A green splash filled the air, and a rock near him exploded. Pulling his wife down, he ducked his head in the hairgrass momentarily while the shards flew. Leaping up, he jerked Etana away as her horse crashed to the ground, writhing in agony with red flames rushing down its spine. They whirled around to face the slope again and surged upward, Etana gasping for breath. Creating another thick shield, Rafen took the lead.
The ground was becoming steeper and more slippery. Rafen and Etana stumbled across a stony path that wound around a curving wall of rock. They pushed themselves on.
The whistling and screeching of Naztwai reached them from below.
“Come on,” Rafen said, prodding Etana forward.
“Wait,” Etana panted, clutching her side.
“Oh Zion,” Rafen said, “you didn’t fall, did you?”
“No.”
Without waiting for more, Rafen pulled her upward into the labyrinth of rock that the mountain was fast becoming. Black figures rushed upward from below, like a fast moving cloud. Rafen estimated their visible pursuers numbered a hundred. Yet they were still behind Rafen’s shield.
There’s still time, he told himself.
Etana staggered and barely missed pitching into a long, shadowed scree to their left. Rafen pulled her back with a gasp. A rock behind them splintered with the impact of kesmal. Etana stifled a cry, and they both ducked as they scuttled upward. Someone with thin, cold fingers seized Rafen’s shoulder and jerked him backward. He landed heavily on his back. When Etana whirled around to help him, Rafen shouted, “Run!”
He leapt up, only to be hit squarely in the chest with a burst of black. He reeled into a monolith, grazing his head. His chest pounded as he flicked up his glowing sword, absorbing his kesmal so that he remained conscious. Annette shoved a long knife to his throat before Etana shrieked and vanished behind another monolith up ahead in the clouded night. Her kesmal flashed and hit the rocky hides of several Naztwai, bounding upward toward the rocky pillar. Two fell, but the other continued undeterred.
“ETANA!” Rafen roared.
Annette laughed low in her throat.
Chapter Eleven
Adelphia’s Shack
“Is something the matter, Rafen?” she said sweetly. “I have waited for this moment so long. You have escaped me too many times before.”
Framed by night-black hair, Annette’s heart-shaped face bore many resemblances to her sister Etana’s. They had the same cheekbones, similar eyes (though Annette’s were hooded and pale green), and both were tall. Yet Annette had a more womanly figure than Etana, and she maximized it by wearing clothes Etana would have been ashamed of.
Rafen gritted his teeth. This woman was partially responsible for his mother’s death, after revealing to the Lashki the location of Fritz’s Hideout and the way to enter it.
“You don’t have any heart, do you?” he growled. “You would kill your own father.”
“I never said that,” Annette said in a dangerous voice. “But I will certainly kill you.”
“Fine,” Rafen said, spreading his arms as he leaned against the monolith, the knife at his throat. “Prove it.”
Annette smiled in a way that she probably hoped was menacing. Rafen caught hesitance in her eyes.
“The Lashki will reward you richly,” Rafen said. “After this, Nazt can take over everything… which I suppose is what you want.”
Annette twisted the dagger, increasing the pressure against his tender skin. Rafen seized her hand and jerked the knife away. The spell was broken. Annette threw her weight forward, the knife raised above his head. It was so much easier to kill in conflict.
Rafen transformed in an instant and considered tearing her throat open then and there. Yet he could still see King Robert’s face in his mind, filled with grief after the disappearance of his daughter three years back. Rafen couldn’t do it, and he hated himself. Mercy was a weakness he couldn’t afford.
He eluded her and flew up the rocky incline, his senses alert to every scent on the air tonight: that of the Naztwai, coyotes and sleeping moose, Ashurites and Annette, and even the scent of some Tarhians who had come a long way to do the Lashki’s bidding.
He couldn’t smell Etana.
He was at the monolith she had been hiding behind, and there was nothing to see except some sticky Naztwai blood, mingled with… with another’s.
He bolted higher, his paws now sinking into slushy snow that deepened in the cold air thickening around him. His tongue hung out of his open mouth, which was dry. He had lost Sherwin and Francisco, but this was too much. He found himself on his hands and knees in the wet snow.
