Its begun, thought Braddoc. His eyes left the stage and combed the audience.
Jo pressed against the delicate iron grillwork that screened the small anteroom from the great hall. She couldn’t see beyond the backs of the first row of people. Braddoc could be anywhere out there! she thought. She could only hope she would catch sight of him as she walked up the aisle.
The squire wrapped her fingers around the metal grill- work. Her hands were perspiring from the heat of the small, crowded room, and she hoped to cool them. She glanced nervously to each side of her. Eleven other men and women were gathered with her, each wearing the same golden tunic Jo did. Most of them were young like her, though one man sported a grizzled beard. Jo wondered what had prompted him to become a squire in midlife.
In a separate cluster stood seasoned squires who were about to be promoted to knighthood: two men and three women, one obviously elven. Jo hadn’t had the nerve to approach the elf maiden, even for a simple greeting, for she admired the elven race above all others. Tonight’s ceremony was too distracting and emotionally taxing to let her overcome her shyness and approach the golden-haired, violet-eyed beauty.
Jo furtively watched the soon-to-be knights, who were talking quietly among themselves. Some were trying to feign nonchalance, but Jo sensed their excitement nevertheless. They’re about to become knights in the Order of the Three Suns! Jo thought, then caught one of the women trying to surreptitiously rub a tarnished spot from her armor. Jo smiled. Unlike the squires, who had already been given their golden tunics, the knights would receive their midnight-blue tunics from Baroness Penhaligon herself. The tarnish will never show then, Jo thought charitably.
Trumpets sounded then, and Jo turned back around and pressed against the grillwork. Beside her, a young man did the same, and Jo glanced at him. She blushed and averted her eyes immediately when she saw that he was looking at her. “Hello,” said Colyn Madcomb, the squire who had opened the door for Jo in the practice courtyard a week ago.
Jo blushed, unable to say anything to the young man with the merry eyes. She couldn’t help noticing that his eyes were an interesting combination of green and brown, and that they were framed by black, curly lashes.
The trumpeters finished their introductory theme, a fanfare that had been used since the beginning of Penhaligon s days as a court. The people responded by slowly quieting. Baroness Penhaligon regally stood and began to speak, her voice echoing through the great hall. Jo strained to see past the people still moving about in the hall, but she lost sight of the dais. She would have to be patient: she and the other initiates weren’t allowed into the great hall until a page opened the door and escorted them to the council area.
“Gentle folk, commoners and royals alike,” rang Arteris s voice, “welcome, one and all.” Arteris paused while the audience erupted in the traditional cheer of greeting.
“In the tradition of our forebears,” the baroness continued, “tonight we celebrate the initiation of those who have been found worthy to join the Order of the Three Suns. . . .”
Jo rubbed her sweaty hands on the legs of her trousers, then fidgeted with the collar of her tunic. Her thoughts drifted away, and she remembered Flinn telling her he believed she would one day become a knight in the order. His words and manner had been filled with such earnestness, such faith, that Jo had believed him with all her heart. It had been the first time since her parents had sent her away and betrayed her that she had believed anyone so fully.
Oh, Flinn! Jo’s heart cried. I have such doubts! How I wish you were here! Once again, the words have faith entered Jos mind. She smiled sadly and put her hand on Wyrmblight. “I’ll try,” she whispered, “but it s so hard without you.”
Then suddenly the door opened and a young woman poked her head inside. “It’s time for the squires,” the page said. “The castellan will announce your name shortly— begin walking down the aisle at the pace he taught you.” The page smiled sweetly and held open the door.
Jo’s heart thudded, and she barely heard Sir Graybow announce to the audience in the great hall, “We have found twelve persons worthy to become squires in the Order of the Three Suns.” Listen, girl! Jo admonished herself. It’ll never do to miss your name!
Sir Graybow called out, “Colvn Madcomb, from Greenheight in the County of Vyalia, now squire to Madam Francys Astwood. We bid you welcome to Penhaligon ” The young man with the merry eyes flushed and stepped out onto the velvet-strewn aisle. Jo clenched her hands.
Moments passed slowly, agonizingly, while Squire Madcomb walked the long hall to the dais. The audience responded with a round of cheers and clapping when the young man reached the council members. Jo felt faint.
