. The beasts didn’t understand fear; of all emotions, this was the one guaranteed to make them most crazy. Where any other being with a
smidgen of sense would tuck tail between legs and flee, Death Dogs by contrast always attacked. The greater the perceived threat, the more ferocious the charge.
Thorn hissed in frustration. His fingers were too short, he couldn’t manage a decent grip even with his nails on the cuff to latch it closed. He cast all awareness of the approaching hound from his mind, and sent a small charge of energy the length of his arm and into the chain. Faint crackles of blue fire popped from one flat piece of iron across to the other. But nothing else happened. Sweat ran into his eyes, as though he’d suddenly placed himself before one of the cook hearths in the palace kitchen, blazing hot enough to shape raw steel. The crackles weren’t faint anymore, and the Death Dog had almost reached him.
He heard a snap, and a modest roll of thunder; his eyes registered the sizzling afterimage of a bolt of lightning that had split the air between the halves of the manacle, now closed. He blinked again and saw something dark and blurry appear atop the stairs. It wouldn’t stay still, swaying from side to side, then dipping down, forepaws scrabbling in frustration, as though it wanted to leap down and rend him to bloody, broken bits but didn’t dare. The noises it made were nothing like any honest hound, not bark nor growl nor whine; it was a kind of burble, as though it was talking underwater, pitched higher than the shriek of boiling steam out a whistle, a tone that set his own nerves to screaming in sympathy. He set his head against the wall behind him, in the vain hope that its coolness would whirl away the sweat his exertions had drawn from his skin, and closed his eyes to shut the Death Dog away as well.
When he opened them again, he had company. The full complement of his inquisitors had arrived.
“So, Peck,” the tall Daikini said with a smile, predator to prey, “what do you have to say for yourself?”
He was backlit by torches, so that most of the cut perfection of his face was defined by savage planes and hollows and only his teeth could be clearly seen, but Thorn recognized stance and harness as the man who’d ridden beside Anakerie on the esplanade and assumed him to be the Maizan warlord, their Castellan.
“My lord,” was Thorn’s reply in desperate protest, playing innocence with confusion and no little fear, “there’s been some mistake.”
He never saw the glove, the motion was too sudden, too fast. He barely sensed movement before feeling the sting of leather across his cheek. Wasn’t meant to hurt, this was more the reminder given by a parent to a willful child, to pay attention and behave. Worse would come later.
“Wrong answer, Peck,” the man said to him, in that same light, cultured tone.
“Forgive me, lord. What answer would my lord prefer?”
He heard a chuckle from the background, a figure blocked from view by the body of the man. At the same time he was raging furiously at himself within. Too much spirit, too openly displayed, major mistake. He wondered how much it would cost him.
The glove slapped against the other cheek, no harder than before.
“Are you going to be difficult, Peck?”
“Leave him to me, my lord Castellan—” began the captain.
“Would you like that?” A simple question, ostensibly directed at Thorn, but it was the captain who began to sweat, regretting to the pit of his soul that he’d ever opened his mouth and drawn attention to himself. Thorn said not a word, hoping silence would be interpreted as terror.
Nervously he licked his lips, casting a furtive flash of the eyes toward the Death Dog; quick as he was, the hound caught his gaze and bared teeth in a hungry snarl, jaws closing with an audible snap. The beast wouldn’t stay still; he’d noted that from the start, and it wasn’t due to its high-strung nature. It sensed the other presence in the cell, even if its humans did not, too faint a wisp to prompt an attack response but sufficient to put it on edge. Its claws tapped the stone like slow-rolled castanets, the rhythm broken every so often when the creature flexed them to fighting extension and scored the floor as a sword might. The captain didn’t like the sounds much; the other two didn’t appear to notice.
“My pet doesn’t like you, Peck.”
“My lord has a unique taste in pets.”
“And the Peck speaks like a born diplomatist.”
“What’s your name?” the woman asked, speaking for the first time as she stepped around the Maizan and from his shadow. There was one other person in the room, fully armed and armored, wearing the colors of the Red Lions and the chevrons of a sergeant major. He was a seasoned campaigner, he was there in case of trouble.
“Thorn Drumheller, lady.”
“Tell us of Willow.”
“I”—he swallowed extravagantly—“I’m not sure what my lady means.”
