Pilgrim

by Sara Douglass

  Magic? Enchantment?

  Certainly. But what enchantment?

  And why?

  Drago abruptly realised the cats were purring so loud the kitchen was vibrating very slightly with the strength of their rumbles, and he looked over to them. Again, as one, the twelve motley cats got to their feet and stalked, tails waving in the air, towards the door that led to the interior rooms and spaces of the Keep.

  Drago followed.

  They led him through the lower service corridors, past storerooms, servants’ quarters and unknown, unexplored chambers, up the stairs leading into the main living and reception areas of Sigholt, and finally into the Great Hall.

  A pace inside the door, Drago stopped, and then walked forward hesitantly. The cats had walked over to a far wall and sat down under one of the huge tapestries that lined its stone.

  Drago did not look at them. Instead, his eyes were fixed on the dais at the far end of chamber. This hall held no pleasant memories.

  Here, the SunSoar family had sat about the fire and laughed without him.

  Here, great Councils had been held. Without him.

  Here, receptions and galas and the magnificence of the SunSoar court had glittered, and all, all of it, every last single bloody bit, without him.

  And here Caelum and WolfStar had twisted and manipulated to do away with him once and for all. Here he had been falsely accused and then convicted of RiverStar’s murder.

  Drago’s feet slowed even further as he reached the centre of the hall. Caelum’s enchantment falsifying Drago’s memory of his sister’s death had been powerful beyond compare.

  “What a waste,” Drago said to the hall, listening to his words echo about its vastness. “What a waste of a wonderful man and an extraordinary power.”

  And even as he said it, Drago did not truly know if he referred to Caelum with those words…or to himself.

  His staff, almost forgotten, scraped against the stone flagging, and Drago jerked out of his reverie as it twisted in his hand. He looked about for the cats, saw them sitting patiently against the far wall, sighed and walked over. He stopped three paces away from the tapestry under which they had placed themselves, and stared.

  He knew it well. How many times had he stood where he was now and gazed into its magic for hours on end, hungering for the power it portrayed, and hungering for the woman it portrayed to turn her eyes, just slightly, and see him?

  And seeing him, laugh, and reach out to embrace him.

  The tapestry depicted Azhure at the height of her magical frenzy at Gorkenfort, slaughtering hundreds of thousands of Skraelings with her magical bow, the Alaunt streaming out of the wraiths’ nests and boltholes amid the rubble, driving the screaming and gibbering Skraelings before them.

  It was fully night-time, the moon casting a silvery glow upon the ethereal scene. Grey blocks of masonry piled into massive heaps of meaningless rubble. Moonwildflowers, drifting down from an unseen sky. Alaunt hounds, all spectral-pale save for their gaping, slavering scarlet mouths and golden eyes. Azhure atop her red Corolean stallion Venator, her raven hair flying and her face alive with magic, the Wolven singing destruction in her hands, and the quiver of unending arrows, all fletched in the blue of her eyes, strapped tight to her back.

  Gods! Drago could almost swear he could see her lean backwards to seize an arrow and put it to the Wolven, and then hear it scream as it flew through the night to plunge into one of the silvery orbs of a Skraeling.

  And yet now something was very, very different about this tapestry. It had lost its magic.

  It was only Drago’s memory that gave Azhure’s face its aura of enchantment. As he blinked and focused sharply on the tapestry, he saw that now the threads had worn and her face was…well…a trifle threadbare.

  The bodies and faces of the Alaunt, once so clearly depicted, were even more shabby, almost as if only a memory lingered, not their form. Now they were truly ghosts in this wall hanging. Loose ends of thread hung out in unsightly tatters, and Drago had to narrow his eyes and concentrate to make out the individual hounds. Even then, four or five of them had so lost their definition they had merged into one unsightly splotch, the backing canvas clearly showing through the worn embroidery.

  Everything in the tapestry had faded and unravelled, just as the Star Dance had been all but lost.

  Everything, save one thing.

  The Wolven glowed. Its warm ivory wood with its golden tracery, its scarlet and blue tassels, its silvered bowstring, all gave a sense of reality, of impatient reality, within the fading insignificance of the rest of the tapestry.

