He didn’t know Lian’s position any longer, and Ammon had stayed inland as he swept westward, so he was far away from the action that was about to take place. If Lian survives being dashed against a reef, he thought darkly. Even if he lived, he might be injured beyond the ability to defend himself, and he’d need every edge against someone like Ammon.
What I wouldn’t give for the service of a dragon, even if only for a day, he thought. The great beasts of yore were nearly as fast as a gryphon, and like those dangerous feathered hybrids, didn’t tire. In the old stories elves a-dragonback could cover more than twelve hundred miles in a single day, and he could sweep ahead of Ammon, find Lian, and help defend him when the Easterner came. Or simply drop on Ammon and get the frog back from his burned corpse. The dragons had been versatile allies.
But if he had had a dragon at his disposal, he’d have caught up to Lian already anyway, and who was to say how that would have played out if Ammon had still spotted him in Avethiel. It would have been obvious that Celewyn wasn’t stalking the prince but instead aiding him, and Ammon’s plans would have been very different. One of the Wavecrest crew had a little weather magic, though his voice was not a good one, and he’d used the few spells he could sing to find the limits of the storm. They’d be able to make significant headway again in a half-day or so, and he could continue trying to catch up with Ammon and Lian. Riding along in his cabin was all Celewyn he could do.
^ ^ ^ ^ ^
By the time morning came, Lian was more certain that even their one rope would hold Indigo Runner against the tide in the cove, and he settled for doubling the rope to protect against the rock cutting through it over time. The merchantman wasn’t his property, and someone would want her back if she could be located…even if that was the sailors. He had the beginnings of a plan to try to avoid having to silence them in his mind, though it needed more work. At present, he didn’t dare trust them, but if a way could be found to ensure their loyalty, he desperately wanted to spare their lives.
Snog’s knowledge of the least Truenames of the Gods of the Inner Darkness might be part of the answer if he could offer a big enough carrot to go with that dire stick. And Indigo Runner, with a suitable new name and repaired masts, might be big enough. Sailors were superstitious, understandably so given how dangerous the seas were and how capricious Ashira, Bes, and Tysleth all were. The oath Snog had used to allow Lian to trust him early on in their relationship would be one they would not lightly break; perhaps not break at all, given how terrible the consequences were likely to be.
I might still have to kill Virinos, he thought sadly as he finished packing up what he planned to take from Qan’s cabin. The man was unstable, and the fear of the wrath of the gods might not be enough to keep him quiet about Lian, depending on his mental state at any given moment. Lian liked the man, despite the danger his half-cracked mind represented, and he didn’t relish the thought of slitting his throat. And worse, making it look like some southern monster had gotten to him.
Elowyn had once said, “Lying and murder are, all too often, the tools of statecraft, my younglings. You must set the needs of your nation above those of your own conscience, and even what you believe to be your own honor, for your honor revolves around Dunshor’s needs, not your own. Lie if you must; kill if you must; even betray if you must. But these deeds must always serve Dunshor, for once you do those things for your own benefit you have become no different than any petty tyrant in some oppressed little barony in the western kingdoms.”
Radiel, who’d been present for this lesson, had nodded and said, “Never my own glory, but Dunshor’s, is that what you mean?”
Elowyn had snorted and grimaced. “That’s Alec’s teaching, to be about glory, but yes, it holds for glory as well as truth and honor. ‘For Dunshor’ must be in your thoughts at all times.” The then-eight-year-old Lian and Radiel had both nodded solemnly, not really understanding, but committing the Old Elf’s teachings to memory as they always did.
Now, Lian found that he did understand, and his misgivings about murdering Virinos, or all four sailors if need be, would not stop him from doing his duty to the kingdom. To a point, Lian thought to himself as he carefully folded and stored the rest of Qan’s charts in their waterproof containers. I think if I’m willing to go too far, I’ll be that petty despot Elowyn talked about, even if I lie to myself that what I’m doing is for Dunshor’s own good.