“ETANA!” he bellowed across the cold waste.
Another smell tickled his nostrils; he scarcely cared. He rose and rushed upward past a couple of stunted spruces and firs, turning around numerous times to see anything he had missed. Six Naztwai and a philosopher were speeding up through the slush behind him.
Ahead, a misshapen shack stood lopsidedly on the almost vertical slope, peppered with faint sprinklings of snow. A silvery hue glittered around it, and within the shimmering confines, Sherwin and Francisco beckoned to him. A tall, slender woman with a glass scepter clutched Etana to her side. His wife was calling to him. The sound was switched off – he couldn’t hear her through Adelphia’s kesmal.
It would have been a sprint away if the ground wasn’t so steep and slippery. He hurled himself forward, and spirits flocked his vision, screaming at him. Nazt palpably exerted itself on his limbs, and he swayed, thrown off balance. A rock-like weight slammed into his back, and he flew forward again, landing face down, choking on snow. This was how he had lost part of his fifth finger on his left hand, he remembered. He struggled to roll over. The Naztwai dug distended claws into his back, and he felt warm blood wet his shirt. Flinging his sword behind him, he blasted the beast off with a strong torrent of kesmal.
Something cold touched his chin and the voices of Nazt intensified. They were heavier than the Naztwai; they made it impossible to think. He tried to see the Phoenix in his mind, tried to bring his sword arm around and imbue it with kesmal, because he was so much stronger now.
Pull back from the rod! his mind screamed. Kill him!
And yet… he didn’t want to. He remembered with horror how the Lashki had paralyzed his kesmal with cold in the throne room, the day of Sirius’ death. That had nearly been Rafen’s end. And now the ghoul was doing something similar again…
He managed to look up and saw the Lashki’s dripping mouth moving – leering. The copper rod vibrated as kesmal shot down its length. In his mind, he could already see the wave of Nazt rolling forward. He screamed at his helplessness.
Sherwin hurtled into view, seizing the copper rod and tearing it away from Rafen’s head as a blue beam burst from its end. The kesmal hit an approaching Naztwai. Sherwin seized Rafen’s hand and pulled him up. The Lashki swung the copper rod around, this time to point at his friend. Rafen gave a broken yell as kesmal hit Sherwin fully in the chest. Sherwin looked momentarily dazed while the Lashki stared. Then Sherwin shoved Rafen before him and started running back up the slope. That was when Rafen realized he had been surrounded. The other five Naztwai and the Ashurite moved as one, their eyes glinting in the phosphorescent moonlight. A blue beam sliced the air behind Rafen, who snagged it on his sword and drew it into his arm with a powerful muscular movement. The Lashki’s kesmal was so cold that Rafen couldn’t even discharge it again. A Naztwai lunged toward him. Rafen pointed his sword at it, trying desperately to release a flame. Realizing he was too frozen, his arm like ice, Rafen ran after Sherwin toward the shack. Sherwin gave him a tremendous clap on the back to urge him forward. The Ashurite seized Rafen’s neck, and Sherwin kicked him between the legs and shoved him backward. The Lashki had vanished, and Rafen’s sight was filled with the transparent ghoul-like face that his enemy had assumed. Sherwin was already within the shield again. Rafen’s foot struck a stone, but the shield was right before him, and he knew he wou
ld fall into it.
The Lashki dropped out of the air like a rain of decay and seized his collar, pulling him back, his black eyes smoldering with uncharacteristic rage. A hand shot out of the shield and grabbed Rafen’s ankle, tearing him free of the Lashki’s grasp and dragging him bodily into safety.
The Lashki’s blast of kesmal came too late. It buffeted the lower part of the shield with extravagant, though silent violence. Through the curved wall, he looked misty, pearly, as he turned away and swept down the slope, still with a perceptible limp from the time Rafen had bitten his leg. He motioned to the snowy incline around him, and more figures came out of the shadows and sludge: Naztwai, philosophers, and Tarhians. The crowd continued to gather, and Rafen stared at the patchwork of faces.
