Catherine Coulter the Sherbrooke Series Novels 6-10 (9781101562123)

by Coulter, Catherine

  He shook his head impatiently. “Of course. I am simply as I should be here in the Pale. Just as are you.”

  His Pale counterpart, just as Isabella was hers, well, it made sense. Or an illusion, just as Sarimund had warned them about. She said, “You look like a warrior.”

  “The differences in us, we will ask Sarimund, if that no-account writer shows himself.” He felt only mildly curious at the changes in himself, and not at all alarmed. “Don’t worry. We will deal with it. We must find a red Lasis.”

  When they turned back, they saw a beautiful creature as red as the bloodred moons in the heavens standing in the cave entrance. It looked sleek, as if its coat were brushed every day, the muscles in its legs thick, its back wide, its neck long and graceful. It looked like a cross between a Shetland pony and an Arabian. Its eyes were huge in its long narrow face, a dark vivid gray, and filled with a sort of glowing light.

  The red Lasis said nothing, merely gazed at them. It had absurdly long eyelashes. Nicholas knew in that instant that the red Lasis was very vain about its long eyelashes, and he thought, Yet another small curiosity.

  He said, holding perfectly still, keeping Rosalind plastered against his side, “Are you Bifrost?”

  The red Lasis bowed his head.

  “You are the oldest red Lasis in the Pale?”

  Bifrost sang in a beautiful sweet voice,

  Yes, I am he.

  Yes, I am old.

  I came before time.

  So it is told.

  Not more poetry and bad rhymes.

  Bifrost said, “It is not such a bad rhyme. Yes, yes, I can hear your thoughts. You are harsh. Rhymes are difficult. Let us speak then in human talk.”

  Nicholas said, “Sarimund wrote you would protect us from the Tiber. But you were not here when we came into the Pale.”

  Bifrost slowly nodded. He chanted this time. “I am the only remaining red Lasis in the Pale. My mate was killed by a moon storm—” At Nicholas’s raised eyebrow, Bifrost said, “The storm comes occasionally when the three bloodred moons are full. Perhaps every thousand years or so, there is a moon storm and the moons are shoved together. There is a horrible rending noise that brings all out to see what is happening. Huge flaming spears of sheered-off moon, glowing red, fall to the ground. That time, unfortunately, one of the flaming spears killed my mate, who was standing beside a sharp-toothed angle tree. I am alone. However, the Tiber don’t know this.”

  Once in a thousand years? “When did this happen?” Rosalind asked.

  “Perhaps at the last full moon, but I doubt that can be true whenever I think about it carefully. My cousins are black and brown, a dull bunch with no imagination, always complaining, the lot of them. Even the Tiber doesn’t like to eat them, much too salty, so it is said. But the Dragons of the Sallas Pond say their meat is beyond sweet. However, the dragons do not eat meat so I wonder how they could know.

  “The Tiber still do not realize I am the only red Lasis left in the Pale. They are that stupid.

  “I came to see that you were all right, that you survived your tussle with Taranis’s son, Clandus, a spoiled little buttel, that one. You both did very well.”

  “What is a buttel?” Rosalind asked.

  The red Lasis batted his long eyelashes at her. “A buttel is a particularly noxious creature that is forever trying to make himself more important than he is. I would kill all the miserable buttel if I were not so depressed.” Bifrost dipped his head down and sighed.

  After a few moments of silence, which neither Nicholas nor Rosalind wished to break, he raised his head again and spoke with a bit more vigor. “Perhaps it was a foolish thing you did, my lord, telling Clandus he wasn’t a god, though it is quite true. A Dragon of the Sallas Pond must do great deeds to gain the state of godness.”

  Nicholas said, “Who decides whether or not to make a Dragon of the Sallas Pond a god? What can possibly be higher than a god?”

  Bifrost blinked his very long eyelashes, his head down again so both of them could better see the amazing length and thickness. “On precious occasions, a golden shell cracks open and a dragon rolls out, all tiny and wet, its wings plastered against its body. It grows quickly, hopefully in both its brain and in its body, and is then offered tasks to perform.”