  Sigholt’s gift. The Wolven.

  As the Alaunt had come to Drago, so here sat the Wolven. Waiting.

  Drago tried to remember when he had last seen Azhure use the Wolven. It had been many, many years, and Azhure had probably handed it over to Caelum with the Sceptre when he’d ascended the Throne of the Stars. As Caelum had hidden the Sceptre with enchantment, so he had hidden the Wolven—in plain view of everyone, and yet more hidden than if he’d secreted it in the deepest dungeon.

  Drago still stared unblinking at the Wolven. Here it sat—trapped by enchantment.

  “So, Caelum,” he said, very slowly and very softly, “what was the enchantment you used? What must I do to retrieve this bow?”

  And Caelum did not answer. Drago knew he faced a test: release the Wolven, and retrieve yet another part of his lost Acharite magic. Drago felt that if he understood how to release the Wolven, he would break the thickest barrier to the full use of his ancient Acharite power…the Enemy’s power.

  Was Sigholt’s gift the Wolven? Or the ability to make full use of his power?

  Drago sank down to the floor, sitting cross-legged, chin in hand, his staff laid before him. Thinking.

  The cats, satisfied, curled up into tight balls, but they still kept their eyes on Drago.

  “I am no Enchanter,” Drago said, thinking it out aloud, “for the Demons have used up all my Icarii ability. And even had they not, there is no music of the Star Dance to manipulate with Song. But the Star Dance still exists, even if I cannot hear it.”

  Drago trailed off into silence. Power was still there for the using…StarDrifter’s opening of the door to Sanctuary was proof enough of that. It was the power of the land, which was the power of the craft which had drifted for millennia amongst the stars, absorbing the Star Dance.

  And Noah had bred it into the Acharites.

  StarDrifter had tapped into the power of the land by using dance as a form of pattern.

  “The Star Dance—or its power,” Drago said, speaking his thoughts out softly, “is contained in the land, a gift from the craft. And now this power rests in me…”

  So how to access it?

  Pattern. Pattern was the key. Song and music was nothing, but pattern. Dance was pattern. Drago took a deep breath and slowly rose, using the staff to help lift himself. He stood indecisively, leaning on the staff as if it, perhaps, held the answer. Could he use dance to form the pattern, the enchantment, needed to release the Wolven?

  But what was the enchantment that Caelum had used in the first instance? Drago would have to know that if he was to—

  He cursed, absolutely stunned, and stepped back a pace, dropping the staff at the same time. As he’d been wondering what enchantment Caelum had used, the staff had vibrated in his hand. It had not been an unpleasant sensation, but surprising in the extreme.

  Now Drago bent down and retrieved the staff. It still vibrated, and with a growing sense of excitement Drago realised that the pattern of fletched circles that ran about the staff was moving.

  Showing him…showing him a pattern. The pattern of the Song Caelum had originally used to hide the Wolven.

  The staff was acting in the same way that Drago suspected Zenith, and probably Axis and Caelum, had used their rings. How many times had he seen Zenith glance at her ring before she sang a Song of Enchantment? Did their diamonds alter the same way these circles now altered?


  Yes!

  It was a pattern, and knowing what it was, Drago found the reading of it easy. Translate the distance, both width and height between the fletched circles (notes!) into music—easy enough—and then the music into the steps of a dance.

  Done!

  But there was a problem.

  StarDrifter was an accomplished dancer—his Icarii grace would be enough to make him elegant even had he two broken legs and moth-eaten wings.

  But Drago had lost his Icarii grace and elegance, and as he now stumbled about in front of the tapestry—even the cats raising their heads to watch and grin—he knew that his skill on the dance floor would see him dead the instant he tried to outwit even the least of the Demons, let alone Qeteb.

  No, no, there had to be a different way, and Drago realised it would have something to so with his innate Acharite power.

  He stopped fumbling about with his feet, and stood again staring at the tapestry. Pattern…music was pattern…dance was pattern…and for different reasons both those were denied him.

  Unbidden a memory surfaced. Standing before the doorway that eventually led to Noah. The recessed rectangular section beside the door, filled with nine slightly raised knobs. His fingers dancing over the knobs, pressing each in turn. Forming a pattern.