He suspected that Snog and Lord Grey wouldn’t agree with him on that topic but that Gem would, and he longed for his father Evan’s counsel, or Elowyn’s—though he knew the elf’s opinion already on the matter. He ached, as well, to see Elowyn and his family alive again with emotions so strong that he couldn’t fight them off. The long fight against the storm and the long flight from his uncle’s assassins had exhausted him, and he couldn’t contain it any longer.
Stumbling to the door, he made sure it was firmly locked before he knelt before Qan’s bunk to weep. At Gem’s soft insistence, he’d levered himself into the bunk before crying himself back to sleep, her gentle thrum soothing him as best she could. It was late afternoon before Lian awoke again, the catharsis of his weeping having lowered his grief to a tolerable level. When he ventured out of the cabin after cleaning himself up, he found the men, including Snog, lazing about in various pursuits.
Most of them, Snog told him softly, had slept as well after the physical labor of running another longline to shore and tying it about the boulder. They were all exhausted, and none of them had begrudged their captain an extra few hours of rest. Lian nodded to his goblin friend and then announced to the crew that they’d set out overland in the morning. He’d prepared lists of supplies and provisions they’d need and tasked Naryn and Virinos—who so far had not noticed he was being drugged from time to time—with making sure the men gathered everything asked for. Naryn, being the better reader and the ship’s part-time quartermaster besides, was put in charge. Vir didn’t seem to care that he wasn’t, as had become usual, in charge. He knew he didn’t read very well and that Naryn was much better getting supplies organized for their trek across the Vellan continent.
None of the men appeared to shirk this duty, since none of them really knew what to expect on their land voyage. Lian had been a mercenary officer with Searcher, and they assumed that meant extensive command experience. (That this was reinforced by Snog’s stories, Lian wasn’t directly aware.) And he was no doubt well trained as a military officer by the king’s best teachers, so their confidence was high in their new leader. At least for now, Lian thought. When things got desperate, and they would no doubt get desperate, that might change.
None of the men had demanded they stay with Indigo Runner, though Lian shouldn’t have been surprised. They all knew Lian wouldn’t just take up residence on the ship forever, and none of them were willing to be separated from the two “Master” magicians that Lian carried. Vir was the most terrified of a resumed wraith attack, but none of the four had forgotten what she’d done to their shipmates.
In seeking Lian, in their minds, she’d probably track the merchantman first, and woe betide anyone foolish enough to have been left behind! The safest place, by far, was near Lian and the two spellsingers. He was afraid, however, that being near him wasn’t safe at all.
Chapter Twenty Seven
“Although the layman might believe that many different species of dragons exist, in truth there are but three: the night-colored land drakes, the blue and green sea drakes, and the winged true dragons, who have been seen in as many different colors as can be imagined.
“It is also believed that the Eternal Empire had mastery of all three types of the great beasts, but this is also untrue. Great elven wizards could influence land and sea drakes and make them attack their enemies, but that control was soft and unreliable, and in Dw’ell’n Marieda, the great elven sage Evoryn recorded that the drakes could turn on their presumed masters without warning.
“Finally, it is believed that the elves controlled the
sky dragons, and this is the most laughable of all of the layman’s assumptions. No one can control an adult dragon, and fool would he be to try. No, the Eternal Empire had befriended the dragons of the sky, by means none living know, and they served the Emperor not out of fear, but in love.”
-- from “Dragonfire,” by Sage Alionur, 1507 PE
The terrain below had become sparse with vegetation as Ammon had flown west, breaking into a large plain of basalt where lichen and mosses grew and little else. The weather after the storm had remained exceptionally clear, and from height he could see a huge curved region of volcanic rock that had apparently flowed from inland to the sea. It had changed direction several times as it flowed, giving it a serpentine look, though no serpent ever seen was seventy miles wide and hundreds of miles long.
He could imagine what it looked like in the distant past, when red-hot rock had flowed slowly but inexorably over everything in its path, and he’d never seen anything remotely like it in scale and desolation. Entire nations might have once lain underneath the countless tons of black basalt below him, so great was the area of the stupendous flow. The sulfur must have choked the entire continent, he thought, for he’d once chased a foe to the summit of an active volcano and very nearly been overcome by the harsh sulfurous fumes.