  “Rather like Hercules in earth mythology?” Rosalind asked.

  Bifrost said, “I don’t know of any Hercules, all I know is that if the Dragon of the Sallas Pond is successful, he changes—both his status in the Pale and his abilities. He is able to impress his will and wishes sufficiently upon all the wizards and witches who dwell in the fortress of Blood Rock to prevent them from butchering every creature here in the Pale. I will tell you, he once controlled them easily, but now their depravity makes them stronger, more conniving. Now they occasionally try to do him harm though they pretend to worship him, to admire him. They should be thrown into the river and sucked down by the demons who rule the underrealm. My mate once tangled with an underrealm demon and survived.” Bifrost paused a moment, then looked at Nicholas. “You wonder what creature or being is above a god. There must be something, I suppose, else how do the Dragons of the Sallas Pond know what tasks to perform? Who judges them? I shall contemplate this mystery in those moments when I am not mourning the loss of my mate.

  “Now Clandus is offended and has doubtless flown back to his cliff to huddle next to a fire in his mother’s cave, his wings spread, naturally, to protect his fire from the flying creatures. It will be interesting to see what Taranis does after Clandus whines in his ear about how loathsome you and the mistress are. Taranis hates sulking, and that is what Clandus is doing right at this moment.”

  “I hope that a father dragon disciplines the son by smiting him hard with his tail,” Nicholas said.

  The red Lasis bowed his head in agreement, his thick lashes fluttering. They heard his deep voice, amused now. “It seems like only yesterday that Taranis and I wagered about your coming and what would happen. But again, my mate’s death seems such a short time ago as well.

  “I have waited for you, my lord, and you, mistress. It is a strange thing to see you, mistress, as a woman and not the small girl whose face Sarimund placed in my mind. As for you, my lord, you are yourself and yet also the boy.

  “And there is Epona, a witch who is vicious to her soul, though I do not know if she has a soul; probably not. She kills cleanly, no madness for gore in her. There is not a wizard in Blood Rock who isn’t afraid of her, or, at the same time, who doesn’t admire her immensely. She is very dangerous, my lord. I pray you will not forget that.”

  Rosalind said, “But she wanted Sarimund.”

  “That is so.”

  “Because he is so beautiful?” Rosalind asked.

  “That is so as well.”

  “What is your wager with Taranis?” Rosalind asked.

  “Taranis wagered you wouldn’t come, mistress, that the passage of time had distorted what should happen, but you are here. You are very powerful, both of you. I wagered you would come, that you would save Prince Egan, that my lord would indeed pay his debt to you, for both your lines are powerful.”

  Rosalind asked, “What was your prize if you won the wager with Taranis?”

  “Taranis swore to intercede for me with the wizard Belenus. He is more powerful than he should be, Belenus is, with his big white teeth. The fiend cursed me to shepherd about the occasional magician who found his way to the Pale. He laughed, said since my mate was dead I had more than enough time to see that the few straggling humans who wander into the Pale do not end up Tiber victuals.”

  “What did you do to bring down Belenus’s curse?” Nicholas asked.

  “He did not come to my mate’s interment. My grief was great, and so was my anger. I sent an army of black snails to invade his living quarters on Blood Rock. They naturally found their way into his bed to sleep with him at night. Belenus cursed me for it. And so I have protected the pathetic magicians who have come here for a very long time n
ow, surely a millennium. Perhaps.

  “At last you have come, both of you. Mistress, I watched you save his lordship by breaking off a yellow Sillow branch and striking Clandus with it. My lovely eyelashes thickened with the excitement of witnessing what you did so naturally, without a human’s infernal questioning or doubts. I was convinced at that point that you were the two predicted to come to the Pale, even more so when his lordship reattached the branch to the yellow Sillow tree. I have seen that done only once in my life. By Epona. Ah, but withal, I must make certain you are indeed what you say you are.” He stopped and suddenly opened his mouth and sang to the three blood moons in a beautiful baritone:

  I dream of beauty and sightless night

  I dream of strength and fevered might

  I dream I’m not alone again

  But I know of his death and her grievous sin.