  Symbols.

  The Maze Gate was surrounded with symbols!

  Song, dance, movement all formed patterns. As did symbols.

  Drago lifted his right hand, studying it. Idly, he flexed his fingers, and then, in some almost subconscious process he was barely aware of, he transferred the pattern of the dance into a series of numbers, and from there into a complicated symbol.

  “Do as I ask,” he said, his voice strangely powerful, and his fingers sketched the symbol with fluid grace before the tapestry.

  Instantly the Wolven glowed, then formed into solid wood from the silken threads that had trapped it, and it clattered to the floor. A moment afterwards the quiver full of arrows likewise dropped to the floor.

  The cats were now sitting, and as one, always as one, they looked from Drago to Wolven and back to Drago again.

  Their eyes were wide with wonder.

  Drago’s heart was hammering in his chest. “Show me,” he whispered, “the enchantment for creating a juicy mutton pie.”

  The staff again vibrated in his hand, and Drago noted the pattern the notes formed, translated them into music, then into the movement of dance, and from there into numbers and symbol.

  “Do as I ask,” he said, sketching the symbol in the air, and a juicy mutton pie formed a pace in front of the watching semi-circle of cats.

  Drago laughed, then spun about in sheer exuberance.

  He had power back!

  And his Acharite blood was truly in full ascendancy.

  He stilled and smiled gently at the cats. “Eat,” he said, waving at the pie, and the cats set to.

  50

  Sanctuary

  StarDrifter paced back and forth, back and forth. Where was Drago? He’d been gone hours.

  “We must go look for him!” he said, coming to a halt before WingRidge.

  WingRidge, annoyingly calm, shook his head.

  “Wait,” he said.

  Faraday smiled. She was sitting to one side, Katie asleep in her lap. “Wait,” she echoed, and StarDrifter bit down a tart reply and walked away a pace or two.

  Wait! Ah, bah!

  The Alaunt sat and lay about in no particular order, half-asleep, utterly unconcerned. Just behind them the lizard lay, lazily combing out his feathers with a talon.

  SpikeFeather had wandered off to chat to the bridge who was now happily engaged in relating the tale of how Rox had been foolish enough to step on her back. She’d told StarDrifter the same tale, and WingRidge; then Faraday and the girl, and now StarDrifter felt like shouting at her to shut up, for who needed it told an eighth time?

  But he bit back his tongue. If it made the bridge happy to repeat the story for the next thirty lifetimes, StarDrifter supposed she had a complete right to. No-one else had managed a single scratch on the Demons’ equanimity, let alone eat one whole.

  One of the Alaunt lifted his head, and stared at the bridge. StarDrifter spun about as Faraday tensed and Katie awoke.

  Drago was striding back across the bridge, smiling and greeting both the bridge and SpikeFeather. Over Drago’s left shoulder was slung the Wolven bow and quiver, and behind him trotted a dozen mangy cats in single file, all with their tails held up in complete feline self-satisfaction and superiority. StarDrifter’s face went slack in disbelief.

  “They are only cats, StarDrifter,” Drago said, his eyes dancing, as he stopped in front of his grandfather. “There is no need to look so surprised.”

  “What is this?” StarDrifter said. One hand fleetingly touched the Wolven, as if it might scorch him.

  “Evidence of Sigholt’s gift,” Drago said, and turned to help Faraday to her feet.

  “Evidence of Sigholt’s gift?” Faraday asked, her eyes searching his. Something had happened.

  “I will tell you and you, StarDrifter,” Drago said, “but not here. It is more than time Sanctuary released her secrets. Come, step back to the bridge.”

  He clicked his fingers, and whistled to the Alaunt, and they rose obediently and stepped onto the bridge. The feathered lizard yawned, blinked slowly at Drago, then did the same.

  Cats yowled and greeted both hounds and lizard with the deep affection usually reserved for the most generous and softhearted of kitchen hands, and wound about canine, reptilian and Icarii legs with equal friendliness.

  “Drago’s travelling menagerie,” StarDrifter muttered. “Please do not tell me you are going to add these courtyard cats to our retinue, Drago!”