There was a three-dimensional structure to the lava that he could see from the air, but he couldn’t puzzle out the meaning. In places, it looked like the lava had criss-crossed its own surface, piling up in layers and ropes of rock, while in others, it was smooth and almost featureless. Once, it looked like some ancient race had carved it, for he flew over—and curiosity forced him to land on—large polygons of long-cooled lava which stood interlocked at dozens of different levels. He stood for a while in awe of the mysterious field of multi-sided pillars. The purpose of these carvings—for that was what he supposed they must be—was impossible to determine, and the field was massive, over twenty square miles in size, so it must have been the work of hundreds of craftsmen over many years. Despite examining some of the pillars quite closely, he couldn’t make out any tool marks upon them, but he supposed they must have worn away over the long centuries since this desolate monument was carved.
He took the opportunity to rest and to take a bearing on the prince, so the stop wasn’t completely a waste of time. He smiled as he noted that Lian was northwest; from the change in bearing and the time he’d been flying, he was no more than eighty miles away from his quarry now. Even better, they were many hundreds of miles west of Wavecrest’s furthest possible progress, and it would be a week at the least before Celewyn could reach them, if the elven assassin could even find Lian now without the frog, that was.
It was a huge ocean and a huge continent, and it would be easier to find a needle in a haystack, Ammon suspected, than to find Lian. The storm might have blown him anywhere, and the Avani had no way of knowing it had driven Indigo Runner and the prince due south. Stop worrying about the elf, he reminded himself, though it was difficult to do so. Celewyn’s speed and deadly skill had surprised and appalled him. He was unused to feeling physically threatened, and he didn’t like it any better from the elf than he had from the vampiress.
It’s too bad I haven’t got time to let Lian reach the lava field, the Easterner considered. He’d be hard-pressed to find shelter or hide his presence crossing this wasteland. But the strange polygon field of pillars—or were they steps? he pondered—was on the westernmost edge of the massive flow and it might take Lian a week to reach it.
No, I need to finish this journey to find Lian, take account of his surroundings, and act, he thought. Unless it’s a double-canopied jungle, he won’t be hard to spot from the air. That was especially true because of the frog.
He took to the air again, leaving the plain of lava behind him, though he noted that many of the rocks and outcroppings to the west were also volcanic. Not surprising, given that the continent was named for the god of volcanoes. It was only a short while longer than an hour before he landed again on a tall cliff that overlooked the ocean. The wind here was a lot stronger, a feature of the shape of the cliffs, he thought, and he had to concentrate carefully to land safely.
He quickly found a depression in the lee of the wind where he could take another bearing, and he looked upon the bobbing cork with pleasure. Lian’s path was now directly along the shoreline, for Ammon had set his course as close to north-by-northwest as he could. A few hours and he’ll approach along this long beachhead, Ammon guessed, unless he has to move inland to bypass an obstruction. Although the beach below and to the west of him was almost entirely flat sand with a few low black rock outcroppings that could be walked over or easily gone around, the coastline to the west might have cliffs or obstacles the prince would be forced to avoid.
He lay down on the grassy cliff top and began to watch for his prey. If he didn’t appear when Ammon predicted, he’d take a new bearing and hunt him down another way, but that soon proved unnecessary.
Six figures, and one of them half-size, Ammon thought excitedly as he spotted them rounding a rise of sand and rock. The smaller one had a slightly bow-legged gait, and that usually meant goblin, or possibly a rare human dwarf. He didn’t move like a true dwarf, that was clear.
He had a good description of “Alan,” as the Searcher’s crew had known him, and in another thirty minutes or so the party grew close enough to see that this person was present. He wasn’t sure how Lian had maintained this illusion for so long, nor why he would bother out in the wilderness. The smaller figure was also almost certainly a goblin and not a small human, making it much more likely that the man below was the one he was seeking.