Then the words Jo longed to hear rang out. “Johauna Menhir, from Specularum in the Estate of Marilenev. We bid you welcome to Penhaligon,” came Sir Graybow’s strong, gruff voice. For a moment Jo couldn’t move. Then she caught sight of the page hurrying toward her, and the motion spurred Jo forward. She stepped onto the velvet walkway.
As she walked the long aisle, Jo was too overwhelmed to even think of looking for Braddoc. To each side of the aisle, people sat in neat rows on the floor and peered expectantly up at her. She swallowed convulsively; Sir Graybow was speaking.
“—formerly to the Mighty Flinn, the order’s most renowned knight, who recently died in battle against the vile wyrm Verdilith. Johauna Menhir has accepted the position as squire to the Castellan of Penhaligon,” Sir Graybow was saying. Jo flushed at the proud tone in his voice. Her eyes were bright as she continued down the walkway. To each side of the aisle, people twisted and shifted to get a look at the young woman. Jo was almost halfway to the dais.
Sir Graybow continued, “Squire Menhir has also graciously agreed to become my ward—”
His words were cut off by a sudden screeching noise, as of metal twisting and groaning under pressure. Jo stopped and looked around, trying to locate the sound. The protesting metal screeched louder, a piercing wail echoing off the stone walls of the hall. Some in the audience rose to their feet in confusion; they began to murmur, their cries mixing with the grating noise. The screech came again, though this time more muted. Jo looked up.
There, four stories above her head, a huge, wrought-iron chandelier pitched precariously back and forth. Its magic sconces cast swirling, ghostly shadows across the ribbed vault, and a green-gray mist seemed to hover about the chandelier s iron mounting. Jo gasped, raising her arm up over her head, squinting at the brilliant, hypnotic lights. Suddenly, the chandelier began to flicker, as did all the other magical lanterns inside the great hall. Women and children screamed and cried out in panic, and the sounds masked the screeching of rending metal above Jo. In the next instant, the floor filled with running people, shouting, fleeing from the hovering doom.
It seemed like Verdilith s first attack on the great hall.
The lights flickered into blackness. Abruptly, someone slammed into Jo and flung her forward through the racing dark. As she hurtled heavily to the ground, panic swept over her, then crunching pain. Jo struggled to break loose of her assailant, tugging helplessly at the sheathed and tangled great sword harnessed to her.
With a rumble more felt than heard in the chaotic din and darkness, the chandelier s mounting tore free of the stone ceiling. A horrible and sudden silence in the crowd answered the rumble, and in that shocked hush, the gentle clink of iron chains filled the hall. Jo stiffened in fear, knowing the chandelier was directly overhead. Whoever had knocked her aside clutched her collar in tight fists and dragged her, rasping, across the mosaic floor.
Jos feet tangled with her assailant s, and the two of them fell heavily to the stone floor. With a deafening thunder, the iron chandelier crashed to the floor, its massive metal frame less than a sword s length from Jo. The lights flickered once, and Jo saw the grimly terrified look of Braddoc Briarblood holding her.
Then all was blackness.
The crowd panicked, running toward the entry doors, trampling any who
had remained sitting or had fallen to the ground. Children cried. Jo heard prayers being spoken, and curses as well.
Sir Graybow’s voice rang out stentorianly, “Stay calm! Stay calm and sit down! The lights have failed—that’s all! We are not under attack. Please remain calm; we will have light soon.” Several knights entered the hall carrying lanterns, which they began passing out to the other knights, squires, and pages.
“Braddoc! Braddoc!” Jo said shakily, sitting up next to the dwarf. “Are you all right?” she asked, her breaths coming in labored wheezes.
“I was about to ask the same of you,” the dwarf noted huskily.
“You made it to the ceremony,” Jo mumbled, and the moment the words had left her lips she realized how stupid they sounded.
“You have a gift: for understatement, Johauna,” Braddoc said, rising to his feet and coughing.