He turned to Adelphia, who still held Etana’s arm. Etana’s hair hung over her face, and one of her eyes was bruised. She shivered uncontrollably. Sherwin was hovering behind him, and Rafen gripped his arm and murmured, “Thank you.”
Sherwin shrugged.
“Etana,” Rafen said softly, and Adelphia handed her to him.
“The shield will only last about five days,” Etana whispered to him as he pulled her close. “We have to think of something.”
“Are you hurt?” Rafen asked, searching her arms and her torso with his hands. He discovered a gash along her right arm.
“It is nothing,” she said. “I was more worried about you.”
Rafen looked up to see Francisco staring at him intently. He supposed Etana had told him that she was married to Rafen, while he was having his seizure.
“Are you all right?” Rafen asked him.
“Oh, yes,” Francisco said. “We have lost our horses, that is all, comrade. And we are on a mountain with nowhere to go, surrounded by Naztwai.”
*
Adelphia’s shack consisted of one ramshackle living area and one long hallway, from which various rooms branched off. From the outside, the house looked as if it contained three rooms at the most. Once inside, Rafen saw the hallway led to any number of chambers. When one moved out of the living area, one could be forgiven for thinking one was in the New Isles palace.
Right now they populated the small front room in which rickety chairs and dilapidated, patched settees were scattered. The fire behind the rusted grating burned with an unnatural energy, probably fueled by Adelphia’s kesmal. A small and dented table stood to the right of the crudely hewn, bolted doorway. Two cheap wax candles dimly lit the room. Sherwin and Francisco had collapsed on the rickety chairs near the fire, and Rafen had moved a pile of battered books to make room for himself and Etana on a beaten old settee. He wondered why he was limping and then remembered that a Naztwai had bitten his leg earlier that night. While his shirt was bloodied from the ordeal on the mountainside, it looked worse than it actually was. Rafen supposed he had only been scratched.
“Both wounds will have to be cleaned,” Etana said. “They might get infected.”
“If you think so,” Rafen said, leaning back.
“I suppose we are finished,” Francisco said with mild resignation.
“No,” Adelphia laughed lightly.
She carried a cauldron of ice over to the hearth and fixed it above the fire.
“You can use hot water to clean any wounds,” she said. “The shield will last the Lashki’s and the other philosophers’ attacks for the best part of a week. During that time, we shall plan your exit.”
A shield lasting for the best part of a week was unheard of. Rafen could only guess this was Adelphia’s special talent.
“I must apologize,” Adelphia said. “I discovered Naztwai in the Mountains late yesterday afternoon and pursued them to find out where they were coming from. As a result, I missed the Festival of Zion – or the Festival of Richard, shall we call it? – and was not there to defend you, Rafen.” She closed her eyes briefly. “I think my influence would have done much to change the people’s opinion. The Lashki distracted me deliberately, it seems, for now it is too late. I cannot leave, or else my shield will collapse, leaving you all vulnerable.”
“How will we get out when the time comes?” Rafen asked.
“They will indeed surround us,” Adelphia said, “though Alakil knows as well as I do that there are often blizzards up here.”
“In the summer?” Francisco said.
“The Mountains are somewhat kesmalic,” Adelphia said. “They do what they wish.”
“What Grandmother is saying,” Etana said, gently rolling up Rafen’s trouser leg to make his wound easier to access, “is that she has more control over the weather here than she means to tell us.”
“Hush, child,” Adelphia said, staring into the flames with eyes that were both old and young. “Zion controls the weather.”
But she looked mildly pleased.
“Father told me Grandmother can control the weather within three leginis of herself when she is in the Mountains,” Etana whispered to Rafen while she worked. “I’ve often wished to see her do it.”
“A blizzard will make it difficult for them to form ranks,” Adelphia said. “That will give you a chance to break through the circle.”
“If we can find the breach,” Sherwin put in.
“Then you will make for the narrow pass into the mountain paths. The mountain paths are often only wide enough for one person abreast. It will make it immensely hard for them to pursue you.”
“I need a lord to help train me and provide me with some men,” Rafen said. He didn’t even dare mention bringing Fritz back right now. His insides were still churning at his recent failure on the mountainside.
