Cherryh, C J - Fortress 02- Fortress of Eagles (33 page)

If there was any answer from Emuin, the hills hid it from him, while to his backward glance the column had grown behind him, continuing to form inside the monastery walls like a balled string extending itself, and that unwinding was almost done now. They were well and truly on their way to Amefel.

The magic of the frost grew thinner as the sun climbed, as the frost left the eastern side of hills, then the west, persisted only in the shadows, and at last vanished altogether.

By noon the sun had brought a warmth to their backs, an easy warmth. Even toes in boots grew warm, and Petelly, who had shown an uncommon keenness to frolic this morning had settled down to the general pace.

Master Emuin, Tristen was vaguely aware, was decidedly awake now, had made not quite such an early start, and ached in his joints with the bouncing of the wagon. It was not a good beginning, this Cherryh, C J - Fortress 02- Fortress of Eagles trailing along the countryside for miles and days, and he was sorry to leave master Emuin further behind, but what more could he do?

he posed the peevish question.

He had no more answer than before, and at their noon rest, weary of worry, fretting in Emuin’s protracted and maddening silence, he had Dys brought up in the line and rode him for the rest of the afternoon, a lively contest of wills, since Dys had not worked in a month. Uwen had called up Cassam, his own heavy horse, at the same time, and the two horses being stablemates, and both needing to have a little room around them, they rode at times beside the column, at times ahead.

One could easily drowse on Petelly, rest one’s eyes with caution on Gery, but one never forgot the difference of being on Dys. The big hooves went down with a heavier sound, the motion was broader, softer, and more deliberate. Dys’ ears were constantly up, then flat, for Dysarys expected enemies. Yet Dys loved attention, too, and since most grooms were afraid of him, he got less of it than he liked…

Very like his master, Tristen thought.

But it was a good, level ride, the road presenting no particular difficulty for the wagons and no need to plan alternatives. The bridges on a king’s road would bear a loaded cart without worry, or failing that, offered fords with good firm approaches and no great depth. So he had nothing to do but contend with Dys’ humors and watch the grass blowing in the breeze. He was aware from time to time of master Emuin, eventually that Emuin had reached the monastery at long last and was safe, but full of aches from being Cherryh, C J - Fortress 02- Fortress of Eagles tossed about on the wagonseat and sore from a stint of riding. He was sorry for that. Master Emuin settled in for a belated noon meal, and then took a nap.

But as the hours passed he began to realize master Emuin had no intention of leaving the monastery. And when the sun went down in a bank of cloud and they were pressing into a murky twilight to reach their scheduled camp he was aware of master Emuin sitting by a warm fireside sipping ale.

—
Master Emuin
, he began. But had no answer, only the waft of master Emuin’s extreme vexation.

No more had he stood overlong on the tower stairs on those evenings when master Emuin would not open the door. On prior evenings he had simply set the basket down and gone back to his rooms, reckoning the old man had studies and reading to do of some great moment.

But now he was angry, and the end of a long day on the road had not improved his own spirits or set him in a more cheerful mood.

More, a wagon broke down, just as they were coming down the last fairly steep hill to the border. It was the farrier’s wagon, as it proved.

“All that iron,” Uwen said, and there was no way for men to lift it.

There would have to be a new axle made, the load all shifted off, then on again. It was within sight of their proposed camp, down where Assurnbrook wended along, intermittent with trees and wild meadow.

“They’ll have it by morning,” Captain Anwyll came riding up beside them to report. “They’ll shape an axle and may have it in Cherryh, C J - Fortress 02- Fortress of Eagles good order by daybreak. Otherwise, we can take the rest of the wagons on tomorrow.”

“Could be we’d ha’ broke ’er in the ford,” Uwen said in an attempt to put the best face on matters, “and have all the farrier’s iron to save. As well it broke now.”

“That’s so,” he said. “But I wish nothing else breaks before we get there.”

“Oh, have a care, m’lord, or we’ll all break down in the town gate.”

Tristen laughed in spite of his daylong mood. Then he imagined the gates of Henas’amef, as clearly as if he saw them before his eyes.