“Yes,” Jo said absently as she tried to dust the powdered stone from her clothing. Lantern light flickered by the pair, now and then casting strange and eerie shadows onto the hall’s walls. The audience was still confused, and pages and squires hurried about trying to calm frightened men and women and comfort crying children. Groping in the darkness, Jo’s shaking hand found Braddoc’s shoulder and she blurted, “How . . . how did you know? About the chandelier, I mean. How did you get here in time to save me?”
“A little gift of mine, you might say.” Braddoc held out his hand. The light was so dim that it took Jo a moment to make out the curved form of the blink-dog’s tail. “Or a little gift of yours, more truthfully.”
Jo took the bristly tail and ran her fingers over the beaded handle. “How—? Where—?” she began, unable to continue.
The dwarf shrugged. “I . . . stopped to pay my respects to Flinn. I thought I’d look around while I was there and see if I could find it. Dwarves can be notoriously tenacious when we want to be, you know.” He took the tail and flipped it over, then handed it back. “I’d thought some animal would have eaten it by now, but there must be enough magic left in it to make it distasteful.”
Jo looked at her friend. “How did you figure out how to use it? I taught Flinn the particular bark command to trigger the teleportation, but . .
Braddoc rubbed his elbow and said, “Oh, I heard you use it once or twice.” The dwarf smiled ruefully and shook his head. Then he sobered. He fixed Jo with his good eye. “I almost didn’t make it, Johauna. I couldn’t get the right tone. If I hadn’t—” The lines around his eye creased in worry.
Jo touched his hand and bit her lip.
A page ran up to Jo and Braddoc and asked, “Squire Menhir, you’re wanted up front by the castellan. Immediately. Do you need any help?”
“No, thank you,” Jo said automatically. She stood and Braddoc did the same. Together they began pressing forward through the crowd. The audience was beginning to settle now that more light had entered the hall. Most were sitting on the floor, huddling in small groups. The flush of fear had given way to curiosity, and the screams and moans had given way to muttered speculation.
Trumpeters blared the peal for silence once more. Jo and Braddoc hurried forward. Baroness Penhaligon stepped to the end of the dais and raised her hand.
“People of Penhaligon,” Arteris said loudly, “I pray you calm yourselves. Our mages inform me that the chandelier s mountings were slowly corroding in the ceiling. As it began to work its way loose, it broke the incantations that lit this hall.”
Jo and Braddoc reached the dais, and Sir Graybow gestured for them to join him. They did so with alacrity.
“The ceremony will commence immediately, for we are all too proud of the friends and family we admit this night into the Order of the Three Suns to cease the ceremony here,” Arteris continued. “Heaven help us if the pride of Penhaligon should be brought to its knees by faulty lamps! We’ll celebrate as we did in days of old!” The baroness’s uncharacteristically impassioned speech brought a ragged cheer from the crowd.
“The good castellan will check on getting us additional light, and so I am turning his part of the ceremony over to Madam Astwood. She will announce the remaining squires and introduce you to the new knights in our order.” The crowd, pleased that the ceremonies wouldn’t be canceled, answered with a heavy round of applause. Smiling tightly, Arteris finished, “I pray you enjoy yourselves, good people of Penhaligon. And I enjoin you to remain after the ceremony to partake of the fine wine and food the pages will dispense. I must take leave of you for a few minutes, but I shall return shortly. Madam Astwood, pray continue with the initiation.” Arteris bowed slightly and turned toward the knight, who strode forward as Arteris retreated.
Madam Astwood called out, “Thank you, Your Ladyship! We look forward to your return.” The woman gestured toward the people, “And now, people of Penhaligon, let us bid welcome to young Squire Aldney Blackbuck, late of the Rugalov village—”
Sir Graybow nodded, then began moving rapidly away. Jo and Braddoc fell into step behind him, and they met up with the baroness as she neared a small door at the side of the dais. Arteris strode through the door and rapidly down a short, dark hall that led to a stairwell. Jo was not surprised to see that torches lined the walls of the passageways and stretched away into the distance. So, the lanterns failed elsewhere, too, she thought, as she followed the castellan up the stairs. Behind her, Braddoc was grumbling beneath his breath.