The men with him must not know who he really is, the wizard-assassin thought as he pulled his thin beard thoughtfully. It’s the only reason to bother maintaining the illusion all this time. Lian clearly had some magical mechanism at his disposal that spun and maintained the illusion, for he hadn’t hired a wizard in Avethiel, and the Searcher’s men had been certain that Snog, although touched by magical ability, was no true wizard.
He had questioned the men in the elven city using his preferred methods, songs that created gentle enchantments that mesmerized the subject, encouraging them to be helpful and talkative and then left them with no clear memory of the event, but he had reached limits to how much information he could gain from the mercenaries. He could have used some of the powerful compulsion spells he knew, true, and forced the men and goblins from the warship to answer his questions. If he had, however, it would be remembered and marked, for it was nearly impossible to cloud a subject’s mind after such a strong—and usually terrifying—enchantment.
His only choice in that instance would be to kill the ones he questioned, and he might have risked such a blatant and obvious move had Celewyn not also been stalking the streets and taverns of the elven city. Slaying Lian’s former companions would have raised alarms and suspicion. Although the mercenaries couldn’t have warned Lian, who by that time had already left port, it would have put the Avani assassin on his guard.
“Shaman’s apprentice,” the two big goblin brothers had told him, unwilling even under the strongest enchantment he dared to reveal any more about their distant kinsman. The goblin healer had earned his place among the crew, and the Searcher’s company valued loyalty.
Perhaps that was why Ylen had no longer been with them, because that man was more than willing to talk about his ship and his former shipmates. It had taken little drink and coin to pry the gross details from the man, and when the dour little navigator had gotten drunk only mild magical encouragement to entice him to tell the Easterner all he needed to know.
Although it was highly unlikely Ylen represented a danger to Ammon’s objectives, he’d lured the man behind the filthy little Island Kingdom tavern he found him in. He’d then slit the man’s throat, for Ylen was the only link between Mola and Alan who wasn’t dead or still aboard Searcher. No matter how Ammon would have clouded his mind, Ylen would remember the strange
r asking such pointed questions. Unpleasant and disagreeable Ylen might be, but he was a first-rate navigator and his mind was sharp. He might have—likely would have—decided that the information Ammon had been so interested in obtaining might have value to others, and that Ammon could not permit.
Ammon pondered the small band walking up the beach toward him. If they’re just sailors or mercenaries, I can handle them even in a direct fight, Ammon thought. But if one of them has any Witchblood, even just enough for hedge wizardry, it might get chancy with so many. Obviously, none of them are vampires, since they’re moving about in broad daylight, but that doesn’t make them benign, or even human, not by a long shot. He snorted at himself for thinking about vampires at such a time, but he supposed it wasn’t surprising. He’d been this close—even closer—to his target before, when Sileth of the Silks had swept out of the darkness to tear out his throat. She had been much on his mind during his recovery. But even the most ancient and powerful vampires, so far from their homeland, couldn’t stand the full light of day for this long without shelter of some kind.
As the men drew closer, Ammon hummed his unseeing spell. It was unlikely any of them was sharp-eyed enough to pick him out of the grasses and rocks of this cliff face, but he wasn’t one to take unnecessary chances this close to the payoff. He’d invested nearly six months in this enterprise, suffered mightily for it, and taken a great deal of risk to get this far. He wasn’t about to make a mistake now!
The shadows of the six figures were striding nearly twenty feet in front of them, for it was close to evening, and they broke inland to the shelter of an eroded basalt outcropping. Clearly, the waterline had shifted over the years, for it was well above even the full-tide mark despite having once been in reach of the waves. They gathered driftwood to build a fire, luck of the draw placing them in view of the silently watching assassin, instead of making camp on the obverse side. One of the larger men lit the fire with what looked to be a coalstone and proceeded to assemble an odd-looking triangular metal frame over the fire. After a moment’s consternation, Ammon realized it was a grill, once the man placed some sort of food on it and began preparing supper for Lian and the others.
By Blood Hunted: Kingsblood Chronicles Part Two (The Kingsblood Chronicles Book 2) Page 38