How could Nazt be so strong? And how could he be so weak?
“Make for Parith,” Adelphia told him. “You will have to travel through the Mountains now, because the Lashki’s troops will definitely kill you if you attempt going down the mountainside. Also, Richard’s men will still be looking for you in the lower, more exposed areas, Rafen. In the next few days, I will outline the mountain paths you must take. Once you have escaped the Mountains, Parith will be directly before you. When you get there, request the help of Lord Cyril Earl. He will provide you with men in addition to those we hope Robert will provide.”
Rafen subsided, feeling exhausted. He knew after this happened that there would be some sort of battle, either with the Lashki or with Richard. He would never be able to rule Siana with Etana unless he fought for the right.
“Incidentally, Etana,” Adelphia said, stoking the fire, “I discovered today that something of immense value has gone missing, and I can’t help wondering if its disappearance is connected to the recent events. My husband’s phoenix feather—”
“Richard has stolen it,” Etana cut in. “He presented it as his own before the people today. Then the Lashki attacked, and I think he lost it.”
Adelphia remained with her back to them, but her shoulders rose with tension. “Your brother Robert is a thief,” she said. “He was here not a week ago.”
“Oh, Grandmother!” Etana cried. “He wouldn’t have. Not Robert.”
“I only allow family to roam this house freely. No one else has been here in months.”
“He wouldn’t know where to find it,” Etana argued, stirring restlessly beside Rafen. Rafen gently restrained her from getting up.
“Arlene would know,” Adelphia said.
“It’s ridiculous!” Etana exclaimed.
Adelphia rounded on her, her face hard. “Do you think this issue will split only the commoners? When people choose convention over Zion’s elected Runi – a prince over a peasant, a clean-blooded man over a human, the familiar over the unfamiliar – even our family will be divided.
“I know Arlene,” Adelphia said more softly. “She has always been one for convention, for having things correct. And Prince Robert follows her lead.”
Etana lay back against the settee, one hand pressed to her temple. Rafen wrapped an arm around her, digesting this. He, too, would never have thought it of the well-meaning Robert.
They sat like this for a few minutes while Adelphia added herbs and meat to the cauldron.
“You do understand, don’t you?” Etana said, one hand stroking Rafen’s face.
“Understand what?” he said.
“That once I am rested, I must go back. There is a passage…”
Rafen’s blood ran cold. He grabbed Etana’s hand so hard that she gave a little scream.
“You’re hurting me.”
“You’re not going back,” Rafen growled. “You’re not—”
“I have said that she must,” Adelphia said, “once she is rested.”
“She’s not going,” Rafen said through clenched teeth.
“Let go of me,” Etana said, and a faint sting traveled up Rafen’s arm as she broke away from him and leapt up from the settee.
He stared at Etana with hurt. She had never used kesmal against him before.
“Etana,” he whispered, “my mother… it can happen to anyone. It mustn’t happen to you.” He broke off and looked away, breathing heavily.
“She must go back to speak up for you,” Adelphia said.
“She could ’ave done it earlier, though, couldn’ she?” Sherwin said from his chair.
“You said it would be a terrible defense,” Rafen said sharply to Etana. “Why is your word going to make a difference now?”
She met Rafen’s gaze. “Earlier, we had no proof you weren’t in alliance with the Lashki. Now that your house has likely been destroyed and Naztwai are probably jumping on top of what is left of it, people may actually believe me.”
“The truth must be told, Rafen,” Adelphia said, facing him directly now. Her waist-length white hair shimmered in the firelight. “The people must be given a chance to respond. They will be gathered for the festival tomorrow and the day after. Etana will rest for the best part of a day and then she will journey back and tell them. There is an underground passageway that finishes outside the walls of New Isles. The entrance to it is a little outside the shield, but it won’t be amid their ranks. The risk will be relatively small. The passage is large enough for a horse, so she will be able to travel quickly. If Richard tries anything untoward, Etana’s father or brothers will help her. His Majesty Robert did well today, and Richard is not yet beyond his conscience’s recall.”
The Fourth Runi (The Fledgling Account Book 4) Page 12