  Drago looked between the cats and StarDrifter. “If they want to come, then who am I to stop them?” he asked, and then faced the end of the bridge that led into HoldHard Pass and raised his hand.

  “Connect this place to Spiredore,” he said to the bridge. “Do as I ask.”

  And as he spoke, his right hand wove through the air so fast, and with such fluidity, that StarDrifter could not follow it.

  “What…” he began, and then the road beyond the bridge shimmered and altered, forming into a close tunnel of blue mist.

  “Come,” Drago said, and led them into Spiredore.

  In two days Zenith had accomplished miracles, although she felt that her voice would soon give out from its constant use. She’d been forced to use everything from sweet charm to strident threat to get the Icarii in the Minaret Peaks ready to evacuate towards Fernbrake Lake. Even FreeFall’s support and backing was not always enough to convince the Icarii that they should once again prepare for exile from their beloved southern lands, even though to a place more wondrous than their previous exile.

  Isfrael had not helped.

  He’d been with FreeFall and EvenSong when Zenith had returned from Fernbrake with the stunning news of Sanctuary’s discovery, and the slightly less exciting news that no-one could yet reach it.

  “Ah,” he’d said, as Zenith had told her news, “Drago’s Sanctuary. Why am I not surprised to hear, that while it does exist, it can’t be approached?”

  Zenith had rounded on him, furious. “It will serve to save you and yours, as well as the Icarii and Acharite,” she’d snapped.

  “The Avar will move nowhere,” Isfrael had retorted, his tone very quiet. “The trees protect us.”

  “For now,” Zenith had said, and turned her back on him.

  Dubious, frightened, their cold and hunger the only reason to even consider exile, let alone attempt it, the Icarii had at last listened to Zenith’s and FreeFall’s arguments and threats.

  Now they stretched in long, murmuring lines that wound under the sheltering trees of Minstrelsea, rose up the slopes towards the crater that cradled Fernbrake Lake, and then spilled over the ridge and down to the edge of the Lake itself, the line stopping at the edge of the trees.

  And
so they stood, while Zenith, FreeFall, EvenSong and Isfrael waited in the domed chamber at the doors of Sanctuary.

  “He will return soon,” Zenith said. “StarDrifter was certain they could quickly locate Drago—”

  “Even if he did,” Isfrael said, his arms crossed over his bare chest, and his curls in angry disarray about his horns, “will Drago return with StarDrifter?

  “And…” he lifted one hand to wave it languidly at the silvery trace-work of the bridge spanning the chasm into Sanctuary, “will he have any idea of how to convince this bridge to let the Icarii past?”

  “You should have more faith in your brother,” a woman’s voice said behind them, and they turned to see Faraday walk down the stairs into the chamber. She was holding the hand of the small girl who walked with her.

  Behind her came StarDrifter and Drago, then WingRidge, SpikeFeather and, Zenith was astounded to note, the Alaunt hounds, together with the feathered lizard (which she could see was now much larger) and a line of cats. Zenith stood, transfixed, and then she laughed in sheer exuberance and stepped forward to embrace Faraday fiercely.

  “I have missed you,” she whispered, and Faraday murmured something back before Zenith extracted herself, smiled at the girl, and then stepped into Drago’s arms.

  “What have you brought us,” Zenith said as she leaned back. “The Alaunt. The Wolven! What? Have you divested mother of all her trappings?”

  “Both Alaunt and Wolven have their own minds and their own choices,” Drago said, “and for the moment it appears that they have chosen to walk with me.”

  “Along with half the cats of Tencendor,” StarDrifter muttered, but his eyes crinkled with amusement, and he smiled as Zenith stepped over to him. She hesitated, then leaned forward and gave him a stiff hug and peck on the cheek.

  The brightness in StarDrifter’s eyes faded, and Faraday frowned as she looked between the two of them.

  “The Icarii wait above,” FreeFall said, after he’d greeted Drago and his companions. “Drago? Will you…can you…?”

  Even with the accoutrements of power that Drago carried with him, FreeFall’s doubt was evident in his voice. Drago nodded, but he did not speak. He stared across the bridge into Sanctuary, transfixed by its beauty. Would anyone ever want to leave?