  Without hesitation, Rosalind sang back to him, joyously, her beautiful voice filling the silent Pale night:

  I was small and I was weak

  He left me broken, without a name

  But I lived and now I seek

  What to do to end the game.

  “Ah,” said Bifrost, “it is time for you to ride Taranis, the Dragon of the Sallas Pond, to the fortress on Blood Rock.”

  He fluttered his eyelashes at them again, then simply faded into the cave wall.

  Rosalind called out, “No! Wait, come back here. Where is Sarimund?”

  There was only silence. The red Lasis was gone.

  They stood inside the cave opening, looking out beyond the river in the distance, at the far end of a vast flat plain to Mount Olyvan, and at its peak the dark brooding fortress of Blood Rock that speared up toward the moons.

  They heard a scuffle, panting, grunts. Suddenly standing before them was Sarimund, and he seemed to shimmer, his golden hair brilliant beneath the bloodred moons. He muttered, “Ah, you are here,” and he gave them a beautiful smile.

  Rosalind stepped up to the beautiful man who looked like an angel. “I first saw you in a vision. You were stirring a pot. You told me I would be with you soon.”

  “And here you are, my beauty. Here you are. Ah, to see you as a woman grown.”

  “Are you my father?”

  “I? Certainly not, but I will say that I have held you close for a very long time, the spirit of you, the promise of you. Now I am here and let me tell you it was difficult. Although Bifrost believed you would come, Taranis did not. He believed I had failed, that too much earth time had passed, but you are here and that proves that I did not.” He cupped graceful hands beside his mouth and shouted, “Do you hear me, Taranis? I have succeeded. I am the bringer of peace—”

  “—and destruction,” Nicholas said. “That is what you told her.”

  “Yes, both she and I are the bringers of peace and destruction.”

  “Are you speaking to us, in English, or are you thinking all of this to us?”

  “I speak beautiful English.”

  “But it is modern English you are speaking,” Rosalind said.

  “Even a dumb beast like the Tiber keeps abreast of things. His English is halting, but the grammar is well nigh perfect, which surprises me since he has the brain of a fig.

  “You have met Bifrost, known as the Scholar. He was hollowed out when his mate was killed in a moon storm so long ago. Everything lasts for a very long time in the Pale, affections included.”

  “Where is the Pale?” Nicholas asked.

  Sarimund studied Nicholas’s face. “The Pale is as close as those three bloodred moons above our heads, yet it is apart, a study in contrasts. But it is as real as an eternal dream. Am I not real? Am I not standing here before you? Do you not see me? Am I not speaking to you?”

  “You could be another specter like Captain Jared,” Nicholas said.

  “His is not idle curiosity, Sarimund,” Rosalind said, lightly touching his arm, a very real arm, the muscles rippling beneath her fingers. Whatever he was, he was no specter. “Listen, we are here because you brought us here. You set this all into motion almost three hundred years ago when you convinced Captain Jared that he owed the little girl the debt, didn’t you?”

  “Yes.”

  “Did you really bring a storm to destroy Captain Jared’s ship, or was it all an elaborate illusion?”

  He made a choked noise in his throat and his golden hair lifted, very nearly standing on end. “The little girl had no bite to her, no impertinent questions for a wizard, but you, the woman, do,” he said, now visibly calming himself. “I am more powerful than you can begin to imagine, I can whip the skies into a froth of madness, I can—”

  “Yes, yes,” she said. “Then you wrote the Rules of the Pale and prayed I would find it, somehow, so everything would be in motion.”

  “No, I did not pray; a wizard casts his spells, and waits to see them unfold. And waits. And watches. And guides. Of course you found it.”

  “Well, yes, I suppose you did that right, though you were a bit on the late side. And you finally released the final pages for me to read, but still that last page was stark white and perfectly blank. I only realized a little while ago that you had written Prince Egan’s name on that page.”

  Nicholas said, “You planned for the little girl to come to the Pale, but she didn’t come because it wasn’t yet her time. Nearly three hundred years passed before she came, not a little girl, but a woman.”