And he recalled the number of camps ahead and saw his company strung out from the monastery at Clusyn to Assurn Ford to Maudbrook in Amefel by tomorrow night, pieces everywhere, and it was not a cheerful prospect.

Meanwhile the surviving wagons squealed and groaned their way down to Assurn’s edge, and by last light the men were gathering firewood, while he stood on the side of that dark stream with a view of the brushy hills and old walls on the other side of the brook.

Both sides of Assurnbrook afforded a few moldering stone walls that travelers regularly used for windbreaks and shelter. On the Amefin shore was the greater part of the stonework, the ruin of a shrine, but despite the remaining daylight, they had not chosen to cross to that more extensive shelter, not with a wagon under repair higher up the hill. They chose to stay on the Guelessar side of the water, where travelers over decades had set up several well-maintained hearths out of the wind.

Cherryh, C J - Fortress 02- Fortress of Eagles The men stretched out a number of the common tents from the sides of the wagons for shelter; and before Tristen had realized what they intended, they had almost gotten down the pavilion for him, too.

“No,” he said to the soldiers, stopping all work, and went to Anwyll to protest any unpacking of the larger tents.

“Your Grace cannot camp in the field.”

“Do not the soldiers, sir?” He was vexed, seeing nothing but delays, nothing but encumbrances from hour to hour, and he walked away in impatience when Anwyll tried to argue with him. He found warmth by the nearest of the three common fires, and stood there waiting for his supper, whenever it might appear.

“Did I do wrong?” he asked Uwen, when Uwen came up to stand by him. “Is Anwyll angry with me?”

“No, m’lord,” Uwen said, who was likewise bound to sleep without a tent tonight, by his decision. “Fewest of these tents we let catch the morning damp, easier to pack. He ain’t that sorry.”

He said nothing.

“Ye’re glum,” Uwen observed after a moment more. “Are ye worrit, m’lord?”

“Anxious to be there,” he said, which had become the all-encompassing truth.

They had a modest supper, bread from the monastery, sausages to toast in the fire, cheese, and a moderate amount of ale, after which Anwyll seemed in far better humor and the men were tolerably Cherryh, C J - Fortress 02- Fortress of Eagles merry. The farrier’s wagon made it down the hill at last, to no little commotion and laughter. Tristen left the fire to see it in, wrapped in his cloak, in a dark outside the fires and the shelters. He sent the weary drivers and the farrier and his crew to a late and anticipated supper, and comforted himself that he had one straggled crew at last accounted for.

He lingered after, cherishing the quiet after the groaning wheels had passed him. It was a place and an hour for shadows, and with no particular dread he realized the presence of one that lurked forlornly near the light, and that feared his impatience. Curiosity had perhaps drawn it. Others prowled the other shore, unhappy shadows that flitted and tricked the eye among the ruins. He had all but heard shadows breathing above the noise of men drinking and telling tales. They might be shadows that belonged to Amefel… or to Guelessar. He had no idea. He found no harm in them, only a kind of company.

As for Emuin and the absent rest of their company, Emuin, it seemed, had gone to bed for the night, and attempted a fitful sleep, with no word to him.

—
Are you well, sir
?
he attempted to ask at last, mustering his last remnant of charity.

—
Here is no place, no safe place
, was all he had in reply, an impression of an old man’s worry… but more than that, more than that, he had a sudden clear sense that master Emuin was determined not to be in his company or in converse with him at all.

In the next moment he received a rebuff and felt a departing presence as strongly as if Emuin had slammed a door.

Cherryh, C J - Fortress 02- Fortress of Eagles It was maddening.

And it was not like Emuin.

—
Master Emuin
!
he called out to no avail, and he paced the shore, seeking to overcome his own angry misgivings that Emuin had not behaved reasonably, that if wagons broke down it was not, perhaps, accident, and that if he had better advice or earlier advice he might not be standing on the side of Assurnbrook blind to the night around him, with his adviser a full day behind and with a king’s herald letting loose rumor in Amefel.

—
What am I to do
?
he asked the unresponsive night.

The gray place ebbed away utterly, until he heard the running water and the sounds of the horses and the distant voices of men.

—
What am I to do, master Emuin? Answer me
!