As Jo hurried to match the baroness’s pace, she struggled to keep a smile of excitement from her lips. She was part of a special detail, the baroness’s own personal entourage. Jo wanted desperately to ask where they were going, but, seeing the determined step of the baroness, she reined in her tongue. They turned down a familiar hall. There, the baroness threw open the doors to the small council room and greeted the three men and one woman who arrived from the opposite hall. Once everyone had entered the chamber, the baroness peremptorily shut the doors—just short of slamming them—and whirled on those gathered.
“What is happening here?” Arteris demanded, glaring. “Why did the magic fail? Are we under siege?” Her agate- brown eyes flashed at the four mages, who glanced nervously at each other. Arteris strode forward and took her accustomed seat at the center of the U-shaped table. The mages moved to the side of the table and sat down slowly. Watching Graybow, Jo set her teeth and tried to look as calm and stern as he. Sir Graybow, glancing sidelong at Jo, positioned himself before Arteris, between the mages and his baroness.
“Well?” Arteris demanded. “All the lights in the castle falter and fade on a single day? In a single hour? How can this be?” The baroness focused her wrathful eyes on the oldest wizard. “Aranth? What is the meaning of this?”
The man named Aranth stood. He flicked a nervous look at his comrades before facing the baroness. Jo felt sudden distrust form in her heart. What is he hiding? What is he afraid of? she wondered.
“Your Ladyship—” the mage said formally.
“Dispense with the formalities, Aranth,” Arteris snapped once more. She crossed her arms, apparently unconcerned about wrinkling her lovely blue-and-silver gown.
“We—we believe Teryl Auroch may have somehow infiltrated the castle,” Aranth began.
The baroness’s eyes narrowed. “What proof have you of this suspicion?”
Aranth smiled wanly, clutching the collar of his robes for an uncomfortable moment. “No direct proof, My Lady. But we’ve noticed a general, magical malaise over the castle—some kind of subtle but powerful spell that’s affecting all the magic here. Its been weakening the light spells, the magic items, even new incantations.”
“Why wasn’t I told of this ‘malaise’ earlier?” Arteris demanded, her sharply trimmed nails beginning to rap impatiently on the table. “This is a matter of castle security—a grave weakening in our magical defenses.”
“I apologize personally for that, Your Ladyship,” Aranth replied, punctuating the statement with a shallow bow. “The effects of the spell have been slow, but cumulative. Though we now believe the
spell has been in effect for some weeks, its influence on our magic only became obvious this morning, and has since then grown acute.” “What—if I may be so bold—” interjected Graybow, thoughtfully stroking his chin, “does this ‘malaise’ have to do with Teryl Auroch?”
“He is the only mage we know of with enough power to cast such a spell,” replied Lady Irys, the female mage, as she rose to her feet. She was a slight, middle-aged woman of plain appearance. “We’ve discovered Auroch is a much more powerful wizard than we had been led to believe. And, he’s the only one with a clear motive to cast such a spell.”
“And that motive is . . . revenge?” Arteris inquired.
“No,” Aranth said simply, then thought to quickly add, “Your Ladyship. I fear it runs deeper than that. Teryl Auroch originally insinuated himself into this court—into your trust—for some evil purpose. We believe his purpose was left unaccomplished when he was driven out by Flinn. We believe the spell he has cast must be calculated to bring about his unfulfilled plans.”
“Dominion over Penhaligon,” Graybow whispered in awe to himself, though the words cut through the silent room.
“What?” Arteris snapped, rising to her feet.
Graybow, shaken from his musing, blinked twice and said, “It only makes sense. Auroch is a ruthless, power- hungry mage. If he cannot rule Penhaligon from within, he will do so from without.”
“This is all guess and conjecture,” Arteris noted, striking her palms firmly on the tabletop.
“Not all,” Jo responded quietly, her voice quavering. Graybow glanced toward her quizzically. His gaze was sharpened with irritation that she had not observed proper etiquette in addressing the baroness. Jo, unaware of her mentor s attention, took a weak step backward, bracing herself with a trembling hand against the table.
“Squire Menhir?” Graybow blurted in quiet alarm, reaching out a hand to steady her. “What is it?”
Jo, catching her breath, shook her head gently and murmured, “The mages are right. Auroch is behind it.”
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