“Of course you don’t.” Her voice turned hard, its tone peremptory; she was as used to instant obedience as the warlord, yet there was as well the sense that she’d had to work far harder to earn it. She didn’t have the patience of the Maizan, or perhaps the atmosphere of the cell was affecting her as it did the Death Dog. “Willow Ufgood. Slayer of the sorceress Demon Queen Bavmorda, godfather and sworn Protector of the Sacred Princess Elora Danan. The Magus. Need I say more?”
“With all you seem to know, great lady, what need have you of me?”
The warlord’s glove again, sharp enough to sting. The reminders had turned pointed.
“Not a moment for wit, Peck,” the Castellan noted.
“I have no wit to offer, lord, believe me. Whatever you require, I wish to provide. I mean none harm, I swear it.”
“Then why are you here?”
“A question I’ve asked myself ever since I was dragged below. Lord, lady, I’ve done nothing,” he finished hurriedly, to forestall another blow.
“We are charged,” Anakerie said, and Thorn had a sudden flash of InSight that she didn’t much like Elora, “with the defense of the Realm and of the Sacred Princess.”
“I am no threat to either.”
“This is a dangerous time. Never in history have the rulers of all the Realms Beyond gathered at a human table. Prophecy says the Sacred Princess is the salvation of the Realms, the means by which they might find their way to true and lasting peace. Which is why we will allow nothing to disrupt the ceremonies. Again I ask, why have you come to Angwyn?”
“Because I’ve never been. All the world knows of your city, lady, and with the Ascension and all, this seemed like the time to visit.”
“The trooper says different,” commented the warlord. “Says you’re a Nelwyn.”
“I’ve never denied that.”
“But the Magus says he’s the only Nelwyn.”
“The Magus is mistaken.”
Another slap.
“You arguing, Peck?”
“Forgive me, lord, but you are misinformed.”
“You know the Magus?”
“Lord?”
“Don’t be so tedious, Peck, you said you could help with the search.”
“I knew him when he was a farmer, lord.”
“Ah. In the days of his humble origins. A while ago, you must confess. Hardly of use today.”
“I have no idea, lord, what would or would not be of use. I thought only of Elora Danan—”
There was no gentleness to this blow, the glove cracked his skin like a whip and he tasted blood at the corner of his mouth, where the skin had been gashed on a tooth.
“Forgive me, lord,” he said quickly, “I mean no disrespect. I thought only to offer service to the Sacred Princess Elora, as my people had in years past. Where’s the harm in that?”
“The Magus spins a different tale,” Anakerie told him in her flat, cold voice, a prosecutor standing before the dock, hammering out the indictment for the jury, “of Nelwyns allied with the darkest of powers, of murder in the night, the foul betrayal of those who loved and trusted them. Because of them, Tir Asleen is no more. Did you think, because Angwyn is half a world away, none would hear the truth?”
“That is no truth, lady.”
“You call the Magus a liar?”
“I know what I know.”
“That’s why we’re here, Peck.” The Maizan’s smile broadened and Thorn braced himself for what was to come. “So we can learn what you know, learn all you know. You may have beguiled the boy; we’re made of sterner stuff.”
“Shall I order the implements of interrogation made ready, dread lord?” asked the captain.
“We require answers, dolt,” snapped Anakerie, “not a bloodbath.” She wasn’t at all pleased with the captain for directing his every question to the warlord.
“I think,” the warlord said, “this circumstance requires my lady’s special talents. Consider yourself dismissed, Captain, with our thanks for a job well done. If we’ve need of your…toys, you’ll be so informed.”
“As my lord commands.”
The captain was scrambling up the stairs as the words tumbled from his mouth, rending all sense of propriety in his haste to be away. It was only after he was actually out the door that Thorn realized the Death Dog was gone as well. The sergeant major had noted that as well and his eyes flashed from the warlord to the Princess, who responded with the merest movement of her head. Without a sound, the soldier sidestepped a few paces until his back was to the staircase wall, right beneath the entryway where the hound couldn’t easily get to him. He’d loosened his scabbard, making his sword easier to draw, and held his war ax in both hands. Thorn couldn’t help wondering, if the crunch came, who he’d go for first, the prisoner or the Maizan overlord.
“Looking for puppy, Peck?” The Maizan put his lips close to Thorn’s ear and pitched the exchange for them alone. His manner was so elegant, his voice so richly cultured, a stranger would be forgiven for assuming he was the Royal here, and Anakerie the lifelong campaigner, more at home in the field than at Court. Thorn had never felt a voice caress before; the Castellan was a spellbinder, using it with a skill most men would devote to the sword.
Shadow Moon Page 19