Mauryl had used to scare him so. He found himself trembling only partly with the cold, and heard the approach of footsteps in the dark, along the pebbled shore.

“M’lord. M’lord, is ever’thing in order?”

“There’s no danger,” he said to Uwen’s inquiry, and as he said it knew he had just told a great lie, and that he had been telling it to himself all day. “Master Emuin will not be here in anything like good time. He has gone to bed. He will overtake us as he can.

Perhaps in Henas’amef.”

“Ah, well,” Uwen said with a sigh, “gods know what he loaded on them axles.”

That was so common a piece of sense he all but laughed despite his Cherryh, C J - Fortress 02- Fortress of Eagles temper, and his structure of reasoned disaster tumbled down. It was common, it was maddening, and it was very like the old man: he could well imagine Emuin had found last-moment items that must go onto the wagons, no matter what the advice of the drivers; and here they were, he and Emuin, Emuin’s wagons moving far too slowly, the utmost the oxen could pull, and he and Emuin were two fools arguing in the night with the world upheaved and tottering.

Emuin had drunk deep of the fine ale, eased his aches, and now he would become oblivious to him and his anxious questions, perhaps to feel a little less foolish and to be in a better humor in the morning.

“I wish we might go faster,” he said to Uwen, the two of them standing on the dark shore. “I wish we were on the other side tonight.”

“It’d ha’ been wet horses and a cold wind for camp tonight.”

That was another piece of common sense: with no enemy to deal with, it was folly to press this hard.

“It’s a notorious place, besides,” Uwen said, “and folk supposes there’s haunts.”

“There are,” he said. “There are, here. But none harmful that I can tell.” Last night he had wished to know that all the doors were secure. Tonight, in the open and the face of shadows, he feared none of them. He felt, rather,
safe
. They would not assail any man of his.

He was sure that this place was safe.

But he was equally sure that something…
something
wanted him on the other side.

“Wind’s cold,” Uwen said, a polite suggestion, he was sure, that he Cherryh, C J - Fortress 02- Fortress of Eagles come in out of the dark and sit by a warm fire where Uwen had far rather be.

Two days on the road had proved a determined sheep could amble faster than the heavy wagons could roll. And within any three days lately, it might rain. Or snow.

It was Amefel on the other side of that brook, and the delay of a night was too long.

He walked back to the fire with Uwen, he sat and drank with Uwen and Captain Anwyll, and listened to Anwyll say they were doing very well, very well indeed, considering the roads and the load on the axles. If they were lucky, none of the wagons would break down coming out of the ford. It was a good gravel bottom. The far bank was the question. So was the overcast sky tonight.

He lay under a canvas roof this night, listening to the water of Assurnbrook flowing nearby, and to the snap and crackle of the fire outside, thinking of the last time he had seen this particular camp, and with what hopes and fears he had ridden into Guelessar with Cefwyn, not knowing what Guelenfolk would think of his presence.

He knew now… and feared that he should have stayed in Amefel, although he supposed that without his sojourn in Guelessar he would never have seen the court, and without seeing the court and knowing the northern lords he would have found Cefwyn’s actions puzzling and unreasonable.

But he was coming back, now, like a stone rolling back to the hole it had shaped around itself, others’ intentions not withstanding. He fit, in Amefel, or at least he perceived he might do so, better than Cherryh, C J - Fortress 02- Fortress of Eagles anywhere else in his small experience.

And in his strong suspicion, when he moved with that sort of inevitability, that feeling of things settling firmly into a well-shaped place, then it was not chance moving them. He was returning to the place shaped for him. But he had barked his shins on Mauryl’s steps too often not to have learned some lesson, and the lesson he had learned from those steps was to look not always at what drew his eye without being aware of the ground on which he stood.

And that ground, in this case, was his nature as Mauryl’s Shaping…

or Summoning. There was a dreadful, a perilous difference…

Whether Mauryl had Shaped him of many elements or Summoned him entire, of one dead soul, at one moment, out of prior moments each with their bonds to a certain shape of things.

So to what small pit was necessity taking him? Was it Mauryl’s purpose that was still being satisfied? Or was something else being satisfied?