  Sarimund said, “I know. It has driven me quite mad to know I was so very wrong in my calculations.”

  Nicholas said, “How could this be? Why did you want her in the first place?”

  “After I left the Pale, wondering if Epona had indeed birthed my son, Taranis visited me in my dreams one night. He dreamed to me that Epona would kill our son—Prince Egan—because she’d somehow divined what he, the man, would become. Taranis said I had to stop her or the Pale would be thrown into incredible chaos, and he didn’t know if he would be able to fix it. He said there was no wizard, no witch, no creature here in the Pale to help me so I must rely on humans. What could a human do, I asked in my dream back to him. He puffed out a whiff of flame and I swear to you I felt a sting of heat. He told me I was a wizard and a human, wasn’t I, and I awoke. He was right, and so I settled into my wizard’s brain and cast about for other witches and wizards on earth as strong as I. I found two separate, very powerful wizard lines that stretched back into time, meeting at one point back in the times of the Crusades. One was the Vail line. In my time your powerful line was represented by Jared Vail, a ship captain then, but not simple. He was brave, many times too brave. Ah, he was filled with strength, but being human, living in your constricted civilized world, he did not realize what he really was. I knew then that Jared Vail was the one. And you were there in my mind, Isabella, in the same time, representing your powerful line, and you were so clear, so strong, so very magic. I knew that both of you would be successful.”

  She said, “You saw the little girl. Why would you believe a little girl would have a better chance of saving Prince Egan than a grown woman, namely me?”

  “The little girl was a light so bright no evil could touch her. She saw everything clearly, she could not be deceived by either magic or evil. But now? Is your light still as bright, your eyes as clear? Is the little girl still burning bright inside you? We will see.”

  “What does that mean—we will see?” Nicholas asked. “You’re telling us you do not know?”

  “Now is now, even though in the Pale, the present can bleed into the future or shrink into the past, though time itself is not really a factor, and thus I cannot know what will happen.”

  Nicholas looked angry enough to strike Sarimund.

  Rosalind said, “When the child didn’t come, why didn’t Epona kill your son?”

  “The point of the spell was to stay her hand until you arrived, Isabella, until you could come to the Pale to save him.”

  Nicholas said slowly, “You froze time?”

  “That is a crude
way of saying it, but yes, Egan has remained a little boy. When you save him, Isabella, he will become the man, the great wizard ruler he was meant to be.”

  Rosalind said quickly, “There is a problem, however. I don’t know who I am so I cannot know what the little girl was and how her strengths would aid—” She stopped dead in her tracks. She stared from Sarimund to Nicholas and back again. Sarimund smiled at her and slowly nodded. She swallowed. Then she gave them a brilliant smile. “My name is Isabella Contadini. I was born in San Savaro, Italy, in 1817.”

  “And your name is the same as it was then in Captain Jared Vail’s time,” Sarimund said, then leaned forward and kissed her forehead.

  48

  Sarimund gave her a graceful bow. “Yes, your birth was greeted with great celebration, Isabella. You already had an older brother, you see, so the heir to the duchy was secure.”

  “Duchy?” Nicholas asked, an eyebrow raised.

  Rosalind grinned up at her husband. “Oh, dear, Nicholas, I fear you’re not of high enough rank to have married me.”

  “Tell him who you are, my dear,” Sarimund said.

  “I was born to Duca Gabriele and Duchessa Elizabeth Contadini. My mother is English, daughter of the Duke of Wrothbridge, and she married my father when she was seventeen years old—my father was visiting London as a young man, saw her riding in Hyde Park, and wanted to marry her, and so they married two months later. I loved hearing that story, nearly every night I asked my mother to tell me of it after she had shooed away my nanny to kiss me good night.” She paused a moment, and a spasm of pain crossed her face. “My mother,” she said again, and pictured her glossy red hair, the way she’d felt her heartbeat when she held her close against her, how she smelled, of violets, she remembered now. My mother. Over the past ten years, she’d wondered, usually in the deep of night, if she had a mother, if she was alive and thinking of her, wondering where she was, and Rosalind would cry at the pain of both of them.